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Protecting Free Speech: Why Yelp Is Marking Businesses That Sue Their Customers

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Re: Protecting Free Speech: Why Yelp Is Marking Businesses That Sue Their Customers

#71

Post by mcherm »

brightball wrote: post #2

My only concern is around the lack of ability for businesses to respond or request any level of verification that a person actually did business with them. The BBB at least contacts the business and oversees a process for resolution (documenting the entire thing). I personally know multiple business owners who've dealt with threats from customers who will go and write a bad review if they don't simply bow to demands.…

If a person has posted a completely bogus bad review, I, as the maligned merchant, have three choices. I can ignore it. I can post a response. I can sue the person.

I think it is quite reasonable for Yelp to note when merchants use the third option. As a consumer reading reviews, I learn slightly different things when I see:

A: Three good reviews and one bad review; the merchant responded to the bad review and their response sounds well-reasoned.

B. Three good reviews (one deleted review, but I can't see that) and one note from Yelp stating that the merchant has used the legal system to suppress reviews.

I do think it is important that since Yelp (not a customer) is making the statement that the legal threat was used, that Yelp take reasonable steps to ensure the legal threat actually occurred. Otherwise, a malicious user could falsely report receiving legal threats from a business as a way to harm their reputation.

Re: Protecting Free Speech: Why Yelp Is Marking Businesses That Sue Their Customers

#72

Post by mikeash »

talmand wrote: post #70
mikeash wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I gather that this sort of thing happens a lot because the bureaucracy around getting IT to set up a subdomain is so onerous that it becomes easier to just buy a new domain and set it up independently.

But wouldn't IT buy and set up the new domain?

Normally, yes, but it's quite possible for another department to go out and do it themselves. Corporate policies might not forbid it, or the other department might not care about breaking policy. All you need to set up a new domain is a credit card and a web browser, after all.

Re: Protecting Free Speech: Why Yelp Is Marking Businesses That Sue Their Customers

#73

Post by svskeptic »

raverbashing wrote: post #38
svskeptic wrote: post #27

Earlier quoted context omitted.

This absolutely does happen. I have a small business that is facing it right now. I either pay the Yelp tax or they have taken our community-created page with all 5-star reviews completely off the site. Can still find it from Google search, but can't find it from search within Yelp. And if you search for us, they show our competitor as a search result. Got a call from Yelp sales guy about an offer 'that expires this…

> or they have taken our community-created page with all 5-star reviews completely off the site Is this page inside Yelp? You have two business pages on Yelp? What I could suggest is that you get (old) Yelp users to put (legitimate - not exaggerated) comments on your page. And of course, you can make a video lambasting them on YT as well.

There is only one page. The community-created one. As a business, we never created one.

If you google "yelp $business", you can find this page today. If you go to yelp.com and search for "$business", it used to be there. But, in the last week, it was taken off the search results and now a competitor is shown as a search result instead.

Going back to the users is not feasible for us, because we don't know who they are! They are some of our customers who felt the service was great enough to leave glowing reviews. We didn't solicit it.

What actions to take is an interesting discussion for us. Ethics aside, we just might cave and pay the Yelp mafia tax, as a cost of doing business. Which is what they want. And we want to get on with our business.

Edit: $business = 'Real Business Name';

Re: Protecting Free Speech: Why Yelp Is Marking Businesses That Sue Their Customers

#74

Post by throwaway420 »

Not that Yelp doing this isn't a good thing, but an obvious side benefit for them is that they now have a database of super litigious folks who they know to steer their shady marketing practices well clear of because they don't want that kind of headache.

Re: Protecting Free Speech: Why Yelp Is Marking Businesses That Sue Their Customers

#75

Post by raverbashing »

svskeptic wrote: post #73
raverbashing wrote: post #38

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> or they have taken our community-created page with all 5-star reviews completely off the site Is this page inside Yelp? You have two business pages on Yelp? What I could suggest is that you get (old) Yelp users to put (legitimate - not exaggerated) comments on your page. And of course, you can make a video lambasting them on YT as well.

There is only one page. The community-created one. As a business, we never created one. If you google "yelp $business", you can find this page today. If you go to yelp.com and search for "$business", it used to be there. But, in the last week, it was taken off the search results and now a competitor is shown as a search result instead. Going back to the users is not feasible for us, because we don't know who they are…

When you mean google "yelp $business" is $business like "chinese restaurante" or the actual name?

