"I didn't build my business out of algorithms, I built it with people" -

That's the message I will most take away from the past two weeks as I traveled through Jakarta, Bali, Bangkok and Phuket, meeting and listening to hoteliers and restaurant owners whose fortunes are affected in one way or another by review sites such as TripAdvisor.

Picture shows pool at Moevenpick Resort & Spa, Phuket which, by the way, was absolutely full with mainly Chinese, Korean and Australian customers.

It was a restaurant owner in Phuket who said it as he expressed his frustrations over the power of such "platforms" to affect small businesses such as his – one bad review and your business could dive; one good review and your business could fly.

Either way, it's real people who are affected, he said.

Such is the reality of the new world – it's algorithms that determine whether a review is fake or real and indeed, that helps us seek what we find on the Internet.

With 23 reviews coming in a minute at TripAdvisor, which now has 50 million reviews, it is impossible for humans to be sifting through the reviews and deciding which are fake or which are genuine.

And so algorithms are the first line of defence, with a second level of quality control applied, where necessary, by some sort of "fraud squad" trained at detecting fake stuff.

And let's face it, neither technology nor humans are infallible.

Full story:

www.webintravel.com//blog/i-didnt-bulld-my-business-on-algorithms_1932