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> Personally, I don't think Google should be obliged to promote all kind of crappy 2nd rate products out there 1. So you believe anticompetitive practices are

> Personally, I don't think Google should be obliged to promote all kind of crappy 2nd rate products out there 1. So you believe anticompetitive practices are okay when you "personally" don't like the competing product. 2. It is not promoting Yelp when it is the organic search algorithm. The point is that they are demoting Yelp in favor of their own evidently inferior product, as their own algorithm would have otherwise ranked their own product lower in the organic setting. > I hate Yelp. They are greedy bastards who have cornered up huge content entirely contributed by volunteers. No bias here at all... How is this much different from the endless other free-to-use websites out there? > Yelp reviews and ratings should be free and in open domain by vary nature of how it was created So Yelp shouldn't try to build a brand. They should just host all the content and give it away.

telltruth 8y ago
In a fair world, there would be an option in Google for "Show me reviews from X" where users are forced to select X (i.e. no defaults provided). The problem is that Yelp is the one who wants to be monopoly and they would never agreed to this. They don't want Google Maps to show any reviews at all. Instead they insist that people must take an additional step to go to Yelp's own website for reviews. This is unworkable. Reviews and ratings decide the ranking in maps query. I as a customer should have an integrated experience in maps instead of having thrown 10 random results for each of which I have to go to Yelp website to figure things out. Lot of search results in maps are driven from review text, for example, names of dishes. The ratings and reviews are integral part of a map product. Yelp doesn't care about how much users would suffer as long as they can get their eyeballs. Google shouldn't be forced to work with these kind of people. Yes, I do strongly believe that any website that harvests volunteers to gather the publicly accessible data must give away that data for free. I can never agree to the business model that a company has sole propitiatory right to that data by duppig millions of people in to labor who didn't cared to read legal T&C stating that all this is going to be behind the wall so CEO can get his billion dollar exit to buy private island while stagnating the company.
- hueving 8y ago
  >The ratings and reviews are integral part of a map product. No they are not. I and many others I know just use the "map product" for directions to get to places. Google maps was useful long before the integration of the cesspool of crowd-sourced reviews. You might want a map of top 10 whatever voted by the democratic people of Gmaps/Yelp busy-bodies but there is no reason that needs to be in the core. Google maps has an API that lets you plot things on it. Yelp can plot things on it. Leave maps to be maps and keep the clutter of opinion diarrhea out of there.
  - jryle70 8y ago
    If you search for places to eat at 10pm, wouldn't you also want to know if they are still open, what kind of food they offer, how people rate them? Google Maps is such a dominant service that a competing company like Yelp will be at a huge disadvantage. No wonder Yelp complains. But you can't say what Google does doesn't make sense.
    - jasonlotito 8y ago
      > If you search for places to eat at 10pm... All the times I've searched for places to eat at 10pm or later, no. I just wanted to find the place.
    - mmt 8y ago
      >wouldn't you also want to know if they are still open, Yes, but my experience is that, especially for the case of later (or earlier) than peak business hours for an area, I can't trust a second- or third-hand source like a mapping service for this kind of information. Even if it weren't for the GIGO problem, I still have the UI problem in that there's only an "open now" boolean filter, which is horrible if I'm searching at 9:48 for places open after 10. >what kind of food they offer, Sometimes, but there's often at least a hint in the name of the restaurant. Often, though, the later it is, the less importance the kind of food holds. >how people rate them? Honestly, not even a little, since, by this point, it's a "beggars can't be choosers" situation. Plus, even if I had the inclination to dig into the reviews, I wouldn't care what people thought of, for example, the service during the dinner rush.

telltruth 8y ago

In a fair world, there would be an option in Google for "Show me reviews from X" where users are forced to select X (i.e. no defaults provided). The problem is that Yelp is the one who wants to be monopoly and they would never agreed to this. They don't want Google Maps to show any reviews at all. Instead they insist that people must take an additional step to go to Yelp's own website for reviews. This is unworkable. Reviews and ratings decide the ranking in maps query. I as a customer should have an integrated experience in maps instead of having thrown 10 random results for each of which I have to go to Yelp website to figure things out. Lot of search results in maps are driven from review text, for example, names of dishes. The ratings and reviews are integral part of a map product. Yelp doesn't care about how much users would suffer as long as they can get their eyeballs. Google shouldn't be forced to work with these kind of people. Yes, I do strongly believe that any website that harvests volunteers to gather the publicly accessible data must give away that data for free. I can never agree to the business model that a company has sole propitiatory right to that data by duppig millions of people in to labor who didn't cared to read legal T&C stating that all this is going to be behind the wall so CEO can get his billion dollar exit to buy private island while stagnating the company.

hueving 8y ago
>The ratings and reviews are integral part of a map product. No they are not. I and many others I know just use the "map product" for directions to get to places. Google maps was useful long before the integration of the cesspool of crowd-sourced reviews. You might want a map of top 10 whatever voted by the democratic people of Gmaps/Yelp busy-bodies but there is no reason that needs to be in the core. Google maps has an API that lets you plot things on it. Yelp can plot things on it. Leave maps to be maps and keep the clutter of opinion diarrhea out of there.
- jryle70 8y ago
  If you search for places to eat at 10pm, wouldn't you also want to know if they are still open, what kind of food they offer, how people rate them? Google Maps is such a dominant service that a competing company like Yelp will be at a huge disadvantage. No wonder Yelp complains. But you can't say what Google does doesn't make sense.
  - jasonlotito 8y ago
    > If you search for places to eat at 10pm... All the times I've searched for places to eat at 10pm or later, no. I just wanted to find the place.
  - mmt 8y ago
    >wouldn't you also want to know if they are still open, Yes, but my experience is that, especially for the case of later (or earlier) than peak business hours for an area, I can't trust a second- or third-hand source like a mapping service for this kind of information. Even if it weren't for the GIGO problem, I still have the UI problem in that there's only an "open now" boolean filter, which is horrible if I'm searching at 9:48 for places open after 10. >what kind of food they offer, Sometimes, but there's often at least a hint in the name of the restaurant. Often, though, the later it is, the less importance the kind of food holds. >how people rate them? Honestly, not even a little, since, by this point, it's a "beggars can't be choosers" situation. Plus, even if I had the inclination to dig into the reviews, I wouldn't care what people thought of, for example, the service during the dinner rush.