All pages are "community created", you can try to recreate the page if your page is gone, you go to "Write a review", search for it and then "Add a Business"

Of course you might pay, or take them to court as well

Re: Protecting Free Speech: Why Yelp Is Marking Businesses That Sue Their Customers

#76

Post by slapp672 »

As a SLAPP victim, Yelp's decision to punch-down against a pet-sitting business is a slap in my face. A few years back I was sued by a chain of business for $2 Million. These were private-equity financed businesses which serially sue customers, as I later verified using public records search. I complained to Yelp, to no avail.

I went to a lawyer who told me that they have a lot of cash in the bank and that I don't want to fight them, and encouraged me to sign a non-disparagement agreement and pay them some money and move on with my life. I took his advice.

I lost over $20K due to this, as well as months of frustration in which my career and family life took a hit.

Still quite angry, I watched, (using public records requests) as they continued to sue more customers, contractors, or anyone else. Eventually, I found a lawsuit in which they directly contradicted claims they had made in their complaint against me, and even provided 100s of pages of documents showing that my "defamatory" statements were correct! So I called a lawyer, who reviewed the documents and told me that I have a very strong case to have my settlement thrown out because it was fraudulent induced. However, he said that that due to their history of Trump-like earth-scorching, it would be a bad idea to pursue this without a big reserve of cash, patience, and nerves. (In fact, the lawyer, who practices in NJ, mentioned Trump by name as an analogy.)

When I was sued, my adversary was financed by private equity company funded by someone with over $10 billion net worth. (This was one of my assertions that I was sued for, which was later corroborated in court documents.) Yelp told me I was on my own. Now Yelp is taking on Prestigious Pets, in an effort to protect free speech.

So, Yelp, if you want to humiliate someone your own size, I'm happy to have a confidential discussion with your lawyers. Let me know how to get in touch with you.

Re: Protecting Free Speech: Why Yelp Is Marking Businesses That Sue Their Customers

#77

Post by pixl97 »

talmand wrote: post #70
mikeash wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I gather that this sort of thing happens a lot because the bureaucracy around getting IT to set up a subdomain is so onerous that it becomes easier to just buy a new domain and set it up independently.

But wouldn't IT buy and set up the new domain?

After consulting with a large retail chain that also has a decent sized web presence, I've found that IT can be an adversary to getting things done quickly. The web team commonly needed new domains set up, IP changes, SSL certs and other related tasks done and IT would take days to complete them. The web department ended using other domains for things like job postings and marketing so changes could be completed in hours.

My guess is when you see things like this, there is an adversarial relationship between departments.

Re: Protecting Free Speech: Why Yelp Is Marking Businesses That Sue Their Customers

#78

Post by darkerside »

> may be trying to abuse the legal system in an effort to stifle free speech

I'm not a lawyer... but doesn't this open Yelp up to allegations of libel?

As a side note, I am really starting to be irritated by confirmation buttons that say things like "Got it, thanks!". Stop putting words into my digital mouth!

Re: Protecting Free Speech: Why Yelp Is Marking Businesses That Sue Their Customers

#79

Post by pixl97 »

prodigal_erik wrote: post #21
cloudjacker wrote: post #17

> but there will always be a small handful of businesses who mistakenly think it’s a good idea to threaten consumers who exercise their free speech right Wh... what? the free speech right only covers repercussions initiated by the government. Businesses are not the government so consumers have no free speech right or expectation here.

Private businesses can suppress freedom of speech because (unlike for the government) there is no law preventing them from doing so.

There is a whole set of laws and regulations regarding it, queue the FTC. That's why we have a consumer protection organization.

Re: Protecting Free Speech: Why Yelp Is Marking Businesses That Sue Their Customers

#80

Post by Grishnakh »

anilgulecha wrote: post #9

Businesses making profit off entities with positive reviews has been the norm: e-commerce etc. Business making profit off entities with negative reviews (GlassDoor, Yelp & friends) reek of protection-rackets. These services are best decentralized rather than be profit-seeking.

How is GlassDoor a protection racket? Are there any genuine complaints about them screwing over businesses?

I once backed out of a job interview because of a slew of truly horrible reviews on Glassdoor. A bunch of current and former employees described a horrible work environment where the HR director, an "iron lady", seemed to run the place, with HR people in the parking lot logging what time employees came in, cameras in front of the bathrooms to see how long people were taking in there, etc. One bad review I'll generally ignore but this place was filled with a bunch of them; I'd never seen anything like it (and never have since).

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