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Yelp.com Stands Accused of Acting Like a "Modern-Day Mafia"

34 points by vaksel 17y ago

rmorrison 17y ago
The company, which has yet to turn a profit despite astounding popularity Really? How is this possible?
- AlexBlom 17y ago
  It's a tech startup silly. Are you suggesting these companies focus on making money?????? What the hell are you smoking!!! *sarcasm
- sliverstorm 17y ago
  They obviously haven't figured out how to effectively monetize the site, which IMHO makes accusations that they are trying to get companies to 'subscribe' all the more plausible.
nfnaaron 17y ago
Every business has good and bad interactions with customers. For most businesses the bad ones are unfortunate but isolated cases. For those where it's a pattern, they'll eventually lose enough business that they'll change or die. What yelp has done is to artificially magnify the effect of an individual complaint. Most people don't bother to write publicly one way or the other, and (I think) people with a negative experience are more likely to complain publicly. The effect of yelp is "world changing" in some sense; they make it easier for perfectly good businesses to go out of business. Not really what I'd want my life's work to be, but to each his own, I guess.
- bkbleikamp 17y ago
  Yelp's data would seem to indicate that users with a positive experience are more likely to write a review: http://www.yelp.com/press http://www.yelp.com/press
  - AlexBlom 17y ago
    I wonder if those figures are massaged, considering everything else going on!
    - bkbleikamp 17y ago
      That graph has been on the page since before any class action lawsuits were filed.
      - AlexBlom 17y ago
        But that does not necessarily mean it is legit. Until the class action did we not think Yelp was totally legit?
    - deleted 17y ago
      [deleted]
    - moultano 17y ago
      Amazon has observed exactly the same behavior. The average review for something on the internet is 4.5 stars.
      - mahmud 17y ago
        What about astroturfing by product vendors?
  - diego_moita 17y ago
    I am not sure what you mean by that. To me it seems something like: "well, most of the time, lynch mobs do catch the bad guys."
- emmett 17y ago
  Yelp can also put bad businesses out of business, and does. And it can make an already good business a success, which it also does. What evidence is there that they change the world net negative, rather than net positive? My experience with Yelp has been great: it has encouraged me to explore much more widely which restaurants I attend.
  - potatolicious 17y ago
    Even if Yelp is still a net positive on the world at large, it in no way justifies extortionist behavior like the ones alleged. Your argument sounds like "but he's such a great guy, so what if he murders a few people now and again?"
  - nfnaaron 17y ago
    The point of the complaints, and the lawsuit, is that you as a consumer are not receiving a fair picture of reviews. The allegation is that businesses that don't pay lose positive reviews and gain negatives, by yelp's manipulation. If the allegations are true, then what yelp may have helped you do is frequent businesses that knuckled under and paid the extortion.
- invisible 17y ago
  It's difficult to justify that perfectly good businesses can go out of business over Yelp (at least outside of huge cities). I haven't ever typed "yelp" into my browser (or found it through google search) and yet I'm a technology-oriented guy. Maybe it's where I live? Whatever it is, I think word-of-mouth is not a case for suing unless it is artificially created. I don't know how many salespeople at Yelp carried the "extortion" sales pitch, but if it was more than a few individuals I think they do have grounds to sue. Comparing this to "mafia" is ridiculous though and truly shouldn't be publicized by any news outlet.
- deleted 17y ago
  [deleted]
derwiki 17y ago
I see more "People Love us on Yelp" stickers in a 10 minute walk around SoMa than the 10 people who have joined this lawsuit. What's browardpalmbeach.com anyway? This article is just an echo of the hundreds of other articles from more reputable sources about this topic.
- hugh3 17y ago
  This one has allegations I haven't seen before. I've heard that yelp offers to rearrange reviews or remove one or two bad ones if you buy advertising, which sounds a little dodgy. I've never heard of it threatening to remove good reviews if you don't buy advertising. I'm more skeptical of that one.
iamdave 17y ago
And I'm supposed to let Facebook connect my profile to this site with it's OpenGraph?
rhettinger 17y ago
Unlike many lawsuits, this one is a testable hypothesis. It is knowable whether favorable reviews disappeared, whether an algorithm or person triggered the disappearance, and whether this occurred after a sales-rep made contact. The phone logs, syslogs, and code repositories should reveal the truth in this case.

