[db48x]

> She recommended a few cafes, and I went to look at their menus. To my surprise, I couldn’t access their menus. They were only on Instagram, and it’d force a sign in before showing me the content.

Wow. There are over 30 restaurants within a mile of where I live, and not one of them uses Instagram to host anything as far as I know. They always have a real web page, even if it’s cobbled together on Wix or some other horrible thing, and the menu is invariably a PDF (because they had to send something to the printer, and they don’t know how to put something nicer on the web). Sometimes you have to allow third–party JS to get their webpage to render so that you can get the PDF though.

Well, I guess the national chains don’t post a PDF these days. They give you a real menu and even offer online ordering and delivery. Most people probably don’t need to look at a McDonald’s menu to know what they sell though.

[reginald78]

The other day I went to view my kid's elementary school class page and was hit with an instagram login prompt.

[ghssds]

Is this even legal?

[AStonesThrow]

What I've found very useful is Google Maps for ordering online. I typically use DoorDash, which can access and aggregate almost any restaurant I'd care to patronize, but if the restaurant isn't listed, Google Maps can accurately direct me not only to the restaurant's main website, but also to their menu, and a complete list of online ordering services.

I've been able to reliably target a restaurant 20 minutes away by bus, select my order, pay for it online, and have it ready for pickup by the time I disembark. It's a pretty sweet arrangement.

If your chosen restaurant directs you to some dumb QR code and Instagram, try just looking them up on Google Maps. You'd be surprised what resources are available there, including plenty of reviews and customer-submitted photos of the very dishes you're looking to order!

[OsrsNeedsf2P]

I doubt they'll stay with custom websites for long, given 1. The new generation grew up with Social Media as a native service and 2. How much easier it is to run a Business account vs your own website

[db48x]

That’s why I mentioned services like Wix. They host your site and give you an online page builder, then you just point your domain at their servers. It’s basically just Geocities, but without the stigma. I believe Square runs one that is fairly popular, and there are others.

No more technical skill is required to use these service than is required to use Instagram, but the difference is that Instagram takes away all control from their users while these services give their users control over everything (except of course that hosting millions of restaurant websites lets these services collect a lot of data about the visitors that they can sell behind the scenes for extra profit, of course).

[benhurmarcel]

I’ve been to some restaurants that have a QR code to their own website but I get blocked by their Cloudflare settings for some reason. So even a proper website doesn’t avoid issues.

[db48x]

Yea, I don’t use any website that requires a captcha or any other such nonsense. A restaurant won’t lose me as a customer over that, if I am already inside, provided they can bring me a regular menu. So far that’s never been a problem.

[me4502]

Honestly hearing how different this is for Americans makes me wonder if it’s a self-fulfilling prophecy type situation. Everyone in Australia is already using Meta services, so businesses just go where the customers are and keep putting everything on Meta services. Less about Instagram being a good solution, and more just being good marketing when it’s where your demographic is.