The One Tech Company That's Engaging In California's Housing Debate

While tech giants like Google, Facebook, and Apple have approached the Bay Area's housing crisis gingerly the CEO of Yelp has thrown himself into the YIMBY movement. His activism says a lot about the real world and the virtual world.

May 3, 2018, 8am PDT | Josh Stephens

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"Last year, Stoppelman wrote a $100,000 check to SF-BARF. This donation got Trauss in trouble with some of her anticapitalist critics, who complained that she was just doing the bidding of big business. I’d like to think, though, that it’s the other way around: this is one instance in which business is doing the bidding of — or at least supporting — the common good."

"Stoppelman called out his fellow tech giants directly the other night: 'Google and Facebook have started to engage locally, Stoppelman said, and he’s surprised that "more tech leaders weren’t paying attention to this problem as it was developing,'" according to the Chronicle. Not exactly damning criticism, but it’s a start."

"Yelp’s users come from the same faceless mass of bits and bytes that Facebook’s, Google’s, and Snap’s do. But, whereas those other companies seek to create their own 'communities' online, Yelp is one of the few tech companies whose product is linked, intrinsically and immutably, to the real world. (No offense to Pokémon Go.)....Cities thrive when Yelp works properly, and Yelp thrives when cities work properly."

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Yelp in My Backyard

Published on Tuesday, May 1, 2018 in California Planning & Development Report