Posted by justincormack 2 days ago
Im sure they favour the ones that use google ads, but i would not think that they are bullying places a la yelp.
Anyway its pretty crazy that nowadays your success as restaurant is so dependent on one huge platform. (… and actually, lets not forget the delivery platforms also)
It has yielded quite good results basically immediately. People (myself included) have gotten too used to living In The Box. Putting aside the time to just go for a walk around and pop into random shops and pubs has been wonderful.
I think this is very likely false if you mean compared to the status quo ante. Before Maps, a well-loved but hard-to-find venue just wouldn't ever be seen by most people, and the absence of reviews made branding more important because it was all you had to go on. I'd be very doubtful if the proportion of independent cafes and restaurants decreases when Google Maps enters an area. (Couldn't find any causal research designs though....)
The more general point that the algorithm is not neutral (and probably never could be) must be right.
(I asked ChatGPT but it ended up with: "We have almost no clean exogenous variation in Maps rankings or feature rollouts at fine geographic scales that would let you estimate impacts on entry, survival, or market structure in a neat DiD/IV way.")
That might just be a feature of the area though.
> "I scraped every single restaurant in Greater London"
How hard is that now? I assumed that Google is very protective of that data