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I guess I’m in the minority, but I can’t remember the last time I used Yelp to find restaurants. It’s been obvious for years (it feels like at least 10, maybe more) that they can’t be trusted.

I’m actually surprised they still get enough traffic to be sustainable.

9 comments

Yelp is bad (really bad) but so is everyone else. I still use them on road trips alongside Google Maps and Apple Maps simply because none of them show all the restaurants in an area. It's kind of unbelievable how frustrating it is to try to get a complete look at all the restaurants nearby some location. Then again, it's a good trip if Google Maps doesn't ask me to turn left across three lanes onto a private alley and right through a brick wall (true story).

I feel like it used to work better than before. I don't just mean "and they all had more of the restaurants" I mean there will be a ton of restaurants in the map and Google Maps will only pick about half to make red when I click "Restaurants". It'd make some sense as a density problem but it still shows the restaurant markers, just with orange labels instead of red ones!

If I open Apple Maps and look for restaurants around me, tapping on one displays partial pics and reviews from Yelp. Tapping on those to read more will request I install the Yelp app. I would guess this integration is at least a contributing factor.

Same. Yelp is for finding pics of menus and food. Googling "<name of city> restaurants reddit" is for finding good places to go.

reddit is gamed as well, depending on the subreddit

Reddit is better than Yelp (what isn't?), but I haven't found Reddit to be particularly useful for this sort of thing.

side not, wtf did google do to their menu photos, its like a canvas u can zoom in or get the any type of img?

I stopped using them because they became unreliable. They turned pay to play into an art. Can't trust them at all

They turned into an online version of the mob. Pay them and they'll take care that your bad reviews are gone. Don't pay and risk getting a few extra bad reviews

It’s equivalent to crowd sourcing star ratings for music. How could I know our tastes are compatible?

Yelp ratings are basically useless, except for egregious things like cockroaches found running around. The worst part about the site and Google is that they paginate restaurants in a local map view by rating. It would be better to see everything all at once for certain views.

But restaurants that delist themselves for whatever reason from the review sites, also delist themselves from me ever going to them.

I'm never going to choose a restaurant where I can't see pictures of the food and the menu before going ever again.

It doesn't have to be Yelp, but if I search and didn't see the restaurant, it doesn't exist and I will never go to it. If I pass by a place and it isn't brand new, yet they've scrubbed their web presence, I'm not going to go.

There's no reason to take a chance, and any place that is trying to hide from it, will just always be a place not worth bothering to find out why they are hiding.

Most excellent restaurants where I live would never post pictures of their food anywhere and have no web presence at all. In many you can’t even reserve a table - you go there and eat. Those who need a lot of web presence / pictures etc are usually not great (good but not great).

If you see lots of people in a place and it’s crowded it’s probably good.

What area do you live where this is true? Michelin places may prevent customers from taking pictures, in my experience only the overrated ones do this, but they have their presence with information on the Michelin site.

In Tokyo, everywhere but the smallest stand, and often times even them, had reviews on Tabelog. In my smaller East Coast city, every restaurant I've seen within walking distance of my apartment has reviews and their menu online.

Places famous before the internet may get away with forcing their customers to pay in cash and no SEO, but places that completely delete themselves from the web are hiding something. They will also just never come up in a discussion about where to eat because they don't show up online.

> What area do you live where this is true?

I'm not who you're responding to, but this is certainly true in my part of the US.

> If you see lots of people in a place and it’s crowded it’s probably good.

McDonalds? it's even called a "restaurant"...

The absence of a web presence is not a sufficient indicator that a business might hide something from you. There are multiple reasons which can lead to the decision to not participate in this playing field.

> I'm never going to choose a restaurant where I can't see pictures of the food and the menu before going ever again.

That's certainly a choice, but you're missing out on a lot by doing that.

You seem to not like to go to better establishments. The best in my area do not advertise at all.

It's only the run of the mill restaurants which have a web presence

Me too. I avoid Yelp because they're worse than worthless, and I'm always surprised to hear that anyone finds value in them.

I use Yelp and Google Reviews pretty regularly. If a restaurant has a bad score it might still be good. If it has a good score with lots of ratings then it's probably pretty decent.

not my experience.

I feel like (a) people like places bexasue they're trendy, not delicious. (b) People also like to brag and posting reviews give a small dose of whatever it is that people get from posting in Instagram. (c) Most people don't like to be mean so odds of a bad review for restaurants are lower. (d) there are also cultural norms. Check restaurant reviews in Japan in Japanese, most are in the 3.1 to 3.8 of 5 range where as USA Engliah google maps it's more like an average of 4.5

Also people's tastes are different. I recently went to two highly rated coffee shops. Had some of the blandest food of my life. So bad bland I decided not to eat it because why get fat if it's not enjoyable. But it was highly rated. I think if all you get is a coffee and a croissant then you're only judging on atmosphere

> If it has a good score with lots of ratings then it's probably pretty decent.

I haven't noticed this at all. As near as I can tell, the rating of a restaurant on Yelp is completely uncorrelated with how good or bad the restaurant is.

So what do you use instead?

I pick a restaurant and go to it. It's almost always fine.

We managed for centuries without comprehensive reviews of every single restaurant from every two bit individual who thinks they have a valid opinion on cooking. I genuinely don't understand, don't you people ever do anything you haven't been recommended by an algorithm?

I have never looked at reviews for restaurants. I will use Google maps to look for "nearby" places, but I will not look at the reviews.

> what do you use instead?

Beli has been surprisingly good [1].

[1] https://beliapp.com

does beli not have a website? wild choice if so.

I know I'm a minority, but I refuse to do research on a 3.5"x6" screen.