
Apparently Yelp has a no-fly list - chriszf
http://chriszf.posterous.com/apparently-yelp-has-a-no-fly-list
======
varelse
If they had the guest list beforehand, they had a responsibility to inform you
of this issue before the trip. Putting you on the spot forced you into making
a crappy decision either way you went with it.

I personally would have yanked all the students out and explained why and
exactly why you were all leaving to someone in authority if this couldn't be
cleared up, further that it was going to go up on the Internet, but my
personal bias stems from years of being excluded from things for no obvious
reason as a kid.

~~~
freehunter
Think about what benefit that would give the other class members, though.
None. All they would be feeling is that they missed a lecture they wanted to
be at and should be at.

It's sad for the student who could not attend, that is obvious. That's Yelp's
fault. But these kids aren't kids. If they wanted to stand on principle and
leave the presentation, they could make that call. But the decision to pull
the whole class from the conference shouldn't be up to the teacher of a
college class populated by adults.

Throw a shitstorm at Yelp, yes, but if I were in that class and the teacher
told me to get back on the bus, I'm under no obligation to listen to him. And
I likely would have stayed, almost equally as upset at the poor behavior of
the instructor. The way Chris handled the situation was about as good as you
can get under the unfortunate circumstances.

~~~
path411
If I was the teacher I would have just taken everyone for Ice Cream and use
the time to teach the students.

------
zoevkay
Hey guys! I am the student in question. As someone else said, we are all
adults (in our 20's and 30's) and I wasn't hurt/isolated/crushed/etc. when our
teacher didn't come with me. In fact he's a wonderful teacher and person, and
instead of protesting against security (who doesn't care), he posted this,
which gained a lot more attention.

It turns out someone causing problems at numerous Yelp events has the same
name as myself and they were on the "no-fly" list. I'd say the security needs
some improvement, as they couldn't tell the difference between us after
checking my government-issued ID.

Thanks for all the discussion.

------
FuzzyDunlop
> _But here I was, helpless. The only thing I could do was direct her to BART
> and join the rest of the class inside_

... or pull the class out and refuse to attend it out of principle?

~~~
chriszf
I had another 9 students inside, and the talk was worthwhile for them.
Furthermore, the problem was not with the organizers (who were generous and
accommodating) or the speakers (who were similarly generous), but with the
venue. Nothing would have been solved by protesting: I'm not important enough
that anyone would have noticed.

~~~
mbateman
You would have demonstrated that moral authority is on the side of the student
who was wronged. It doesn't matter whether or not they change their policy,
what matters is that you went along with excluding a student for no reason.

EDIT: Sorry, this came off a bit too personally. I'm a teacher too and I got
angry when I read this story. I'll just say more generically that it is easily
possible (and justifiable) for a student to feel alienated after a situation
like this, especially if they feel like their educator didn't stand up for
them. Whether or not "standing up for them" involves canceling the entire trip
is a contextual issue, and I really don't know if it would have been a good
idea in this case.

~~~
mnicole
I don't get the teacher-blaming here.

Imagine you're a student in that class; you're stoked to see this talk, but
one of your classmates can't get in. You feel terrible but you've been looking
forward to this. If the teacher decides to "stick it to the man", you and 8
other of your classmates miss out and possibly become bitter towards the
excluded one because of Yelp's security measures.

His having to direct her to the nearest transit might seem cold, but he was
responsible for all of those students, and he was trying to offer them an
experience they would grow from. I would have been incredibly bummed if I were
her, but it wasn't anyone in her group's fault and they shouldn't have missed
an opportunity to learn because the teacher decided he wanted to take some
sort of personal, _"Yeah, well I'll show you!"_ stand.

~~~
morsch
What kind of students are we talking about here? I assume they're not
explaining how Pinterest is scaling to eighth-graders. If we're talking about
adults here -- and apparently just 10 of them --, why not let them quickly
huddle together and figure it out?

~~~
mnicole
Regardless of age, I'd assume they'd rather take notes [on her behalf] than
not attend.

------
soupboy
Why go on with the field trip at all? For all the talk about "you feel the
pressure to be that authority", wouldn't the best move have been to abandon
the trip and side with the student?

~~~
lusr
Not sure that would achieve much, except maybe make her feel (unfairly) guilty
and the rest of the class potentially resentful (despite this not being her
fault).

But sending her away makes no sense either. Why not ask her to wait outside,
ensure the rest of the class finds their way, then attempt to find somebody
with suitable authority to allow her in?