34 points by vaksel 17y ago

rmorrison 17y ago

The company, which has yet to turn a profit despite astounding popularity Really? How is this possible?

AlexBlom 17y ago
It's a tech startup silly. Are you suggesting these companies focus on making money?????? What the hell are you smoking!!! *sarcasm
sliverstorm 17y ago
They obviously haven't figured out how to effectively monetize the site, which IMHO makes accusations that they are trying to get companies to 'subscribe' all the more plausible.

nfnaaron 17y ago

Every business has good and bad interactions with customers. For most businesses the bad ones are unfortunate but isolated cases. For those where it's a pattern, they'll eventually lose enough business that they'll change or die. What yelp has done is to artificially magnify the effect of an individual complaint. Most people don't bother to write publicly one way or the other, and (I think) people with a negative experience are more likely to complain publicly. The effect of yelp is "world changing" in some sense; they make it easier for perfectly good businesses to go out of business. Not really what I'd want my life's work to be, but to each his own, I guess.

bkbleikamp 17y ago
Yelp's data would seem to indicate that users with a positive experience are more likely to write a review: http://www.yelp.com/press http://www.yelp.com/press
- AlexBlom 17y ago
  I wonder if those figures are massaged, considering everything else going on!
  - bkbleikamp 17y ago
    That graph has been on the page since before any class action lawsuits were filed.
    - AlexBlom 17y ago
      But that does not necessarily mean it is legit. Until the class action did we not think Yelp was totally legit?
  - deleted 17y ago
    [deleted]
  - moultano 17y ago
    Amazon has observed exactly the same behavior. The average review for something on the internet is 4.5 stars.
    - mahmud 17y ago
      What about astroturfing by product vendors?
- diego_moita 17y ago
  I am not sure what you mean by that. To me it seems something like: "well, most of the time, lynch mobs do catch the bad guys."
emmett 17y ago
Yelp can also put bad businesses out of business, and does. And it can make an already good business a success, which it also does. What evidence is there that they change the world net negative, rather than net positive? My experience with Yelp has been great: it has encouraged me to explore much more widely which restaurants I attend.
- potatolicious 17y ago
  Even if Yelp is still a net positive on the world at large, it in no way justifies extortionist behavior like the ones alleged. Your argument sounds like "but he's such a great guy, so what if he murders a few people now and again?"
- nfnaaron 17y ago
  The point of the complaints, and the lawsuit, is that you as a consumer are not receiving a fair picture of reviews. The allegation is that businesses that don't pay lose positive reviews and gain negatives, by yelp's manipulation. If the allegations are true, then what yelp may have helped you do is frequent businesses that knuckled under and paid the extortion.
invisible 17y ago
It's difficult to justify that perfectly good businesses can go out of business over Yelp (at least outside of huge cities). I haven't ever typed "yelp" into my browser (or found it through google search) and yet I'm a technology-oriented guy. Maybe it's where I live? Whatever it is, I think word-of-mouth is not a case for suing unless it is artificially created. I don't know how many salespeople at Yelp carried the "extortion" sales pitch, but if it was more than a few individuals I think they do have grounds to sue. Comparing this to "mafia" is ridiculous though and truly shouldn't be publicized by any news outlet.
deleted 17y ago
[deleted]

derwiki 17y ago

I see more "People Love us on Yelp" stickers in a 10 minute walk around SoMa than the 10 people who have joined this lawsuit. What's browardpalmbeach.com anyway? This article is just an echo of the hundreds of other articles from more reputable sources about this topic.

hugh3 17y ago
This one has allegations I haven't seen before. I've heard that yelp offers to rearrange reviews or remove one or two bad ones if you buy advertising, which sounds a little dodgy. I've never heard of it threatening to remove good reviews if you don't buy advertising. I'm more skeptical of that one.

iamdave 17y ago

And I'm supposed to let Facebook connect my profile to this site with it's OpenGraph?

rhettinger 17y ago

Unlike many lawsuits, this one is a testable hypothesis. It is knowable whether favorable reviews disappeared, whether an algorithm or person triggered the disappearance, and whether this occurred after a sales-rep made contact. The phone logs, syslogs, and code repositories should reveal the truth in this case.