Yelp is a popular website founded in 2004. Yelp allows ordinary people to write reviews of local businesses which are then visible to other users. Yelp is particularly popular among tourists, and is fairly trusted for accurate reviews. But could aspects of Yelp's business plan share similarity's with that of organized crime?
Throughout its life time, there have been countless law suits filed against Yelp. Most of these lawsuits have come from small businesses and claim that Yelp has been withholding or removing positive reviews, while at the same time pestering the business with offers to post ads on their site. In the case of the business buying ads, Yelp would then increase the number of positive reviews that appear on the company's Yelp page. Now, since many people rely on Yelp, a lack of positive reviews for a business can be very detrimental to their profits.
Back in 2014 one of these lawsuits gained traction when several small business owners banned together to sue Yelp, and the outcome of this lawsuit was very interesting. Basically, the U.S. Court of Appeals ruled that Yelp has the right to arrange their reviews in anyway they see fit, based off of any reasoning they like. Meaning that as long as they don't openly relate business' buying ads to the order of their reviews, they can get away with it, no matter how shady it is.
So is Yelp operating in a sketchy manner? Yeah, I would say so. The similarity's between their "buy ads, get good reviews," methodology and blackmail are a little to apparent for my taste. But hey, none of it's illegal!
Tuesday, February 28, 2017
Saturday, February 11, 2017
Could "The Hunger Games" Be Real Someday?
Suzanne Collins 2008 book "The Hunger Games" and the movie of the same name have a fairly simple concept. In the not to far future, the government has divided the upper, middle, and lower class in a manner to oppress the 99% and allow for the 1% percent to live in absolute control and luxury. As part of their method of oppression, the government holds an annual "hunger games," where a male and female teenager from each of the twelve city-states are forced to come together into an arena to fight to the death. "The Hunger Games" brings up many interesting philosophical questions about entertainment, media, and government, but could there ever be a real life arena style sport where players fight to the death?
This last December, a new Russian reality show called "Game 2 Winter" was announced. The premise of the show has 30 participants attempting to survive for nine months in the below freezing Siberian wilderness. In addition to the bears, wolves, and frost bite, creator of the show Yevgeny Pyatkovsky has claimed the participants will also be allowed to kill each other saying "Everything is allowed. Fighting, alcohol, murder, rape, smoking." Not quite sure why drinking and smoking were included alongside murder and rape, but whatever. Now, players wont actually be able to murder and rape each other, as that is illegal in Siberia. The official rules of the game state "You must understand that the police will come and take you away [to arrest you]," but the game does not discourage such acts. Now why would the participants want to murder each other. Well, the winner(s) of the game will split a a sum of approximately 1.6 million dollars, and the fewer winners, the larger the portions. And to win, the players must survive the nine months with out calling in a helicopter to take them away, or dying.
The game will be broadcast live through the internet, on a pay to watch basis, through 9000 cameras spread around the three square mile arena. Each participant will in addition have a body mounted camera. Just like the hungers games from the books, viewers will be able pay to send care packages to their favorite players.
Now the proposed rape and murder of the game are clearly just a marketing strategy, but could there someday be a "fight-to-the-death" style TV show? All that would need to be done to create such a show would be to find a place where such acts aren't illegal, and to do this, a company would merely need to buy an island that some how is not affiliated with any country's, thus not possessing any laws. For instance, if you murder someone on an unregistered boat, you will not be charged as because the boat is not associated with any country, and the murder took place in international waters, there is no where to charge the murder for their crimes. Loopholes like these make the possibility of their being a real life "Hunger Games" seem almost inevitable. Violent action movies/games and popular TV shows such as "Cops" have already proved there is an audience who would watch such a show, now we just have to wait as the media takes baby steps towards capitalizing on real life violence.
