I have a love-hate relationship with Yelp, especially when it comes to choosing a restaurant.
I love the idea: I can be walking down the street in New York, tap into Yelp on my phone, and soon I’ve got this mega-list, with star ratings and user reviews, of all the eateries within a couple of blocks. If I want sushi, I can find that. Bistro fare? Yelp’s got it. I can even filter the results for how much I want to spend and how far I want to walk.
In theory, this should be nirvana for anyone who’s deciding where to have dinner, but it doesn’t always work out that way, at least for me. The problem certainly isn’t a lack of options: You could spend a day reviewing the options presented by Yelp. And that’s the problem. To make a decision on where to eat, you’ve got to work for it. You’ve got to scan through Yelp’s endless listings, reading individual reviews — some witty, some inane — and crafting your own conclusions about what all this foodie fieldwork really means.