Yelp Finally Shuts Down Yelper Rating Her Dates

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By: Stuart Heater

We've all heard of Yelp, the popular review site for places like restaurants and nightclubs. What about reviewing your dates? What if the review you gave an establishment had nothing to do with how great the food was or how great the ambiance might have been, but instead how your date was? When I say “date,” I mean the person you are out with, not the experience. If this sounds like something Yelp was not designed for, well, you'd be right, but that didn't stop one yelper from doing it anyway.

New York actress Natalie Walker did this very thing. Like me, you're probably wondering where she got the idea from. Well, like many Yelp users, Natalie had a craving for something — in this case, French toast. She hit Yelp and read reviews to try and find the perfect place for French toast.

This is when she came across a review where the reviewer made a comment about her boyfriend. This review got Natalie wondering: What if someone just did reviews based on the experience of her dates and the actual establishment she was visiting? This is exactly what Natalie decided to do.

She told Mashable, "I really started doing this just as a stupid joke.”

Well, the joke took off and was hilarious. Through her Twitter account, Natalie shared screenshots of her Yelp reviews, and she received hundreds of likes and retweets. Needless to say, she wasn't the only one who thought her reviews were funny. Some of the dates she reviewed actually reached out to let her know they thought they were funny.

To be fair to businesses, she never reviewed small businesses — like mom-and-pop shops who truly depend on Yelp to grow their businesses — just the big boys, like national chains. If her date was a total ass, she didn't want that to reflect onto a small business’s reviews.

Of course, with all forms of expression, you're going to run into those who are not a fan of your work. When it came to the dates, only one of them had a slightly negative reaction to what she was doing; Yelp, on the other hand — well, let's just say they were not amused. They sent Natalie a nice email that commended her on her creative spirit while letting her know that Yelp is no place to rant about her exes.

So what do you think? Was this comedy gold or a misuse of Yelp? I'm on the side of comedy gold, but that's just me.

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About the Author

Stuart Heater is a graduate of the University of Central Florida with a degree in Marketing and Mass Communication. He is an avid sports spectator, Netflix connoisseur, and has a passion for technology.

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