back in the days, chowhound was where the true foodies congregated. its morphed into an unfamiliar beast so i dont use it anymore.

yelp is good as a directory, but not as a guide. pervasive dirty business on the back end really turns me off it. that their feedback system are categorized as "useful" "cool" or "funny" just speaks to what kind of reviews they encourage. they strongly push the community aspect of their site, and id much rather have a blind Up/Down voting system that puts quality of review at forefront than one that young people use as a social platform.

which leaves Tripadvisor. it rightly prioritizes reviews, rather than reviewers. but its not void of clueless contribution. rather, they just come from 40 year old kansas joe rather than 25 year old tiffany. merely a demographics thing. one advantage is that it has better global coverage than yelp.

neither are great. both can be useful , if cross-referenced against each other or to other sources. specifically for food ill also use Michelin, Gault Millau, sometimes Zagat, and Andy Hayler for high-end dining.

as far as posting reviews, i only add to Tripadvisor because it has hotels and thus more travel-centric...and as mentioned i really detest the Yelp userbase