Yikes! Yelp…

I don’t know if you’re familiar with Yelp. I don’t even know if you use Yelp. For that matter, I don’t know who you are. Who are you people???

(start again)

Vicky and I have used Yelp on a number of occasions. On our recent trip around the west, we used it quite a bit. My personal impression used to be that it’s a fairly reliable source of opinion on many stores and services I haven’t tried, yet.

… I say “used to be” because I also use Craigslist. My books haven’t been selling very well and, so, I am looking for a part-time job to help generate some income. As I’ve searched on Craigslist, I have found not just one or two but hundreds – thousands! – of ads looking for writers to write Yelp ads.

These folk will pay a writer as much as $20 to write positive ads for whatever service they are told to write about. It doesn’t matter if the writer has the appropriate experience or even if the words are true; they are paying the writer to lie.

And, on top of that, it turns out most if not all don’t even pay the writer! Most are scams!

If you’re anything like me, your opinion of Yelp just fell through the floor. But I like to believe there are still honest people out there… You know, five or six. And I hope there are enough smart writers out there, like me, who don’t want to lie only to be robbed, in turn.