Focus on the Evidence: A Brief Rebuttal of Wu, Luca, et al

Abstract

Yelp and other members of its “Focus on the User – Local” interest group commissioned a paper by Tim Wu, Michael Luca, and others (the “FOTUL Paper”). This paper ostensibly provides empirical data to show that Google is “degrading its own search results” for some queries by displaying a local results box containing Google’s own local results – rather than results taken from other local search services, such as Yelp. We examined the FOTUL Paper and its associated evidence, and conclude that its claims are not tenable. In particular, the FOTUL Paper’s testing methodology is invalid and does not support any of its claims.