If you’re looking for restaurant reviews, there are plenty of options out there such as Yelp or TripAdvisor. However Google themselves have also started offering reviews of their own, and recently it was discovered by both Yelp and TripAdvisor that despite searching specifically for either website, the results returned with Google’s own options first.
Should we be surprised? We suppose in a world without regulation and laws, rivals would be doing everything they can to try and remove the competition, but given that there are rules set in place to prevent monopolies, this could be bad news for Google if either Yelp or TripAdvisor were to explore their legal options. However Google has since come forward to claim that the search results was due to a bug.
In a statement provided by a Google spokeswoman, “The issues cited were caused by a recent code push, which we’re working quickly to fix.” However Yelp’s CEO Jeremy Stoppelman claims that this behavior is typical of Google. According to Stoppelman, “Far from a glitch, this is a pattern of behavior by Google.”
This isn’t the first time that Google has been accused of anticompetitive behavior, but the company had previously claimed that its search products are driven by the needs of users, and not competition. That being said at the end of the day, if Google can return the answers that you are looking for, we suppose that’s a good thing too, but perhaps not so good for other businesses.