Back when I was running a service called Feed Digest (which I went on to sell - mostly due to the issue I'm raising here - now known as Feed Informer) this was a common problem. Not just with Craigslist, but with feeds from Google and all over the place. We wouldn't hit a single feed any more than once every 30 minutes but getting whitelisted everywhere was an exhausting task and ensuring you could always get the feeds for your users to reprocess was so difficult that I was heavily turned off of getting into a "man in the middle" situation like that again.
Craigslist blocks Yahoo Pipes
61–70 of 88 posts
Re: Craigslist blocks Yahoo Pipes
#62Hold on here, let's call a spade a spade. Your project has its own doofy .com name, calls itself "alpha", and was rolled out on a web site whose primary function is to connect people who are trying to launch online business ventures. So to wave the bloody shirt after Craig stated that RSS feeds for noncommercial purposes are golden, is a little disingenuous. As others have pointed out, Craig's whole m.o. appears to b…
He's done more good through his site and the $$
he generates off his site ... than you, me and the next 100
people who read this combined.
Fortunately for you, I contribute little so the next 99 have to play catch up.
Re: Craigslist blocks Yahoo Pipes
#63Earlier quoted context omitted.
If someone is complaining about your service, it may be a good idea to listen to them. All of the "Blah, blah, if you want it you should be able to create your own super successful site" posts are really rather pointless. Yes, site/company owners have to make some tough decisions about their product, and how users can access/use it. There are going to be complaints, and there are going to be users who disagree. Telli…
Thanks for the tip. The pointer to your successful site is? Sorry, cheap shot but... And your claim that you or the other folks are a user is based on what? Craig takes care of the _actual_ users, the people who buy/sell stuff there, use it for job listings/postings, etc. Your point about listening to your users would be valid if you actually were one. Or better yet represented a whole class of users. The whining her…
i've been thinking about this topic (users, not craigslist) a lot over the past few weeks. thanks.
Re: Craigslist blocks Yahoo Pipes
#64Maybe this isn't as reactive as you think. I noticed just in the last few days CL blocks any listing containing the string "bit.ly" (a net good for CL users). Try creating a post and you will get an error on the screen where you normally solve a captcha.
Maybe your correspondence coincided with a more general security tune-up they decided to roll out on Thanksgiving?
Re: Craigslist blocks Yahoo Pipes
#65so how is http://housingmaps.com still allowed?
Re: Craigslist blocks Yahoo Pipes
#66Earlier quoted context omitted.
It just means there's a huge opportunity to build a great craigslist competitor by building a service that has all these features.
Have you ever heard of the network effect? Craigslist has such a lock on its market that you would have to have something extremely compelling to dislodge them. A few flashy maps and a web 2.0ish appearance wouldn't be nearly enough to do it.
Classified sites gain a regional dominance. Craigslist in canada for example, is only really dominant in vancouver, one of their biggest foreign markets. Kijiji is dominant in other towns.
Re: Craigslist blocks Yahoo Pipes
#67Suck the RSS to a VPS and read it via Pipes through that.
Re: Craigslist blocks Yahoo Pipes
#68I know Craig personally, slightly, we've been on panels together. I also know Jim and Susan, been to their place in the city, hung out. I'm old, 47, been in the valley for 20+ years. Seen a lot of shit, seen a lot of people get screwed over in stock options, seen the good and seen the bad. What I'm trying to do is establish credibility (prolly didn't do a good job). Whatever. You can listen or not. Craig is good peop…
This comment is a giant logical fallacy.
appeal to authority.
Re: Craigslist blocks Yahoo Pipes
#69It hurts me when people chose to keep things broken (Craigslist) for irrational reasons, especially when it wastes hours of time for millions of people.
their decision seems perfectly rational. if services like this one become popular, they are a huge threat to their business. they're not morally obligated to provide unfettered access to their data to anyone who wants it- i fail to see how it is "broken"
How are these people a threat to Craigslist business? The more people use its data, the more valuable it becomes to post to Craigslist, and the more market share Craigslist gains. Craigslist does not lose a dime because of third-party mash-up sites.
Re: Craigslist blocks Yahoo Pipes
#70You guys. Get a grip. It's his company, he built it, you didn't. He makes the rules, you don't. If you don't like that, then go build your own site that has the same level of success and define your own rules. And deal with all the people who tell you you are doing it wrong, that's a lot of fun. For the record, I have no connection to craigslist other than admiring it. I'm flaming because I've got my own company and…
They're a monopolist with a bad product, like Microsoft, but they have a crunchy image so bay area hackers love them, despite the fact that they are freezing a whole sector of business in the dark ages (again, like Microsoft).
Everything you wrote could have been used as a defense of Windows 98, or IE 6. You may be defending a shitty user experience with a monopolist position, but we love you Craig because at least you hate capitalism.