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He's didn't argue it wasn't within their rights. He called them "quite rude", which seems hard to deny. No matter the rate Yelp set, the apps economics no long

He's didn't argue it wasn't within their rights. He called them "quite rude", which seems hard to deny. No matter the rate Yelp set, the apps economics no longer make sense. The existing customers, already paid, and he has no way to transition them to a subscription.

kevin_thibedeau 2y ago
No problem. He can just dust off his business contract with Yelp and have the courts set them straight. No contract? Then why would one expect the world to cater to their whim. Yelp promised nothing and he got exactly what they promised.
- ordu 2y ago
  [flagged]
- greycol 2y ago
  He hasn't promised not to scrape their site using even more of their resources... Used to be that, coupled with competition with competing services, was the main reason sites offered APIs.
- joshuaissac 2y ago
  > Yelp promised nothing According to the article, Yelp promised him 25,000 API calls per day: > In fact, without me specifically asking for it, they provided a 25,000 per day API call limit
  - kevin_thibedeau 2y ago
    They altered the deal as was most certainly declared their prerogative in the original agreement.
vzaliva 2y ago
He mentions 100 API calls per day. If Yelp offered him a rate of a fraction of a cent per call, it might be a negligible expense that could be offset by past or future sales. If the app has outlived its lifecycle, the end of the free API might be a signal to retire it. Blaming Yelp and making a drama out of it seems a bit much. Suppose they had given him 30 days instead of 4; would his decision really be any different?
- kelnos 2y ago
  > Suppose they had given him 30 days instead of 4; would his decision really be any different? Possibly not, but the point of OP's complaint is that Yelp was rude, handled it poorly, and gave him an unreasonably short deadline. No one is arguing that Yelp doesn't have the right to discontinue free API access, or that OP's business model was a good and sustainable one. But agreed: if OP could have gotten a rate that would have cost, say, 10 cents per day (or even more, like 50 cents or a dollar a day), maybe that would have been ok. And maybe he could have changed the pricing on the app for future purchasers to a subscription model, some small token amount like $1/mo or even $5/year. But also consider it's pretty crappy to give someone such a short amount of time to make the decision as to whether or not that new business model would work, and if it's worth it to put more development effort into the app to enable that new pricing scheme.
- catapart 2y ago
  > Blaming Yelp and making a drama out of it seems a bit much. Don't read it if you don't like it. Some of us actually give a fuck how badly companies are treating people, even if you don't.
  - autoexec 2y ago
    Those of us who do, never expected much from a company like yelp to start with.
  - pino82 2y ago
    Well, don't read the comment that you reply on. ;) The only interesting part of the story is to what extent others actually learn sth from it (that lesson should be trivial, but nowadays it obviously is all but common sense). And I guess: Not very much. They will 'give a fuck' here how bad the world and all is, and then continue in their naive way tomorrow.
    - catapart 2y ago
      There's a tangible difference between shitting on a person who chooses to share an experience, and shitting on a person who is shitting on a person who shared an experience. If you choose to read irony or hypocrisy in it, that's your own issues with context. ;)

kevin_thibedeau 2y ago

No problem. He can just dust off his business contract with Yelp and have the courts set them straight. No contract? Then why would one expect the world to cater to their whim. Yelp promised nothing and he got exactly what they promised.

ordu 2y ago
[flagged]
greycol 2y ago
He hasn't promised not to scrape their site using even more of their resources... Used to be that, coupled with competition with competing services, was the main reason sites offered APIs.
joshuaissac 2y ago
> Yelp promised nothing According to the article, Yelp promised him 25,000 API calls per day: > In fact, without me specifically asking for it, they provided a 25,000 per day API call limit
- kevin_thibedeau 2y ago
  They altered the deal as was most certainly declared their prerogative in the original agreement.

vzaliva 2y ago

He mentions 100 API calls per day. If Yelp offered him a rate of a fraction of a cent per call, it might be a negligible expense that could be offset by past or future sales. If the app has outlived its lifecycle, the end of the free API might be a signal to retire it. Blaming Yelp and making a drama out of it seems a bit much. Suppose they had given him 30 days instead of 4; would his decision really be any different?

kelnos 2y ago
> Suppose they had given him 30 days instead of 4; would his decision really be any different? Possibly not, but the point of OP's complaint is that Yelp was rude, handled it poorly, and gave him an unreasonably short deadline. No one is arguing that Yelp doesn't have the right to discontinue free API access, or that OP's business model was a good and sustainable one. But agreed: if OP could have gotten a rate that would have cost, say, 10 cents per day (or even more, like 50 cents or a dollar a day), maybe that would have been ok. And maybe he could have changed the pricing on the app for future purchasers to a subscription model, some small token amount like $1/mo or even $5/year. But also consider it's pretty crappy to give someone such a short amount of time to make the decision as to whether or not that new business model would work, and if it's worth it to put more development effort into the app to enable that new pricing scheme.
catapart 2y ago
> Blaming Yelp and making a drama out of it seems a bit much. Don't read it if you don't like it. Some of us actually give a fuck how badly companies are treating people, even if you don't.
- autoexec 2y ago
  Those of us who do, never expected much from a company like yelp to start with.
- pino82 2y ago
  Well, don't read the comment that you reply on. ;) The only interesting part of the story is to what extent others actually learn sth from it (that lesson should be trivial, but nowadays it obviously is all but common sense). And I guess: Not very much. They will 'give a fuck' here how bad the world and all is, and then continue in their naive way tomorrow.
  - catapart 2y ago
    There's a tangible difference between shitting on a person who chooses to share an experience, and shitting on a person who is shitting on a person who shared an experience. If you choose to read irony or hypocrisy in it, that's your own issues with context. ;)