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Craigslist has been disrupted

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Re: Craigslist has been disrupted

#71

Post by georgieporgie »

rhizome wrote: post #16
georgieporgie wrote: post #14

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Not sure about the definition of "improving the site" here. How about some sort of reputation system? And decent moderation? As it stands, CL is a great way to (not) meet flaky people, and to have your posts taken down on the indecipherable whims of a few obsessive users. I've gotten one job, bought a few things, sold one motorcycle, and gave away most of my possessions via CL, and it was consistently an awful, frust…

It always takes more than "a few obsessive users," and there is a flag help forum on Craigslist to help explain how your ad might have trammeled your area's standards.

It always takes more than "a few obsessive users,"

As far as I'm aware, nobody knows what logic or thresholds are used by CL. Common wisdom is that it's "lots" but there seems to be no reason whatsoever to think that.

Re: Craigslist has been disrupted

#72

Post by vaksel »

craigslist won't be disrupted for the simple reason because they have a ton of traffic...UI etc, is pointless for classifieds since the only thing people care about is whether or not the service has buyers/sellers for the things they want...and Craigslist has that in spades.

i.e. I recently listed a car for sale on craigslist...listed it on Friday evening and got 8 interested people in a few hours, and it sold the next day.

Re: Craigslist has been disrupted

#73

Post by far33d »

vaksel wrote: post #72

craigslist won't be disrupted for the simple reason because they have a ton of traffic...UI etc, is pointless for classifieds since the only thing people care about is whether or not the service has buyers/sellers for the things they want...and Craigslist has that in spades. i.e. I recently listed a car for sale on craigslist...listed it on Friday evening and got 8 interested people in a few hours, and it sold the ne…

I'm sure there's someone who said that about newspaper classifieds once too.

Re: Craigslist has been disrupted

#74

Post by dedward »

carlosag wrote: post #17

I completely agree with Josh that there is a gap in functionality that needs to be filled. I often hear the argument that I should be grateful for this free online service... Poppycock! My attention on the internet is worth something. Especially for such a profitable industry as classifieds. If I'm looking for a house on the internet I want to be able to zoom into a certain area on a map and click 'refresh' to see al…

So somoene is free to go out and fill it - craigslist is under no obligation to do this. They're private. They can do what they want.

Just because a whole LOT of people would love to get their hands on it because they think they could make billions off it or monetize it better doesn't turn it into an obligation. Craigslist is what it is - and if Newmark is pulling in 50 million a year off it, for all this time, he's probably not all that concerned if the site dwindles out over the next half a decade, if it does that. Unless he has a horrid gambling habit he's probably sitting awfully pretty right about now.

Nobody's forcing you to use craigslist. If you have a better site out there, go use it. IF you think you can do better, try pitching it to them. IF you just want to whine that it's not as good as it could be and you aren't satisfied as a customer... wait.. you aren't a customer. Nevermind.

Craigslist is doing fine without you.

Re: Craigslist has been disrupted

#75

Post by dedward »

danilocampos wrote: post #23
nir wrote: post #8

>"I don't think Craig's a bad guy, but he's harvesting $50M a year into his pockets and not improving the site" Not sure about the definition of "improving the site" here. I'm thankful to CL for not building gratuitous UI, or half assed "social" element, or "tweet this post to your social graph". Instead they work on improving the content by fighting certain types of abuse, having the founder do customer support and…

The fact that they haven't done the things you describe doesn't change the fact that craigslist is a terrible product. It is clogged with spam. Clever types of spam, often ones that crowdsource their content by mining previously legit posts. Since there are no reputation mechanisms to speak of, it's far too easy to waste your time with stuff that's either spam or a scam. Meanwhile, data visualization has progressed d…

Right - it's so terrible nobody uses it -all those other awesome sites out there are just taking over then, right? Craigslist is doomed?

It's obviously a highly successful product. The model is simple, IIRC from articles past, the operating cost is minimal for the size of the userbase, it takes very little staff to actually run it, microscopically little compared to other sites that do far, far less.

