8 ms·

DontEat.at: Check into a NYC restaurant, get texted of health code violations

80 points by ssclafani 16y ago

maxstoller 16y ago
Wow, thanks for submitting my app. DontEat.at is my submission to the NYC BigApps competition (http://nycbigapps.com/ http://nycbigapps.com/). Let me know what you think.
- dotBen 16y ago
  It would be helpful to have a little more info about the app on your site. For example, it seems like it might only be for NYC restaurants given that it is an NYC BigApps submission and with 4Sq being so NY orientated. For example, will it notify be of a bad restaurant in Palo Alto?
  - spencerfry 16y ago
    I second this. Fill out the About section some more.
  - maxstoller 16y ago
    Good point. I didn't expect it to make HN. To answer your question: no, it does not work outside of NYC. It uses data provided by the city.
- matth 16y ago
  To my way of thinking, this is exactly the kind of stuff that makes mobile computing so exciting: Choice and control. Imagine when folks are able to be just as discerning when they are shopping for clothes (was this made in a sweat shop? is it american-made?) or grocery shopping (were these chickens treated humanly?). Good work man! The digital democracy is coming.
- ssclafani 16y ago
  You're welcome :) I found it via Cody Brown and thought it was interesting.
- Sephr 16y ago
  Do you plan on making an Android app that uses GPS? I don't use foursquare, nor do I intend on using it just for the functionality of DontEat.at. I'd prefer to just open up my DontEat.at app and it immediately informing me about the health code status of the restaurant I'm at/next to. Due to it not being limited to the limit of a text message, much more could also be explained in the analysis. Also, if you do make an app, it shouldn't require a foursquare account to use it.
  - maxstoller 16y ago
    I'm not sure. I'll have to see what the users demand. First step: bring the app to other cities.
- lowglow 16y ago
  I was wondering if you had an api or something I could use for my site http://www.onebigmenu.com http://www.onebigmenu.com I think it would be fantastic to get an idea of the health code violations for a place. :) drop me a line. (conrad.twizzle at gmail dot com)
  - jim_h 16y ago
    I happened be looking to NYC violations earlier at http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/html/rii/index.shtml http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/html/rii/index.shtml You could probably make use of it. It's NYC only. Your city probably has a similar site.
jason_slack 16y ago
very interesting concept for sure...How do you plan to distinguish from Yelp and people commenting on Facebook?
TwoTon 16y ago
This could be exactly the kind of spark 4square needs. You know, what scrabble was to facebook and "googling my name" was for google.
asnyder 16y ago
If possible, you should also raise flags for restaurants that have low scores in their initial inspection, but corrected it in the follow-up. You'll see lots of restaurants hit with a failing number of points, then they get the mandated follow-up visit the next week which they "clean" up their act and get an A (and all its privileges). I want to know if the restaurant I'm eating at is one of those so that I can make an informed decision and possibly avoid it. The grade postings only show the last grade, and not the last 5 or 10 point scores. You can also issue a warning for a serial offender, one that makes a habit of repeated high and low scores.
- maxstoller 16y ago
  Good points, thanks. According to the NYC health department, the followup visit is "roughly" within the next month after the failed inspection -- but my guess is that they fall behind often. This is truly a MVP but I will continue to develop it if there is enough demand.
  - asnyder 16y ago
    Indeed, according to the fact sheet (http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/rii/restaurant-grading-faq.pdf http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/rii/restaurant-gra...) Initial Inspection. Every restaurant is scheduled for an unannounced inspection at least once a year. A restaurant that scores 0 to 13 violation points on this inspection, called the “initial inspection,” receives an A grade. Re-inspection. A restaurant that does not receive an A on its initial inspection does not receive a grade until it receives a re-inspection. The re-inspection will occur at least a week after the initial inspection, giving the restaurant a chance to improve its sanitary conditions. At the end of the re-inspection the restaurant will receive a grade card. If the grade is an A, the card must be posted immediately. If the grade is a B or C, the restaurant will also receive a card that says “Grade Pending.” The restaurant has the choice of immediately posting either the grade card or the Grade Pending card until it has a chance to be heard at the Health Department’s Administrative Tribunal.
maxogden 16y ago
This is either highly coincidental or a rip off of "Don't eat that!", based in PDX: http://www.flickr.com/photos/aaronpk/5049962228/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/aaronpk/5049962228/
- maxstoller 16y ago
