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Craigslist Suing Padmapper

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Re: Craigslist Suing Padmapper

#261

Post by hollerith »

freehunter wrote: post #57
brador wrote: post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

"Flying under the radar hoping we don't get caught and sued for something we know is wrong" should not be a part of any reasonable business plan.

But many startups do not have reasonable business plans. They have crazy business plans that everyone knows will fail, except sometimes they don't. Many startups have begun knowing they were going to be sued, knowing they were going to have legal and publicity problems. That's the nature of the disruptive business that everyone wants to be in these days.

>Many startups have begun knowing they were going to be sued

Name one startup that began knowing they were going to be sued and went on to a successful exit.

Parenthetically, the original Napster, the one that began knowing it would be sued, was sold about 3 years after its founding for less than $2.5 million as part of bankruptcy proceedings -- and I doubt that the owners took any significant dividends out of its before its sale: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Napster#Current_status

Re: Craigslist Suing Padmapper

#262

Post by eli »

stcredzero wrote: post #241
eli wrote: post #112

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I thought it was weird that CL didn't add a Disallow line for padmapper to robots.txt from the start (just from a PR perspective). But robots.txt has no special legal authority, it's just a convention used to communicate a publisher's intent. I'm pretty sure the C&D letter made it 100% clear that CL did not want Padmapper crawling their site or using their data.

Padmapper doesn't crawl Craigslist. That's not how it happens.

...any more. Now they are using a third party, but at the time Craigslist sent the C&D they were scraping the site directly.

Re: Craigslist Suing Padmapper

#263

Post by astral303 »

sulife wrote: post #224
pg wrote: post #210

Craig Newmark said on Quora that the reason they didn't like people building stuff on top of Craigslist was simply the extra bandwidth they consumed: http://www.quora.com/Why-hasnt-anyone-built-any-products-on-... But now that 3Taps has found an ingenious way to get at the data with zero extra bandwidth cost to Craigslist (by retrieving it from the Google cache rather than CL itself), it's clear that what Craigslist…

Just like they try to keep the facade up that CL barely makes money. They are swimming in so much $ it's insane.

Proof?

Re: Craigslist Suing Padmapper

#264

Post by president »

sulife wrote: post #224
pg wrote: post #210

Craig Newmark said on Quora that the reason they didn't like people building stuff on top of Craigslist was simply the extra bandwidth they consumed: http://www.quora.com/Why-hasnt-anyone-built-any-products-on-... But now that 3Taps has found an ingenious way to get at the data with zero extra bandwidth cost to Craigslist (by retrieving it from the Google cache rather than CL itself), it's clear that what Craigslist…

Just like they try to keep the facade up that CL barely makes money. They are swimming in so much $ it's insane.

source?

Re: Craigslist Suing Padmapper

#265

Post by potatolicious »

chimi wrote: post #37
cwp wrote: post #22

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Padmapper doesn't steal IP.

It's pretty clear that Padmapper is making use of the craigslist posts without the rights to do so, which is defined by Merriam-Webster as "stealing". STEALING transitive verb 1a : to take or appropriate without right or leave and with intent to keep or make use of wrongfully http://www.merriam-webster.com/dictionary/stealing If you're going to downvote me, that's fine, but if you do, please show how copyright infrin…

There ought to be a rule that when someone reaches for the dictionary in a debate they've already lost. I keep seeing this on HN - a dictionary is probably the worst place go find out about what a word really means.

Re: Craigslist Suing Padmapper

#266

Post by warfangle »

kloncks wrote: post #250
untog wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what Craigslist really dislikes is competition Hm, would you not say that what Craigslist really dislikes is their competition piggy-backing off their data ? Craigslist seemed quite happy with the existing situation until Padmapper launched their own listing service. Though I agree that it's not in the spirit of a .org, if such concept exists.

No. It's not their data. It's ours, as the users. Craigslist doesn't own anything I upload to them. The reason PadMapper exists is because Craigslist refuses to not suck.

"You automatically grant and assign to CL, and you represent and warrant that you have the right to grant and assign to CL, a perpetual, irrevocable, unlimited, fully paid, fully sub-licensable (through multiple tiers), worldwide license to copy, perform, display, distribute, prepare derivative works from (including, without limitation, incorporating into other works) and otherwise use any content that you post. You also expressly grant and assign to CL all rights and causes of action to prohibit and enforce against any unauthorized copying, performance, display, distribution, use or exploitation of, or creation of derivative works from, any content that you post (including but not limited to any unauthorized downloading, extraction, harvesting, collection or aggregation of content that you post)."

http://www.craigslist.org/about/terms.of.use

Re: Craigslist Suing Padmapper

#267

Post by ceejayoz »

stcredzero wrote: post #260
ceejayoz wrote: post #253

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I currently own, but my last place was rented in 2010 without Craigslist. It's entirely possible.

Possible != practical in all cases.

There's no Constitutional right to a practical apartment hunt, either.

Re: Craigslist Suing Padmapper

#268

Post by eli »

kloncks wrote: post #250
untog wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what Craigslist really dislikes is competition Hm, would you not say that what Craigslist really dislikes is their competition piggy-backing off their data ? Craigslist seemed quite happy with the existing situation until Padmapper launched their own listing service. Though I agree that it's not in the spirit of a .org, if such concept exists.

No. It's not their data. It's ours, as the users. Craigslist doesn't own anything I upload to them. The reason PadMapper exists is because Craigslist refuses to not suck.

Exactly right. And if you want your data to be reposted on another site, then you should repost it.

Craigslist is delivering exactly what it its users signed up for (no more no less). People posting ads on Craigslist do not necessarily want or intend for it to be reposted on other sites.

Re: Craigslist Suing Padmapper

#269

Post by Zimahl »

kloncks wrote: post #250
untog wrote: post #244

Earlier quoted context omitted.

what Craigslist really dislikes is competition Hm, would you not say that what Craigslist really dislikes is their competition piggy-backing off their data ? Craigslist seemed quite happy with the existing situation until Padmapper launched their own listing service. Though I agree that it's not in the spirit of a .org, if such concept exists.

No. It's not their data. It's ours, as the users. Craigslist doesn't own anything I upload to them. The reason PadMapper exists is because Craigslist refuses to not suck.

And as a user you can put your information up on PadMapper if you like. If you don't, then it isn't up to PadMapper to get it for you.

Re: Craigslist Suing Padmapper

#270

Post by potatolicious »

greyboy wrote: post #202
keeptrying wrote: post #90

Heartbreaking. Padmapper is the best apartment rental interface out there. The author has been single handedly working on this for 3-4 years and constantly improving his system. Legally he might not have been in the right but we should be helping him out not uselessly debating and casting judgement. If theres anyone who exmplifies the true spirit of Hacker News it would be the author of PadMapper.

> Legally he might not have been in the right but we should be helping him out not uselessly debating and casting judgement. If he's not "legally not in the right," why should I be helping him (doesn't that imply casting a judgement - that PadMapper is elevated above CraigsList because it's "the best apartment rental interface our there")? What if the tables were turned and CraigsList was violating PadMapper's TOS? W…

> "If he's not "legally not in the right," why should I be helping him (doesn't that imply casting a judgement - that PadMapper is elevated above CraigsList because it's "the best apartment rental interface our there")?"

Because legal right and moral right sometimes intersect, but not nearly always.

Because once in a blue moon somebody comes along and creates something with such enormous public good that it forces us to reconsider the context of both legal and moral righteousness.

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