“Real People. Real Reviews.”

0MC • 2nd Jul 2009 • The Daily Nonsense • food, review, Twitter, writing, yelp

Real People.  Real Reviews. So reads the tagline of Yelp.com, a website I had joined way back in 2006 and only days ago I become active again in an effort to review and support local businesses in Orlando, FL (because, boy, they need a little extra help these days).

By chance, I happened upon this post by Kate at the Accidental Hedonist who discusses how social networking has affected restaurant reviewing, specifically in their first few weeks of business. She makes a lot of great points – specifically:

In the end,when it comes to choosing a restaurant, nothing beats listening to those you trust, whether they’re a close friend or a well established food critic.

Which is pretty accurate, I rely on the opinions and experiences of my friends, but only as a means of comparison. Even if a friend swears a restaurant is particularly horrible for such and such reasons, I’m still intrigued to try it out.

But twittering a review – while dining? Well, that’s just plain rude for starters. But I’m digressing – I mainly got stuck on Kate’s comment about “the evils of Yelp”. I’m only vaguely familiar with some of the complaints business and restaurant owners have of Yelp and I’m only just a few days into reviewing, but I can’t really imagine what these evils might be. I think it’s a spectacular mouthpiece for “Real People” writing “Real Reviews” without requiring any special training in writing or reviewing – if there is such a thing. It takes the whole reviewing process and gives it to the masses – sure you’re going to get a lot of crappy without a lot of substance but isn’t it worth all the ones that do?