This last December, a new Russian reality show called "Game 2 Winter" was announced. The premise of the show has 30 participants attempting to survive for nine months in the below freezing Siberian wilderness. In addition to the bears, wolves, and frost bite, creator of the show Yevgeny Pyatkovsky has claimed the participants will also be allowed to kill each other saying "Everything is allowed. Fighting, alcohol, murder, rape, smoking." Not quite sure why drinking and smoking were included alongside murder and rape, but whatever. Now, players wont actually be able to murder and rape each other, as that is illegal in Siberia. The official rules of the game state "You must understand that the police will come and take you away [to arrest you]," but the game does not discourage such acts. Now why would the participants want to murder each other. Well, the winner(s) of the game will split a a sum of approximately 1.6 million dollars, and the fewer winners, the larger the portions. And to win, the players must survive the nine months with out calling in a helicopter to take them away, or dying.
The game will be broadcast live through the internet, on a pay to watch basis, through 9000 cameras spread around the three square mile arena. Each participant will in addition have a body mounted camera. Just like the hungers games from the books, viewers will be able pay to send care packages to their favorite players.
Now the proposed rape and murder of the game are clearly just a marketing strategy, but could there someday be a "fight-to-the-death" style TV show? All that would need to be done to create such a show would be to find a place where such acts aren't illegal, and to do this, a company would merely need to buy an island that some how is not affiliated with any country's, thus not possessing any laws. For instance, if you murder someone on an unregistered boat, you will not be charged as because the boat is not associated with any country, and the murder took place in international waters, there is no where to charge the murder for their crimes. Loopholes like these make the possibility of their being a real life "Hunger Games" seem almost inevitable. Violent action movies/games and popular TV shows such as "Cops" have already proved there is an audience who would watch such a show, now we just have to wait as the media takes baby steps towards capitalizing on real life violence.
Monday, February 6, 2017
Were Early Christians On Shrooms?
In 1970 British Archaeologist John Marco Allegro released his book The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross. It's been widely agreed that the book completely Ruined his career with its highly controversial nature.
The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross brings up the idea that early religions were based heavily off of drug use, more specifically psychedelic mushrooms, due to the fact that they occur naturally and do not need special treatment to be consumed. John also claims that early Christianity was heavily based around the consumption of hallucinogenics in rituals and heavily influenced the founders of the religion/authors of the first testament.
It is hard to Argue with Allegro on the idea that early indigenous religions had drugs included in some way. Many Historians believe most forms of early religion were based off of sex and drugs (mostly sex). Examples of mushroom effigies and carvings of mushrooms appear in many temples in South America, and Soma, a traditional beverage consumed by Hindu priests, is agreed to either be a tea made of the Amanita mushroom (which has some psychedelic property's), or some form of Cannabis.
But did early Christians consume hallucinogenics? Well, Allegros evidence for his arguments come mostly from Christian paintings and stained glass that have images of Mushrooms in them, such as these:
So were early Christians getting high? Well some probably were, but was the whole based around drugs? In truth, there is no way to know for sure. But the concept is at least interesting and amusing.
The Sacred Mushroom and the Cross brings up the idea that early religions were based heavily off of drug use, more specifically psychedelic mushrooms, due to the fact that they occur naturally and do not need special treatment to be consumed. John also claims that early Christianity was heavily based around the consumption of hallucinogenics in rituals and heavily influenced the founders of the religion/authors of the first testament.
It is hard to Argue with Allegro on the idea that early indigenous religions had drugs included in some way. Many Historians believe most forms of early religion were based off of sex and drugs (mostly sex). Examples of mushroom effigies and carvings of mushrooms appear in many temples in South America, and Soma, a traditional beverage consumed by Hindu priests, is agreed to either be a tea made of the Amanita mushroom (which has some psychedelic property's), or some form of Cannabis.
But did early Christians consume hallucinogenics? Well, Allegros evidence for his arguments come mostly from Christian paintings and stained glass that have images of Mushrooms in them, such as these:
So were early Christians getting high? Well some probably were, but was the whole based around drugs? In truth, there is no way to know for sure. But the concept is at least interesting and amusing.
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