There's no point arguing with a security guard past a certain point; they
simply do not have authority you're seeking.

However, even if you spend the entire session trying to find somebody and
don't succeed, at least the student will respect and appreciate your effort
and won't feel alone in her plight.

~~~
chriszf
The story was abbreviated: I talked to several people to figure out what was
going on before they insisted we were blocking the entrance. By then she had
decided it was not worth the trouble and wanted to leave.

------
briandear
Yelp reviews are a big point of anger from many business owners and there's
some valid security risks. However a name based policy is rather dumb.

~~~
cschmidt
I guess that is the underlying issue. Yelp is fundamentally a protection
racket. "Those are some real nice reviews you have there - it would be a real
shame for something to happen to them." I imagine that there are lots of
business owners that would be a security risk. I wonder if Yelp people ask
themselves if they might be doing something bad if people want to do them
bodily harm.

~~~
pyre

      > I wonder if Yelp people ask themselves if they
      > might be doing something bad if people want to do
      > them bodily harm.
    

They don't have to be doing something wrong for people to want to harm them.

~~~
mikeash
Most of the time, if people want to physically hurt you, you're either doing
something really bad, or really good. I don't think Yelp falls into the
"really good" category.

~~~
TeMPOraL
Or you might just be hurting business of bad people. Not every owner of the
restaurant is a nice and smart person who can accept negative feedback (aka.
bad review) as a sing that he/she needs to change something.

------
guelo
I attended a meetup that was held at Yelp and I can confirm that entrance to
the building is weirdly extra secured compared to meetups at other SF
companies I've attended.

~~~
throwaway53211
This entire story seems quite obvious, really.

AFAIK, the CONSENSUS is they run a racket. "Sures is a nice restaurant, would
be a reeeel shame if some negative reviews happened to it, wouldn't it" is
their business model. (not exaggerating here - Google startup extortion, this
is the only company that comes up. They've been sued.)

If you're running an extortion ring, you're not gonna be letting a whooole lot
of po'd people in your office.

I would be extremely curious about the specific name. I bet it is someone they
have tried to illegally strong-arm by showcasing negative reviews.

------
minikites
I wonder if you can pay them a fee to hide the negative security reviews of
your name.

~~~
suyash
haha..being Yelp..probably!

------
Ensorceled
I don't understand this point:

"I don't hold it against the security guy, he was just following
instructions."

Why does everybody assume that while what he's doing is awful, he's just
following instructions and that he wouldn't do anything truly f'ed up.

I would assume that a guy who is willing to take a job that involves excluding
a kid from their class field trip based wholly on that kid's name being on
some magic list is the sort to be willing to do all sorts of evil stuff if
ordered to.

I'm not saying he IS the type to do evil things if ordered, but that is the
safer assumption.

~~~
TillE
I don't think hypotheticals are particularly relevant.

What I would argue is that (unless you're the bouncer at a nightclub) it _is_
pretty shitty to refuse someone entry without explanation. If you don't know
the reason, you should be willing to call your superior and find out, and
maybe sort out the situation properly.

And if it's a company where that kind of information is "secret" and not
disclosed to the people who are enforcing it, that's a sick culture.

------
Cushman
Important edit to the article: _My students are adults, which wasn't really
the point of the article (and wasn't clear). Their ridiculous exclusion policy
is. As smart as kids are these days, I'm not sure a "Pinterest scaling talk"
is something I'd take kids to._

A lot of people here are making some assumptions based on the idea that these
were children, which is pretty interesting in itself.

~~~
wlesieutre
Especially since if they were kids "Direct her to the BART" might not be an
appropriate response

------
pretz
I work for Yelp, and it sounds like we screwed up. Apologies that we weren't
able to get this woman into the MySQL event. We're obviously reviewing our
security procedures to make sure they are more sane and sensitive for next
time.

~~~
MichaelApproved
You're a mobile engineer at yelp, do you have authority to speak on this
publicly? Is this Yelp's official response?

~~~
pretz
You can consider this an officially sanctioned response.

------
mnicole
I'm confused - they had a guestlist and everyone else in the class but her was
on it, or none of your students were on it and they decided to exclude her
personally?

~~~
chriszf
They had a guest list and all my students were on it. This particular student
was also on it, along with a note to exclude her specifically from entering
the office.

~~~
nollidge
That is not at all clear from your post. It sounds like she just wasn't on the
list at all.

~~~
unimpressive
This. I think you may want to add that detail to your post. It's really
important context.

