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"SFGate: Merchants angry over getting yanked by Yelp"

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Photo of Becky T.

Elite '08

16

120

07/07/2008 Becky T. says:

My bay area friend emailed me this.  Have any of you seen it?  We seem to have a lot of threads on this subject here in DC with trying to catch fake reviews.

http://www.sfgate.com/...
Photo of Stef W.

Elite '08

200

459

07/07/2008 Stef "Big Red" W. says:

Thanks so much for sharing this, Becky!  I'm tempted to cross-post the link on the Spam Alert II thread...
Photo of Kate M.

Elite '08

17

116

07/07/2008 Kate M. says:

Did you guys read the comments on that article?  So much hostility towards Yelp!  What gives?
Photo of Jason C.

Elite '08

93

165

07/07/2008 Jason "Sheriff John Stone" C. says:

the class-action lawsuit bit had me in stitches. nothing like a philadelphia lawyer :)

"omg my profile on a free, private website got deleted i'll sue it's not about the money it's about my constitutional rights thomas jefferson is spinning in his grave!!!"
Photo of Jason C.

Elite '08

93

165

07/07/2008 Jason "Sheriff John Stone" C. says:

Looks like yelp's revised the TOS:
http://www.yelp.com/fa...

Self-reviews are now verboten. So are reviews of a place you are or have been employed at.
Photo of heynow g.

4

88

07/07/2008 heynow "free love on the freelove freeway" g. says:

How bout reviews of a place that you have stocks or investments in? In that case, do people with mutual funds have to start finding out about their subsidiary companies?
Photo of marsha s.

12

21

07/07/2008 marsha "paintermama" s. says:

This is very interesting.
I keep active on this site because I truly find it to be entertaining and helpful. Lucky for me, I learned at the start that I need to be very careful about crossing the line.
As a consumer, I appreciate the vigilance. If I'm looking for reviews, I want to trust what I read.

Please keep these quidelines, and changes, in the forefront. Sometimes people who want to give a boost to ( their stylist, a friend, etc.) can make a business look like they're "self helping" when they're not.
Photo of Stef W.

Elite '08

200

459

07/07/2008 Stef "Big Red" W. says:

I thought it was interesting that both the article and the TOS mention the goal that reviews with come from trustworthy sources.  The article states:

"Yelp also routinely removes reviews it believes are spam. Sometimes that means legitimate posts are also deleted.  Lawyers with Goldstein, Gellman, Melbostad, Gibson & Harris LLP said they were dismayed to find that Yelp flagged most of the positive reviews of their law firm as untrustworthy, because they were written by first-time users. As a result, the Web site blocked 11 positive reviews, leaving a couple of unflattering comments."
Photo of Saurabh G.

6

16

07/07/2008 Saurabh "Lovelorn" G. says:

Funny things happen when people start taking social networking sites too seriously.
Photo of Lydia M.

Elite '08

10

77

07/08/2008 Lydia "snoogins!" M. says:

Some people have too much free time on their hands specifically reserved for b$%^&ing ang whining. LAME-O!!! I found it particlulaly amusing theat one woman commented that she was 'forced' to create another Yelp account and questioned the legitimacy of the reviews.

First- That's retarded.
Two- Aren't you contributing to the perceived problem?
Three- You dislike Yelp so much that you want to create a false identity in order to remain? Are you not reading what you are saying?

I have a problem with stupid people. Moving on...
Photo of Rich L.

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07/08/2008 Rich L. says:

I saw no problem with the article, or the comments.  Yelp is a user based community that depends on aggregation of reviews to come up with a true review, so of course there will be problems with the review system.  As well, if I work for or own a business and review things, does that my make my reviews biased?  Horseshit.  Yelp arbitrarily decided to delete accounts/reviews, and that's that.

I don't see how everyone in this thread saying that "yelp is awesome blah blah let me fellate the ceo" is going to fix the fundamental problems that are concomitant with a user-based, supposedly objective review system.  Better that we at least know about what Yelp is doing to protect the integrity of reviews, rather than just saying this shit doesn't happen.

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