If everyone is so keen on saying there's a better way to do property listings - go build it.

Re: Craigslist has been disrupted

#76

Post by dedward »

jarrett wrote: post #57
nir wrote: post #8

>"I don't think Craig's a bad guy, but he's harvesting $50M a year into his pockets and not improving the site" Not sure about the definition of "improving the site" here. I'm thankful to CL for not building gratuitous UI, or half assed "social" element, or "tweet this post to your social graph". Instead they work on improving the content by fighting certain types of abuse, having the founder do customer support and…

They've done a fine job of keeping the site responsive, but that's only a small part of what we normally demand from web apps. I don't fault them for spam. It's a very, very difficult problem, and since I don't have a magical solution to propose, I'm not going to complain. But there are a few areas where CL could have made major improvements at a reasonable cost, especially considering their revenue. They could have…

There also seems to clearly be enough usage and revenue, and profit, for the owners not to want to take it any further and be happy with what they have rather than risk change.

They are under no obligation to do anything with the site other than what they want to. They don't have to monetize it, or go public, or improve anything. If they're happy with what they've got, it's theirs to be happy with.

The only thing that would drive change would be an exodus of people - not just people complaining about how things could be better, but an actual clear, obvious drop in usage with a clear cause and a need for redesign.

(Look how well Digg's redesign worked out for them... it all but killed the site overnight.)

Re: Craigslist has been disrupted

#77

Post by dedward »

jarrett wrote: post #57
nir wrote: post #8

>"I don't think Craig's a bad guy, but he's harvesting $50M a year into his pockets and not improving the site" Not sure about the definition of "improving the site" here. I'm thankful to CL for not building gratuitous UI, or half assed "social" element, or "tweet this post to your social graph". Instead they work on improving the content by fighting certain types of abuse, having the founder do customer support and…

They've done a fine job of keeping the site responsive, but that's only a small part of what we normally demand from web apps. I don't fault them for spam. It's a very, very difficult problem, and since I don't have a magical solution to propose, I'm not going to complain. But there are a few areas where CL could have made major improvements at a reasonable cost, especially considering their revenue. They could have…

There also seems to clearly be enough usage and revenue, and profit, for the owners not to want to take it any further and be happy with what they have rather than risk change.

They are under no obligation to do anything with the site other than what they want to. They don't have to monetize it, or go public, or improve anything. If they're happy with what they've got, it's theirs to be happy with.

The only thing that would drive change would be an exodus of people - not just people complaining about how things could be better, but an actual clear, obvious drop in usage with a clear cause and a need for redesign.

(Look how well Digg's redesign worked out for them... it all but killed the site overnight.)

Re: Craigslist has been disrupted

#78

Post by dedward »

hansy wrote: post #5

"I don't think Craig's a bad guy, but he's harvesting $50M a year into his pockets and not improving the site." Pretty sure Craig Newmark is a nonprofit sort of guy with perfunctory role in the company. Blame Jim Buckmaster for Craigslist's refusal to evolve.

The only people who are in a position to lay any blame are the owners.... and we can be fairly certain the site is going in the direction they want it to.

Re: Craigslist has been disrupted

#79

Post by nihaar »

jarek wrote: post #47
nfriedly wrote: post #39

Is there anything better than CL for apartments in the SF area? RentHop (in the graphic in the article) looks like it's NYC only. I'm looking at a move to San Mateo this summer and every "apartment finder" website I've tried has been a pitiful experience.

Take a look at padmapper - it's craigslist apartments data with filtering and on a map.

May I recommend MapThatPad as well to store your results

Re: Craigslist has been disrupted

#80

Post by intended »

originalgeek wrote: post #64
adammichaelc wrote: post #54

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Had to look that one up. Pretty circular definition. http://www.urbandictionary.com/iphone/#define?term=ghosted

It's Craigslist jargon. I learned it off the forums I was lucky enough to accidentally stumble into.

Could you provide a link to the forum in case anyone else needs to figure it out? (assuming that the forum was useful)
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