Kate's Blog

I’m sure that many restaurant goers have visited a dine-out review website at least once before going to a new place. For Vancouverites, two of the more popular restaurant review websites are Dinehere and Urbanspoon so I wanted to compare how each site awards a given restaurant its respective score.

Urbanspoon.com uses a dichotomous scale where voters can say they either like a restaurant or not. The site then provides the reader with a percentage of the voters who have “liked” a the restaurant. Dinehere.ca on the other hand provides a much more comprehensive review. Each restaurant is given an overall score out of 5 stars. However this score is comprised of 4 subscales that are also 5 stars each, though they each measure a separate aspect: food, service, value and ambiance. Furthermore, the website allows you to view every individual person’s full review.

Here are reviews from both sites for 5 restaurants:

The Foundation – DH: 3/5, US: 78%
The Eatery – DH: 3/5 , US: 73%
Stepho’s Greek Taverna – DH: 3/5, US: 77%
Pho Central – DH: 3/5, US: 91%
The Fringe Café – DH: 3.5/5, US: 57%

The dichotomous nature of Urbanspoon gives us a continuous range of scores but these scores are based on only one criteria making it difficult to know what the measurement is based on. However, Dinehere allows you to get a more complete idea of why the restaurant is rated the way it is and allows for a higher degree of differentiation.

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