
Yelp Prison Review Faxbot - danso
http://lav.io/2014/11/yelp-prison-review-faxbot/
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dantillberg
But what of possible negative repercussions? I imagine that prison
administrators that get poor reviews on Yelp are more likely than average to
respond negatively to reviews received, and more likely than average to expend
a lot of energy figuring out (even if they are wrong) who wrote the review,
and exact revenge upon them.

It would be less snarky, but maybe it would be better to send these faxes to
state/federal elected representatives that could act to change things for the
better, and that would (generally) have less motivation to seek revenge?

~~~
vinceguidry
Off the top of my head I imagine that most prison administrators are political
appointees and probably know far less about the actual conditions of the
prison and are less removed from the day-to-day running than one might expect.
They have the ability to enact top-down changes in operations, but generally
have no motivation to do so. I would think feedback like this would be quite
valuable to them, so they could gain a perspective on what's going on that
isn't coming from their direct reports.

~~~
jrochkind1
that's quite an imagination you have.

~~~
vinceguidry
Thanks. I don't particularly care about the topic, otherwise I'd go about
fleshing out my musings with actual information. In this case I might use
Quora to validate the basics and then spend some time on Google to answer
particulars as I think about them.

But I'd say a good imagination is a necessary tool if one wants to understand
the world. Without it, I wouldn't know where to start a search. Here I made my
work available for others who might want to build on it, since I'm not all
that interested in it.

~~~
jrochkind1
Hey, don't let your absence of caring about the topic, or lack of "actual
information" stop you from sharing on HN the things you imagine based on no
actual information or experience! You might not care to spend the time to
learn anything about what you're talking about, but you can still spend time
sharing your uninformed 'musings' on things you "aren't all that interested
in" with HN! Keep on rocking!

~~~
vinceguidry
Read the thread again, I think you'd find that my contribution to this topic
has been more constructive than yours.

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tacos
Pretty sure this violates the Yelp TOS. Certain it violates good taste.

Friend works as a psychiatric counselor in a max security facility for 20
years. Commutes 2 hours to and from work for safety reasons. Amazingly decent
fellow. Really cares. Really tries to do the right thing.

I showed him this and his reply? "Fuck those guys."

From a job description: "Specific safety and security duties for wardens
include approving security policies, assessing safety and security systems,
managing internal investigations, managing prison intelligence operations,
ensuring facility compliance with applicable standards and overseeing inmate
classification systems. Human resource and budget duties include interviewing
applicants, conducting staff development, promoting career advancement,
compile budget requests, maintain staffing within financial constraints and
set budget priorities, according to ACA. Correctional employees, including
administrators, operate in a dangerous environment where inmate assaults and
more dangerous incidents, such as riots, are a threat. Managing critical
incidents is a significant part of a warden's job. Duties include drafting and
reviewing emergency plans, ensuring the readiness of response teams and
implementing emergency plans when an incident arises."

The last thing these people need is automated FAXes scraping one of the least
reliable services on the web. It's shameful.

~~~
Fjolsvith
Your comment is spot-on imho.

I have done time in 6 state prisons, 2 federal prisons, two federal detention
centers, and several county jails. As long as the inmates aren't killing each
other, the warden/superintendent/sheriff doesn't care overmuch what goes on
inside regarding the inmate experience.

That is, unless it makes him look good.

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danso
I'm assuming this is a half-facetious joke from the creators, but its core
intent is sound: valid feedback doesn't always get to the desk on which the
buck stops. Not necessarily out of a pursuit of "see no evil, hear no evil..."
but just because there's too much noise in the overall dataset of
complaints/opinions, and not enough tools or efforts to filter and sift for
possible leads. The recent GM recall debacle comes to mind, in which 260
complaints purportedly related to ignition problems were submitted to the
NHTSA yet apparently not acted on [1]. The NHTSA's defense is that 260
complaint records is not statistically significant...but...by their criteria,
it seems that a lot of complaint trends would fall in that category. The
bigger issue is that not enough information is gathered about the complaints
to make an informed decision about recalls. Sure, but can the regulators (or
carmakers) honestly say that the people who would prioritize such fact-finding
are fully aware of what the complaints data (all which can be downloaded by
anyone from the NHTSA website [2]) contains at any given point? It's not about
taking action when the truth is encapsulated perfectly in a database, but
making the effort to sift that database efficiently for leads.

tldr: there's a lot of room for improvement and innovation in filtering
feedback for further investigation and action, not just in prisons but much of
the public sector.

(for simplicity's sake, I'm ignoring the obvious factor of
companies/regulators deliberately and maliciously not giving a shit/covering-
things up...which is of course, always something to be aware of)

[1] [http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/09/business/auto-
regulators-d...](http://www.nytimes.com/2014/03/09/business/auto-regulators-
dismissed-defect-tied-to-13-deaths.html)

[2] [http://www-odi.nhtsa.dot.gov/downloads/](http://www-
odi.nhtsa.dot.gov/downloads/)

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markbnj
I thought there were some rules passed years ago regarding unsolicited faxes,
due to the costs in paper and ink they incurred. I remember the topic coming
up in the late 80's or early 90's I think.

I wonder if this use falls under those rules?

[https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/junk-
faxes](https://www.fcc.gov/consumers/guides/junk-faxes)

~~~
rory096
Of course not. It's not in any way an advertisement.

~~~
mattmanser
It's an advertisement for Yelp, would it matter that Yelp's not sending it?

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eridius
Cute, but I'd be concerned that automated unsolicited faxes are not
necessarily something that people want to receive.

~~~
jlgaddis
I'm pretty sure that every company with a fax machine whose number isn't
private is accustomed to receiving "automated unsolicited faxes". At $work, we
receive just as many (if not more) spam faxes as we do legitimate ones. People
just toss 'em in the trash and don't think twice about it.

~~~
TeMPOraL
I worked for a few months in a research facility in the UK, and had a fax
machine on a desk next to me. Once a day, it would turn itself on and print
out an ad for a car, or insurance, or something. I was shocked to discover
that spam is a thing on fax machines.

~~~
vidarh
Spam has been a thing on fax machines since long before Canter and Siegel's
infamous green card spam on Usenet (1994; it wasn't the first, but it was the
first truly major spam)..

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bobo123
I think this is really great. How often do we as a society take the voices of
prisoners seriously? It's kind of interesting to see a "view from below." Very
cool work.

~~~
hnal943
Do you expect people should like prison? Prison would not be much of a
deterrent if it didn't get 1 star from just about everyone in terms of the
experience. In terms of dealing with actual abuse of prisoners, the courts are
a far more robust system for dealing with complaints.

~~~
DanBC
The US has a brutal prison system where prison rape and sexual assault is
routine.

The US also has a huge prison population and recidivism is high, so the
brutality of the system doesn't seem to work much as a deterrent.

~~~
hnal943
How do yelp reviews address this problem?

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Blackthorn
I teach computer science at a prison on a volunteer basis, and occasionally
I've had to use Google Maps to get directions. Always amusing to see some one-
star reviews of it as I find the address.

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jessaustin
"Would not recommend to a friend..."

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Modernnomad84
This is so cool. Wish we saw more stuff like this on HN. Also liked the other
projects you have listed on your site.

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saaaam
Authors here - if anyone has any questions or critiques please let us know.

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blairanderson
i think this is rad.

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jrochkind1
this is good art.

