Tuesday, August 5, 2008

Yelper for Life?

I just realized that my life is now defined by my experiences on Yelp. All of my friends are people I've met on Yelp. My tenants are friends I met on Yelp. 99% of my friends on Facebook are people I met on Yelp. Undoubtedly, my girlfriend will also be from Yelp. If I swing the other way, my boyfriend will be from Yelp. If I get married, my future ex-wife will be from Yelp. I'm even meeting someone from Yelp for lunch today! Yelp, Yelp, Yelp, Yelp, Yelp! IT'S A CULT!

That's why I left. If you aren't one of the "followers" you will be shunned. Be assimilated or removed like a cancerous cyst. For more than a year, I was a follower. But I was never a very good follower. Don't get me wrong, I'm not a very good leader either. I'd rather do my own thing.

That's the downfall of Yelp. It's a great idea, but it has poor execution and policies. Think about it. You are a business. You want to be successful. To do that, you need to grow. The more people you have, the more you grow. Yet one of Yelp's policies is to kick people off, or allow them to leave. Now, I can understand if a person is an Internet Troll (See Wiki for a definition) but they allow trolls to stay and harass people, and allow their "real" users to leave! What kind of policy is that? I bet MySpace doesn't kick people off. Well, unless you're a pedophile or something, but then, that would make you a troll.

So, now I'm on my own again. I'm trying to cut the umbilical cord of Yelp. But it's hard. Some people I can contact only through Yelp. I do have "regular" friends. But most of them are busy with married life, children, work, etc. And my schedule is different from the norm, so I don't get to see them much. Most of my contacts with people now, are at work, and here on the Internet. Nah, I'm not lonely or starving for attention. I'm just telling it like it is, as I see it.

Isn't that what blogging is about?

12 comments:

Linden said...

You will be assimilated.

Fire Ninja said...

That's what this Sat is about! NooooooooooO!

Linden said...

Yes, it's an intervention.

frank said...

Hah, great title for your blog.

PS I like pies, too.

Fire Ninja said...

Darn this thing! How did 2 comments get deleted?

Marimbaroach said...

this is why i don't leave my house... ; )
well, I only leave if there is pie involved. Pie or dodgers. or burritos. Only, waffles, pie, burritos or dodgers...

Fire Ninja said...

It's odd, one comment seems to stay hidden until another comment is written.

Marimbaroach said...

can you delete this one, too?

Fire Ninja said...

dumb comment generator......

Fire Ninja said...

no

juma said...

That was probably me you had lunch with!

I'm not a follower and I don't feel shunned. HQ and Elite doesn't define my yelp experience

Fire Ninja said...

You are/were not a follower, and you were shunned for a little while. They did see the errors of their "Elitist" ways and corrected it. However they still have too many issues that will cause many to break for the next similar site that will do it better.