------
agwa
Interesting information about Yelp's building security from a Scala meetup
group:

<http://www.meetup.com/Scala-for-Startups/events/71726662/>

They actually require government ID, which is a step above most building
security I've encountered. Also, it says that Yelp "shares offices... in a
building with security" - perhaps these stupid policies are more the
building's fault than Yelp's?

~~~
timr
Yelp has its own security team, and they do the administration of the guest
list.

------
feydr
this is extremely common in a lot of meetups in SF - really the only reason
they want your name on the list is so if you are a crazy homeless person
looking for free booze and free food with a lot of expensive ass computer shit
laying around you can't just waltz in

also, I am in that meetup group and yesterday was _insane_ email traffic w/the
amount of people that couldn't follow the most simplest of advice -- "we need
your name"

~~~
waterlesscloud
Name on a list, sure, fine. Pretty standard practice in big office buildings.

Running the guest list against some database of banned names, not so standard.

One reason it's not standard is that properly operating a list of banned names
is very difficult, for the reason pointed out here in this post.

~~~
feydr
I didn't get this context from the post when I read it first - I guess this
begs the question - was this a former employee of yelp or was it a true mixup?

~~~
lwat
It's a student, definitely not a former yelp employee or homeless person.

------
criveros
Go give yelp a bad review on yelp.

------
keithpeter
"But here I was, helpless. The only thing I could do was direct her to BART
and join the rest of the class inside. "

I'm a teacher, and if this happened to one of my students on an _official_
College trip (which, in the UK, would have been documented and approved in
advance with a risk analysis &c, and yes even for adult students) I would
probably be on the phone to the principal.

Given they way things sound in this case, I would have had to consider
options. I'm assuming the teacher in this case was also driving the transport.

------
dustingetz
Standard practice in Manhattan and Philadelphia at most office high-end office
buildings. this is the world Americans live in. Yelp isn't in the business of
protecting civil liberties.

edit: standard practice to deny entry to non-badged persons who aren't on a
pre-submited event guestlist. i've seen this, for example, at every tech
meetup held in a downtown office building i've ever been to in Manhattan and
Philadelphia.

edit2: i've never actually challenged this, but i've been told that i would be
denied entry if name not on list.

~~~
Hominem
All three office buildings I've working in during the past 5 years would not
let you leave the lobby unless you are escorted by a person from the company
you are going to visit. The escort also has to have escort rights.

That is different than an escort coming down to the lobby and saying, "ok you,
you and you can come up. You over there have to leave the building". That is
something I have never seen happen.

Edit: all three have had metal detectors and airport style scanners, really
annoying getting stuck in the security line if you forgot your badge and were
running late.

------
illuminate
I don't see the issue with businesses having a list of people who should not
be admitted to a building no matter who guests them in. Certainly, fires were
on a list of "do not enter" in a call center I worked at years ago, to avoid
reprisal. My local Yelp seems to attract a different sort of troll considering
the large amount of in-person interactions of its members and the psychopathic
small-business owners who can't tolerate a bad review, or a series of bad
reviews that reflect their attitude. This situation seems to have worked out
poorly for all involved, but the policy of exclusion isn't necessarily the
problem.

I don't understand why they couldn't have the desk find someone in HR or other
related department (whoever issues the order) to confer with regarding this
particular guest.

~~~
slurgfest
What is with phrases like "psychopathic small-business owners"? I don't
understand why we are villainizing people who run small businesses.

------
Uchikoma
So the teacher decided it was the best overall to let the students in, abandon
the one student, it's best for him to listen to the talk (!) and go with the
policy. I know it might just be me, but with this behavior I have the feeling
he is supporting this policy.

------
larsberg
I realize these decisions are hard to make on the spot, but it's important to
grab everybody and pull them out on the spot. As a teacher (or me in a
previous life, as a manager --- also of adults), when you disagree very
strongly with the ethics of actions of others, I found it both personally and
team-wise rewarding to react decisively in front of my team so they'd get the
message.

This applies to not only strange security, but harassment, unethical behavior,
and other inappropriate actions.

Trust me from personal experience, you'll never regret it, and as you get
older, the retelling will only get _more_ enjoyable, both for you and those
who were there to see you blow up. On both sides, so long as you keep it
professional.

------
squarecat
This sounds like a lazy (likely contracted) security "officer". Call the
company he works for and relay this story. There simply cannot be a policy
that does not account for people sharing the same name.

