The Chowhound debate rages on and on and on
The restaurant industry hasn’t yet seen its own version of Tavi Gevinson, the wunderkind blogger turned authority on giant bow hats, but Maclean’s is reporting on foodies’ next best thing: Chowhound. The forum site and its ilk are getting as much play these days as old-school restaurant critics. “Ontario is in the top 10 boards in terms of busiest on the site,” Chowhound head moderator and Torontonian Jacquilynne Schlesier tells the weekly. There are 63 restaurant boards identified by region, most in the U.S.
The appeal of Chowhound is its open format, though the site has been accused of censoring unfavourable reviews in the past. Restaurateurs are frustrated with Chowhound because they can’t explain themselves if someone writes a bad review, many of which are written during a restaurant’s opening week, when staffers are still fine-tuning everything (the “first!” mentality still reigns supreme on the Internet). It’s ironic that Chowhound’s posting guidelines say that the site is strictly for regular diners and not a place for restaurant-customer interaction, but in our experience, such exchanges can certainly be enlightening.
I once posted my experience about a restaurant on Chowhound and it was found out by said restaurant. We had a long discussion on the phone where they didn’t appreciate my review of them and I didn’t like it that they called my friend up to find out who I was.
I wrote up this experience on Chowhound and even though I had a lot of support from fellow posters, Chowhound decided to remove our discussion.
Now the restaurant is gone (thank goddess). And I no longer post on Chowhound. That whole experience left a bad test in mouth.
Chouhound sucks!!!!!!
Chowhound is a great board overall. @M’s experience sounds awful, but atypical (thumbs down to that resto for hunting M down!). For the most part the posters on CH seem helpful, active and to be giving their honest opinions. I like the mix of positive and negative feedback – usually the posters explain themselves pretty well so you can decide if you actually agree with them. I’d give it another chance – maybe lurk a bit first.
i never trust chowhound.
yelp is way more reliable, trust me.
Chowhound sucks and is very dictatorial. I prefer eGullet by far!
Chowhound is presumed by many to be an unbiased open forum which reflects consumer sentiment. The truth is that Chowhound is heavily censored. Look at the comments at the end of this post:
http://bit.ly/j3DgOv
Chowhound is a heavily censored (“moderated”) board dominated by cliques. There are ‘secret’ moderators who also participate as members. Totally worthless search function. Yelp is far more democratic and useful.
http://www.foodnerds.ca is much better than Chowhound. People are slowly moving over there.