[ehsankia]

I wonder if part of the blame here comes to the apps pushing people to write reviews. I have a hard time thinking that person would go out of their way to leave a negative review like that, but if Yelp pings and encourages them to describe what they thought of their meal, I could see someone just typing whatever came to their mind.

[panopticon]

This reminds me of the Amazon product Q&A section. Someone will respond to a question with "I'm not sure" likely because Amazon notifies purchasers when someone asks a question.

[ehsankia]

Oh absolutely, I've been getting more and more email from Amazon Q&A telling me that I recently bought a product so I should try to answer a question about it.

On the other hand, I did ask a question on Amazon just yesterday and have received 5 answers in under a day, so it their system does work to some extent.

[martinpw]

I think this is a valid point, especially if the review count is gameified so you are rewarded when leaving more reviews. I see plenty of Google maps reviews from people tagged as "Local Guides" that respond to questions about a location with something like "I don't know, call them".

As an aside, favorite negative review I have heard of is one for the Taj Mahal complaining that it is too far from the airport.