It is a bit worrying, but it's worth noting that this expected future is as much of Yelp's (et al) making as it is Google's. Google Places in its original form

It is a bit worrying, but it's worth noting that this expected future is as much of Yelp's (et al) making as it is Google's. Google Places in its original form was essentially a search interface optimized for places (like the search results of a vanilla Google web search of ten blue links). This original incarnation avoided "subpar results", but Yelp specifically requested that they be removed from these results. Of course Yelp had solid reasons to do so, but from Google's perspective, the choice became one between a subpar interface for Place search and subpar content, the important difference being that meager content can in theory be improved, while a subpar interface will always be so.