It’s not just restaurants: even doctors have to deal with online reviews and some sue over them. I must admit, I remain unconvinced that online reviews are any more accurate a ranking than regular word of mouth used to be, but I don’t assume that the outraged reviewee is in the right either. Which isn’t much guidance.
*Speaking of reviews: if Yelp does, as some businesses charge, offer to remove online reviews in return for advertising, that’s not extortion according to the Ninth Circuit Court of Appeals.
•However California has made it illegal to enforce a non-disparagement clause — no negative online reviews, no unfavorable ratings, etc.—against a state resident. The feds are looking at a similar law.
•Here’s a look at a Portland map of a century ago, mapping out locations of vice, sin and “sporting women.”
•Making your payoff scene count.
•Amazon’s Kindle Scout program will apparently give readers a chance to vote on which potential authors should be published. Jim Hines looks at the program and finds it underwhelming for other reasons.
•If you use a lot of data (and some of us do), a suit against AT&T over data-throttling “unlimited” plans may be good news. Though AT&T says it’s groundless.
•I’m also fascinated as a writer by unusual copyright and trademark cases such as the cronut. And here’s one where MGM threatens to sue a race recreating Rocky Balboa’s workout run (the issue being the use of the Rocky name, not the route)
•I can’t critique this book, as I haven’t read it, but it annoys me when someone suggests that a super-hero story where heroes aren’t perfect and some heroes are outcasts is a radical new idea.
•A couple of freelancer websites in competition.