  Pure coincidence. I've never seen that app before and can't find it on Google. Can you link it to me?
  - TheAmazingIdiot 16y ago
    here: http://donteatit.heroku.com/ http://donteatit.heroku.com/ But dead link. It's the link in the seen picture at full rez.
- mahmud 16y ago
  off topic pet peeve: why do people take computer screenshots with a CAMERA? That's like typing an email, printing it out and slapping postage on it.
luckyland 16y ago
Seems like this would be very useful in a city that doesn't have an already corrupt restaurant inspection culture.
- ams6110 16y ago
  My thought was of Guido from the movie Risky Business: "never fuck with another man's livelihood."
rebeccaaazhou 16y ago
this is a great use of public data! more value add for checking in and using foursquare.
rebeccaaazhou 16y ago
this is a great use of public data! more value add for checking in and using foursquare.
martingordon 16y ago
Ignorance is bliss. I went through Philly's health code reports page and didn't eat out for a few weeks.
- jason_slack 16y ago
  have you ever been to San Jose....I literally get scared to eat out more than 2-3 places that I have eaten at for years.
rumpelstiltskin 16y ago
A bunch of us decide to go out to eat. We look up retaurants on yelp, menupages etc and pick a place to go. When we get there, we check into donteat.at and we get notified of a bunch of health code violations, at which point we decide to find a diff place to eat. Wouldn't the user experience be better served by allowing ppl to enter a restaurant name into donteat.at from anywhere (like from their desktop after reading about it on yelp) and getting the health code violations? Wouldn't this save a lot of time and hassle? Whats the point of getting notified after getting to the restaurant?
- bretthoerner 16y ago
  > Whats the point of getting notified after getting to the restaurant? I don't know about you, but I'm not adding another step to the list of things I have to remember to do (manually) when picking a place to go. Foursquare is one of those things that some people will always use when they arrive somewhere, and so for them it's a 0-extra-action way of saying "Careful." Now, I don't actually use Foursquare, but I get why this would be neat for someone who does.
  - coderdude 16y ago
    I'm with rumpelstiltskin on this. Being persuaded to not eat somewhere after getting there (maybe you made a reservation, even) and then having to make the decision to leave and find another restaurant is a total pain in the ass. Especially during, say, dinner time when the whole area is trying to eat as well. Maybe you went way out of your way to get to that restaurant. Maybe you told your date where you were going and she got all excited about it, now you're stuck eating there -- health code violations or not. That said, I think the idea of this service is totally cool. It just needs the ability to check before getting to a restaurant. That will complete the service IMO.
- maxstoller 16y ago
  I hear you. I'm working on it. :)
- prawn 16y ago
  If it were an add-on that popped-up in your browser when you were on a restaurant's Yelp/other page, or visiting the restaurant's site...? Lots of issues there though.
deleted 16y ago
[deleted]
ehosca 16y ago
thats nice .. how will you monetize it ?
mannkind 16y ago
The FourSquare integration is kinda neat, but it seems like the inspection data would be more useful before you go. In Seattle/King County you can look up that info on a website or use the iOS app 'Seattle Inspections' -- http://inspectapp.com/ http://inspectapp.com/
jpwagner 16y ago
someone bought a domain name before they knew what to do with it...
joe_the_user 16y ago
Hmm, I am not in the least the crusading defender of restaurant owners, but this thing seems kind of unfair. Should not a health violation that's bad enough mean the place has to be closed and anything else mean that the place is OK? If the health departments are "corrupt" and not shutting down places, why would we put credence in their inspections at all? The whole approach seems like an exercise in interpreting data in a fashion in which it wasn't meant to be interpreted. You could extract similar sorts of poor of quality markers from lawsuits filed against businesses or whatever. Am I missing something?
fedd 16y ago
- waiter! an omelette and a pair of kind words here please! gloomy unhappy waiter comes and puts the omelette on the table. - waiter! and where are the kind words? - okay. don't eat this omelette.
davidw 16y ago
Actually eating in .at isn't too bad, it's just not very good for you. Neighboring .it is healthier and has more variety:-)
gaius 16y ago
Clever, but really, you should have checked how it would look when posted on Facebook.
JoeAltmaier 16y ago
These guys will get their buts sued to oblivion. Is it libel? It will be, the minute they are out of date or have a data error. The place isn't closed, because the violations are not bad enough. If they Should be closed, then the health code is not strict enough. Is it right to panic people with alarmist reports? Are diners sophisticated enough to interpret those reports?
idigit 16y ago
Nice job, MaxS!

