But for every link there are dozens of sites that outright steal our content with no attribution. Not just spam blogs, even the NYTimes does it. This isn't a copyright issue - the stories are rewritten by actual people. But it's far cheaper to simply take the news and rewrite it - if you can get away with it – than to hire people who do actual journalism. Over time, it becomes a competitive tax that is difficult to bear.

But even then, companies like ours can find a way to compete.

So what really scares me? It's the rise of fast food content that will surely, over time, destroy the mom and pop operations that hand craft their content today. It's the rise of cheap, disposable content on a mass scale, force fed to us by the portals and search engines.

Monday's launch of Shine, which will use a blog format, is aimed largely at giving the struggling Internet company additional opportunities to sell advertising targeted to the key decision-maker in many households. Yahoo said advertisers in consumer-packaged goods, retail and pharmaceuticals have requested more ways to reach those consumers.

Amy Iorio, vice president for Yahoo Lifestyles, said internal research also shows women are looking for a site to aggregate various content and communications tools.

"These women were sort of caretakers for everybody in their lives," she said. "They didn't feel like there was a place that was looking at the whole them - as a parent, as a spouse, as a daughter. They were looking for one place that gave them everything."

Yahoo is partnering with media companies like Hearst Communications Inc. and Rodale Inc. for content exclusive to Shine. Hearst publishes Redbook, Cosmopolitan, Good Housekeeping and other magazines aimed at women, while Rodale publishes a range of magazines on sports and recreation, including Women's Health.

As online food sites become increasingly influential in the restaurant business, chefs and owners are plying bloggers with free meals to get good write-ups. Some are also posting favorable reviews about themselves on popular Web sites or becoming Internet scribes.

Among those using the tactics are some of the biggest names in the business. Terrance Brennan, co-owner and chef of New York's Artisanal Bistro and Picholine, hosted a cheese class for bloggers last year, waiving the usual $75-a-person fee. Bill Telepan, chef and co-owner of Telepan in New York, donated a $200, four-course meal to one influential blogger's online contest. And in Washington, the Park Hyatt's Blue Duck Tavern says it invited a customer back for a free Father's Day meal after she posted a negative comment on the Washington Post's Web site. (In a follow-up post, the diner wrote, "We will definitely return to Blue Duck Tavern," not mentioning that she had been invited free.)

Chefs say there's another upside to getting chummy with bloggers: advice on improving the food. In San Francisco, Chef Robbie Lewis of Bacar restaurant says he considers Ms. Gagliardi, of Tablehopper, "a friend" at this point. After hosting her at a "friends and family dinner" -- a meal to try out new dishes on close associates about a month after starting as the executive chef at the restaurant -- Mr. Lewis took her advice. He changed the way he plated a roasted baby leek dish, so it was easier for diners to get a taste of poached egg and sauce with each bite.

"I can't get feedback from other critics before publication," says Mr. Lewis. Ms. Gagliardi didn't write a subsequent review, but frequently mentions events at Bacar on her site.

It's relatively easy for restaurants to ingratiate themselves to key food bloggers. Publicists across the industry say they now include bloggers and food Web site forum hosts on their media lists, and regularly invite them to opening parties, free meals and other events.

What I was told, in a nutshell, is that the café staff has encountered a stream of would-be critics "with attitude," predisposed to take issue with or be critical of the business. Whether or not this is a correct perception, there are many more outlets (Yelp being only one) for customers and consumers to voice opinions about businesses on the Internet. And there's little most of these businesses can do about it, for better or for worse.

The staff said to me rhetorically, "If you've got a problem with something, you should tell us first rather than going online and posting." They also expressed the view that amateur reviewers, in this case from Yelp, were not making distinctions between local coffee houses and large corporate outlets like Starbucks. They were, the cafe staff argued, being "snarky" for entertainment reasons or to impress the Yelp community but not being respectful or mindful of the potential impact their reviews might have on a small businesses.

I spend an insane, glorious amount of time in restaurants. And of course I see and taste more than I get to recount within the confines of weekly Dining section reviews, each based on multiple visits to a given restaurant, each boiled down to about 1,000 words from hours and hours of observation and tens of thousands of calories.

This new blog is an attempt to capture and share more of my notes from the field. To provide, in something closer to real time, a sense of what's being served in the city's newest, oldest, most delightful and most frustrating restaurants and of how those restaurants are serving it. To flag trends and, less often and more selectively, flog underachievers. To report moments of real significance and incidents that just happened to be interesting. To keep a journal, and to keep the tone of that journal light, casual, accessible.

Where food critic Chris Sherman and I will blog about the things we love and hate about food and drink. Please join the discussion. Like us, we figure the only thing you love more than eating and drinking is talking about eating and drinking.

Here's my pet peeve: Why don't we get better bread, cheese and produce in the nation's fourth-most populated state? Why don't we demand better?

It’s all about the continuing evolution of consumer power. What started out as backyard discussions over clotheslines, where our mothers would discuss their opinions about retailers and products, evolved into 24 hour toll-free consumer hotlines, full-time consumer affairs staffs, letters to the editor and, at times, even protests and boycotts. Consumers want to be heard. They want to actively communicate their thoughts and preferences; as well as expose dishonest practices, false claims and bad service.