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AFAIK, Yelp has not and does not remove negative reviews for the sake of improving a business's score, but they will remove "spam" reviews (like if a celebrity

by itake 4y ago

AFAIK, Yelp has not and does not remove negative reviews for the sake of improving a business's score, but they will remove "spam" reviews (like if a celebrity dies at a hospital and their fans leave bad reviews). There certainly have been minor incidents where certain employees have behaved against policy. Unlike Airbnb, if users lose trust in their reviews, Yelp loses their entire business. source: I am ex-yelper.

mayankkaizen 4y ago
I've read 100s of comments from variety of sources over the years that Yelp is in the business of extortion. It extort money from restaurants by threatening to remove positive reviews and other such tactics. Yelp is worse than AirBNB.
- itake 4y ago
  Those sources seem like hiersay. A recent story I heard was by Loius Rossmann [0] claimed that he found the family member of a Yelp sales rep left a bad review after he turned down a yelp offer. That just doesn't make sense to me? Like Yelp is telling their sells reps to ask their family to give bad reviews for businesses that don't buy ads? There might be an argument for Yelp to adjust incentivizes for their sales people to discourage that behavior, but AFAIK they are acting on their own and not because Yelp said to do that. [0] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQAAauJlPq0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQAAauJlPq0
raincom 4y ago
Here is an example: One Yelp employee had his friend write a negative review for the business that said 'no' to Yelp extortion/tax. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQAAauJlPq0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQAAauJlPq0
- itake 4y ago
  Yeah, this is a perfect example of why Yelp is not instigating this. Do you really think Yelp is asking their employees leverage their friend's network to leave negative reviews or do you think this sales guy is at risk of losing his job for not converting enough and so he on his own asks a friend to help him keep his job? If Yelp wanted to extort businesses, they wouldn't need employees to ask their friends. They could just adjust the search ranking to down rank businesses that don't want to pay. This video doesn't pass the smell test.
raincom 4y ago
https://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2014/09/ninth-circuit-says-yelp-doesnt-extort-businesses-levitt-v-yelp-forbes-cross-post.htm https://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2014/09/ninth-circuit-... Even though whatever Yelp does is not illegal, it engages in unethical practices: "[R]emoving positive reviews wasn’t extortion because Yelp didn’t have to publish those reviews at all. Third, publishing or showcasing negative reviews wasn’t extortion because Yelp has the legal right “to post and sequence the reviews.” Finally, the plaintiffs claimed Yelp wrote bogus reviews to punish non-advertisers, but the plaintiffs didn’t provide adequate evidence that Yelp wrote those negative reviews instead of someone else. For example, even if a business couldn’t find records matching the reviewer’s details, that doesn’t mean Yelp falsified that review (compare the Yelp v. Hadeed case, which in a different legal context gave more benefit of the doubt to an aggrieved business with similar claims)."

by itake 4y ago

mayankkaizen 4y ago

I've read 100s of comments from variety of sources over the years that Yelp is in the business of extortion. It extort money from restaurants by threatening to remove positive reviews and other such tactics. Yelp is worse than AirBNB.

itake 4y ago
Those sources seem like hiersay. A recent story I heard was by Loius Rossmann [0] claimed that he found the family member of a Yelp sales rep left a bad review after he turned down a yelp offer. That just doesn't make sense to me? Like Yelp is telling their sells reps to ask their family to give bad reviews for businesses that don't buy ads? There might be an argument for Yelp to adjust incentivizes for their sales people to discourage that behavior, but AFAIK they are acting on their own and not because Yelp said to do that. [0] - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQAAauJlPq0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQAAauJlPq0

raincom 4y ago

Here is an example: One Yelp employee had his friend write a negative review for the business that said 'no' to Yelp extortion/tax. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQAAauJlPq0 https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gQAAauJlPq0

itake 4y ago
Yeah, this is a perfect example of why Yelp is not instigating this. Do you really think Yelp is asking their employees leverage their friend's network to leave negative reviews or do you think this sales guy is at risk of losing his job for not converting enough and so he on his own asks a friend to help him keep his job? If Yelp wanted to extort businesses, they wouldn't need employees to ask their friends. They could just adjust the search ranking to down rank businesses that don't want to pay. This video doesn't pass the smell test.

raincom 4y ago

https://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2014/09/ninth-circuit-says-yelp-doesnt-extort-businesses-levitt-v-yelp-forbes-cross-post.htm https://blog.ericgoldman.org/archives/2014/09/ninth-circuit-... Even though whatever Yelp does is not illegal, it engages in unethical practices: "[R]emoving positive reviews wasn’t extortion because Yelp didn’t have to publish those reviews at all. Third, publishing or showcasing negative reviews wasn’t extortion because Yelp has the legal right “to post and sequence the reviews.” Finally, the plaintiffs claimed Yelp wrote bogus reviews to punish non-advertisers, but the plaintiffs didn’t provide adequate evidence that Yelp wrote those negative reviews instead of someone else. For example, even if a business couldn’t find records matching the reviewer’s details, that doesn’t mean Yelp falsified that review (compare the Yelp v. Hadeed case, which in a different legal context gave more benefit of the doubt to an aggrieved business with similar claims)."