I have to disagree. Not everything is about technology - Zagat has something that is highly coveted and difficult to replicate: a good reputation and critical mass.
Google (or any of us, for that matter) can spend all day building the greatest, fairest, most accurate restaurant review system known to man - but it will still be of utterly no use unless there is a critical mass of restaurants and customers who are willing to trust it and, more importantly, use it.
Bootstrapping a trusted content source is really hard (hard in the "nobody knows how to do it reliably" way, not just hard in the "it takes a lot of work" way). If you want to break into this market, simply buying said critical mass is much easier (and much less time-consuming). Whatever crazy technology you have can be layered on top.
Maybe it's my age (currently 23) But Zagat has a good reputation and critical mass?
I know Zagat as that magazine that fast food places brag about getting high ratings from (KFC ran commercials for a while claiming a #1 rating from them).
I am with you, I am 27 and really had no clue what the heck Zagat is. I knew they reviewed food places, but why they are trusted or why I should care? I am more interested in my co-workers opinion.
I don't see this as a great purchase for Google either. They already put business reviews from other websites on their listing pages. I have seen Zagat ratings on various pages. Why couldn't they just pull it in also instead of buying the company?
28..always been aware of Zagat. Who knows, travels, what you read, etc. Zagat rated over the last few years has definitely seemed to not be as indicative, as before, of the highest quality of restaurant.
oh man. The first time I saw a "Zagat rated" sign I was so confused. "Is this some sort of 'American Psycho' tie-in? why would an upscale pizza place pay to be related to that book?"
I was certain zagat was made up by Ellis for his book.
I'd never seen it until I moved to the bay area, where a 'Zagat rated' usually means "Yes, this is a chain, but we pretend really hard that it's not fast food."
Comments
I have to disagree. Not everything is about technology - Zagat has something that is highly coveted and difficult to replicate: a good reputation and critical mass.
Google (or any of us, for that matter) can spend all day building the greatest, fairest, most accurate restaurant review system known to man - but it will still be of utterly no use unless there is a critical mass of restaurants and customers who are willing to trust it and, more importantly, use it.
Bootstrapping a trusted content source is really hard (hard in the "nobody knows how to do it reliably" way, not just hard in the "it takes a lot of work" way). If you want to break into this market, simply buying said critical mass is much easier (and much less time-consuming). Whatever crazy technology you have can be layered on top.
Maybe it's my age (currently 23) But Zagat has a good reputation and critical mass?
I know Zagat as that magazine that fast food places brag about getting high ratings from (KFC ran commercials for a while claiming a #1 rating from them).
I am with you, I am 27 and really had no clue what the heck Zagat is. I knew they reviewed food places, but why they are trusted or why I should care? I am more interested in my co-workers opinion.
I don't see this as a great purchase for Google either. They already put business reviews from other websites on their listing pages. I have seen Zagat ratings on various pages. Why couldn't they just pull it in also instead of buying the company?
28..always been aware of Zagat. Who knows, travels, what you read, etc. Zagat rated over the last few years has definitely seemed to not be as indicative, as before, of the highest quality of restaurant.
oh man. The first time I saw a "Zagat rated" sign I was so confused. "Is this some sort of 'American Psycho' tie-in? why would an upscale pizza place pay to be related to that book?"
I was certain zagat was made up by Ellis for his book.
I'd never seen it until I moved to the bay area, where a 'Zagat rated' usually means "Yes, this is a chain, but we pretend really hard that it's not fast food."