If so, then THAT'S the story here...

------
csense
Ultimately, a private company should be able to ask anybody to leave their
property for any reason.

The checks and balances against abuse of this power are basically that, if
Yelp's a jerk, they get bad PR, as is happening in this case.

------
suyash
I hate Yelp and the Security there, worst place to organize any meetup events!

------
jhull
I think there is only one thing you can do: Leave a negative review about the
place on Yelp.

<http://www.yelp.com/biz/yelp-san-francisco>

~~~
chris_wot
The results may vary. If Yelp pays ridiculous amounts to itself for an
advertising campaign, the review probably won't show up. If Yelp didn't pay
for an advertising campaign, then it will show for sure.

It's not like we are talking about a particularly ethical company!

------
toomuchcoffee
_I pressed further, and they informed me that she could not be let in because
she was an "undisclosed security risk."_

Y'know, it might just be some poorly-paid security drone reading blindly from
some poorly articulated status message on some crappy security desk app.

So instead of something tactful and polite like "Not on the guest list", the
applicable field got set to NULL, which bubbled up as "Reason: Unknown".

------
edward
Yelp.com is blocked from my home Comcast connection in San Francisco
(76.126.140.7). I just get "403 Forbidden". I assume somebody else in my
neighborhood on Comcast tried to crawl the site and they denied access for the
entire IP block.

I tried e-mailing them, no response.

------
n00b101
You seem to think it had something to do with her name? Was it a Middle
Eastern name?

~~~
chriszf
It had everything to do with her name: she was turned away by the person with
the guest list, but not by the security guy checking for fake IDs. That was
the only piece of information they had.

And no, she's got a down-home 'good old American' type name, if I've ever
heard one.

~~~
dfxm12
It didn't have to do with the name in and of itself, but the fact that it
wasn't on the guest list.

Did you ever get to the bottom of why it wasn't on the guest list?

Did you ask the security guard (or did the guard offer) to get someone with
authority to rectify the situation?

~~~
brigade
I'm curious, why is everyone in the comments assuming (contrary to the article
and chriszf's comments) that this student wasn't on the guest list?

~~~
dfxm12
chriszf says nothing to the contrary in the article. We are given the facts:
1) You may only get in if you are on the list (of names) and 2) Student X did
not get in.

~~~
brigade
There are certainly more than two facts in those 500 words. Some relevant
ones:

1\. chriszf wasn't aware of the guest list requirement at the gate

2\. No one at Yelp told him of this in response to his inquiries

3\. Yelp was provided with a guest list

4\. The security guard said "undisclosed security risk", not "not on the list"

5\. Everyone except this student got in without a hitch

6\. chriszf came to the conclusion that, since the only information Yelp had
on her was her name (due to the guest list), that that was why they had barred
her.

Fact 6 implies that chriszf did check the guest list (as later confirmed
here). I'm just wondering at how, especially in spite of facts 2 and 4, so
many people decided that the most logical conclusion was that chriszf is an
idiot that is unable to confirm whether a student's name appears on a guest
list.

~~~
dfxm12
_chriszf is an idiot_ Your words, not mine.

There are many reasons for a name to not be on a guest list. I never implied
anyone was an idiot. Not one of the items listed confirm whether or not
student x's name is on the list.

chriszf was able to come to the conclusion you state because chriszf had more
information than was written in the blog post.

~~~
brigade
But _why_ did _you_ come to the conclusion that _only_ possible problem was
that she _absolutely must not_ have been on the guest list, when the entire
point of the post was that Yelp was excluding people based solely on their
name?

I am genuinely curious.

------
Locke1689
As far as I can see, the problem is with the Yelp organizers, not the
security. I have attended quite a few tech talks by banking and finance firms
in Chicago. Quite often they're also in some of the most high-profile
buildings in the United States. On the listing of their events they always say
in massive font at the bottom: IF YOU'RE NOT REGISTERED YOU WON'T GET IN.

There's nothing wrong with this policy. The problem is that the Yelp event
organizers didn't sufficiently _publicize_ this policy.

Edit: Apparently there was a guest list, everyone's name was on it, and hers
was marked as not allowed for some unknown reason? This is not clear from the
article, but I gather from the comments.

~~~
kstrauser
Re-read the story. The student was registered, but denied entry at the last
moment for undisclosed reasons.

------
tkahn6
"Wait here. After I get in I'll find the event organizer and clear this up."

Am I missing something? Why did you not do this?

------
zem
tear her for her bad homework!

