The concept of a restaurant guidebook is becoming increasingly outdated. The books are rarely up to date and, although they can be carried around by travelers easily, just can't offer the user the same kind of immediate response - and an interactive one, at that - as online, user-driven restaurant guides. Chowhound, Yelp and Citysearch are some of the leaders of this genre, along with similar user-review driven online forums. Zagat, which was unique in the restaurant guide book field in that it based its "reviews" on user commentary, recently decided that it needed to move to a similar online format, where users could offer real-time opinions, in order to remain competitive.
Or, at least, to attempt to remain competitive.
Is there any more room left in the restaurant discussion board field for a newcomer? Given that people have expressed dissatisfaction with the way that Chowhound is run (and they way that the site looks), there just might be.
[via eater la ]
Cheese Course: Brebis Pardou
A transcendent summer tomato salad
Sliced bread turns 80 today
Reader Comments (Page 1 of 1)
2-19-2007 @ 9:53AM
Dmnkly said...
I apologize for how snide this is, but was Zagat ever relevent to food people? I never understood how three distilled scores and a few movie ad quotes was supposed to tell me anything about a restaurant. Not to mention which, the scoring system by design tended to reward inoffensive, broad appeal more than actual excellence.
In any case, it's great that they're trying, I suppose, but too little too late. In Chicago, at least, they could have a horde of aficionados cranking material around the clock and they'd never even come remotely close to being the resource that lthforum.com is.
Reply
2-20-2007 @ 1:22PM
J.Ho said...
I'll usually give some credit to Zagat. Some of their books have been helpful to me, but they still want me to give them money for web access. No thanks!
Reply
2-24-2007 @ 9:39PM
tara said...
Hooray for an alternative to the fascistic Chowhound. Zagat reviews are generally too breezy and not food-oriented enough for me, but the more info, the better.
My biggest problem with the forums: Their JavaScript doesn't work with my browser (Firefox 2 on a Mac), so I can't post anything. D'oh!
Reply