80 points by ssclafani 16y ago

Wow, thanks for submitting my app. DontEat.at is my submission to the NYC BigApps competition (http://nycbigapps.com/ http://nycbigapps.com/). Let me know what you think.

dotBen 16y ago
It would be helpful to have a little more info about the app on your site. For example, it seems like it might only be for NYC restaurants given that it is an NYC BigApps submission and with 4Sq being so NY orientated. For example, will it notify be of a bad restaurant in Palo Alto?
- spencerfry 16y ago
  I second this. Fill out the About section some more.
- maxstoller 16y ago
  Good point. I didn't expect it to make HN. To answer your question: no, it does not work outside of NYC. It uses data provided by the city.
matth 16y ago
To my way of thinking, this is exactly the kind of stuff that makes mobile computing so exciting: Choice and control. Imagine when folks are able to be just as discerning when they are shopping for clothes (was this made in a sweat shop? is it american-made?) or grocery shopping (were these chickens treated humanly?). Good work man! The digital democracy is coming.
ssclafani 16y ago
You're welcome :) I found it via Cody Brown and thought it was interesting.
Sephr 16y ago
Do you plan on making an Android app that uses GPS? I don't use foursquare, nor do I intend on using it just for the functionality of DontEat.at. I'd prefer to just open up my DontEat.at app and it immediately informing me about the health code status of the restaurant I'm at/next to. Due to it not being limited to the limit of a text message, much more could also be explained in the analysis. Also, if you do make an app, it shouldn't require a foursquare account to use it.
- maxstoller 16y ago
  I'm not sure. I'll have to see what the users demand. First step: bring the app to other cities.
lowglow 16y ago
I was wondering if you had an api or something I could use for my site http://www.onebigmenu.com http://www.onebigmenu.com I think it would be fantastic to get an idea of the health code violations for a place. :) drop me a line. (conrad.twizzle at gmail dot com)
- jim_h 16y ago
  I happened be looking to NYC violations earlier at http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/html/rii/index.shtml http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/html/rii/index.shtml You could probably make use of it. It's NYC only. Your city probably has a similar site.

jason_slack 16y ago

very interesting concept for sure...How do you plan to distinguish from Yelp and people commenting on Facebook?

TwoTon 16y ago

This could be exactly the kind of spark 4square needs. You know, what scrabble was to facebook and "googling my name" was for google.

asnyder 16y ago

If possible, you should also raise flags for restaurants that have low scores in their initial inspection, but corrected it in the follow-up. You'll see lots of restaurants hit with a failing number of points, then they get the mandated follow-up visit the next week which they "clean" up their act and get an A (and all its privileges). I want to know if the restaurant I'm eating at is one of those so that I can make an informed decision and possibly avoid it. The grade postings only show the last grade, and not the last 5 or 10 point scores. You can also issue a warning for a serial offender, one that makes a habit of repeated high and low scores.

maxstoller 16y ago
Good points, thanks. According to the NYC health department, the followup visit is "roughly" within the next month after the failed inspection -- but my guess is that they fall behind often. This is truly a MVP but I will continue to develop it if there is enough demand.
- asnyder 16y ago
  Indeed, according to the fact sheet (http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/rii/restaurant-grading-faq.pdf http://www.nyc.gov/html/doh/downloads/pdf/rii/restaurant-gra...) Initial Inspection. Every restaurant is scheduled for an unannounced inspection at least once a year. A restaurant that scores 0 to 13 violation points on this inspection, called the “initial inspection,” receives an A grade. Re-inspection. A restaurant that does not receive an A on its initial inspection does not receive a grade until it receives a re-inspection. The re-inspection will occur at least a week after the initial inspection, giving the restaurant a chance to improve its sanitary conditions. At the end of the re-inspection the restaurant will receive a grade card. If the grade is an A, the card must be posted immediately. If the grade is a B or C, the restaurant will also receive a card that says “Grade Pending.” The restaurant has the choice of immediately posting either the grade card or the Grade Pending card until it has a chance to be heard at the Health Department’s Administrative Tribunal.

maxogden 16y ago

This is either highly coincidental or a rip off of "Don't eat that!", based in PDX: http://www.flickr.com/photos/aaronpk/5049962228/ http://www.flickr.com/photos/aaronpk/5049962228/

maxstoller 16y ago
Pure coincidence. I've never seen that app before and can't find it on Google. Can you link it to me?
- TheAmazingIdiot 16y ago
  here: http://donteatit.heroku.com/ http://donteatit.heroku.com/ But dead link. It's the link in the seen picture at full rez.
mahmud 16y ago
off topic pet peeve: why do people take computer screenshots with a CAMERA? That's like typing an email, printing it out and slapping postage on it.

luckyland 16y ago

Seems like this would be very useful in a city that doesn't have an already corrupt restaurant inspection culture.

ams6110 16y ago
My thought was of Guido from the movie Risky Business: "never fuck with another man's livelihood."

rebeccaaazhou 16y ago

this is a great use of public data! more value add for checking in and using foursquare.

rebeccaaazhou 16y ago

this is a great use of public data! more value add for checking in and using foursquare.

martingordon 16y ago

Ignorance is bliss. I went through Philly's health code reports page and didn't eat out for a few weeks.

jason_slack 16y ago
have you ever been to San Jose....I literally get scared to eat out more than 2-3 places that I have eaten at for years.

rumpelstiltskin 16y ago

A bunch of us decide to go out to eat. We look up retaurants on yelp, menupages etc and pick a place to go. When we get there, we check into donteat.at and we get notified of a bunch of health code violations, at which point we decide to find a diff place to eat. Wouldn't the user experience be better served by allowing ppl to enter a restaurant name into donteat.at from anywhere (like from their desktop after reading about it on yelp) and getting the health code violations? Wouldn't this save a lot of time and hassle? Whats the point of getting notified after getting to the restaurant?

bretthoerner 16y ago
> Whats the point of getting notified after getting to the restaurant? I don't know about you, but I'm not adding another step to the list of things I have to remember to do (manually) when picking a place to go. Foursquare is one of those things that some people will always use when they arrive somewhere, and so for them it's a 0-extra-action way of saying "Careful." Now, I don't actually use Foursquare, but I get why this would be neat for someone who does.
- coderdude 16y ago
  I'm with rumpelstiltskin on this. Being persuaded to not eat somewhere after getting there (maybe you made a reservation, even) and then having to make the decision to leave and find another restaurant is a total pain in the ass. Especially during, say, dinner time when the whole area is trying to eat as well. Maybe you went way out of your way to get to that restaurant. Maybe you told your date where you were going and she got all excited about it, now you're stuck eating there -- health code violations or not. That said, I think the idea of this service is totally cool. It just needs the ability to check before getting to a restaurant. That will complete the service IMO.
maxstoller 16y ago
I hear you. I'm working on it. :)
prawn 16y ago
If it were an add-on that popped-up in your browser when you were on a restaurant's Yelp/other page, or visiting the restaurant's site...? Lots of issues there though.

deleted 16y ago

[deleted]

ehosca 16y ago

thats nice .. how will you monetize it ?

mannkind 16y ago

The FourSquare integration is kinda neat, but it seems like the inspection data would be more useful before you go. In Seattle/King County you can look up that info on a website or use the iOS app 'Seattle Inspections' -- http://inspectapp.com/ http://inspectapp.com/

jpwagner 16y ago

someone bought a domain name before they knew what to do with it...

joe_the_user 16y ago

Hmm, I am not in the least the crusading defender of restaurant owners, but this thing seems kind of unfair. Should not a health violation that's bad enough mean the place has to be closed and anything else mean that the place is OK? If the health departments are "corrupt" and not shutting down places, why would we put credence in their inspections at all? The whole approach seems like an exercise in interpreting data in a fashion in which it wasn't meant to be interpreted. You could extract similar sorts of poor of quality markers from lawsuits filed against businesses or whatever. Am I missing something?

fedd 16y ago

- waiter! an omelette and a pair of kind words here please! gloomy unhappy waiter comes and puts the omelette on the table. - waiter! and where are the kind words? - okay. don't eat this omelette.

davidw 16y ago

Actually eating in .at isn't too bad, it's just not very good for you. Neighboring .it is healthier and has more variety:-)

gaius 16y ago

Clever, but really, you should have checked how it would look when posted on Facebook.

JoeAltmaier 16y ago

These guys will get their buts sued to oblivion. Is it libel? It will be, the minute they are out of date or have a data error. The place isn't closed, because the violations are not bad enough. If they Should be closed, then the health code is not strict enough. Is it right to panic people with alarmist reports? Are diners sophisticated enough to interpret those reports?

idigit 16y ago

Nice job, MaxS!