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Craigslist Is Ugly, Janky, Old School, and Unbeatable

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Re: Craigslist Is Ugly, Janky, Old School, and Unbeatable

#11

Post by vyrotek »

grapevines wrote: post #3

Network effect, reliability, free, anonymous, ability to run without JavaScript. If Craigslist decided to modernize today, they could potentially disrupt the state of things on the internet. Facebook is trying to move in on their territory for sure. Unfortunately, I don't think they will. If a new-kid-on-the-block could offer anonymity, reliability, and free regional market based transactions, with preferably integra…

From what I understand, people started local garage sale groups on Facebook specifically to remove anonymity. It's a benefit for those people. Facebook is just taking what is already a massively popular use of their groups feature and officially supporting it. It won't replace craigslist but it will do just fine.

Re: Craigslist Is Ugly, Janky, Old School, and Unbeatable

#12

Post by brixon »

jasonkostempski wrote: post #9
zerr wrote: post #6

But you still can't search remote jobs, or any jobs without specifying exact town...

I don't get why you can't search for anything across the towns. If I'm looking for something hard to find but is reasonably shippable, I might want to take the risk of a trusting the seller or work out some escrow type thing.

It is likely a technology issue that Craigslist may not desire to fix. It is possible that each city is a different database instance. That is a simple way to scale, but has issues like you are seeing.

Re: Craigslist Is Ugly, Janky, Old School, and Unbeatable

#13

Post by Analemma_ »

smallgovt wrote: post #8

I find it interesting that there's a general undertone that CL is being "honorable" by choosing to not make more profit. I have no doubt Craig's intentions were honorable, but in reality, his refusal to make money to fund the site's innovation is hurting society. His users are screaming "TAKE MY MONEY AND MAKE THE SITE (MY LIFE) BETTER", but he refuses to do so and everyone is worse off because of it! In a way, it's…

Put down the Ayn Rand and go outside.

Re: Craigslist Is Ugly, Janky, Old School, and Unbeatable

#14

Post by Animats »

smallgovt wrote: post #8

I find it interesting that there's a general undertone that CL is being "honorable" by choosing to not make more profit. I have no doubt Craig's intentions were honorable, but in reality, his refusal to make money to fund the site's innovation is hurting society. His users are screaming "TAKE MY MONEY AND MAKE THE SITE (MY LIFE) BETTER", but he refuses to do so and everyone is worse off because of it! In a way, it's…

Craigslist is quite profitable. It just doesn't overdo it.

Re: Craigslist Is Ugly, Janky, Old School, and Unbeatable

#17

Post by laurentdc »

grapevines wrote: post #3

Network effect, reliability, free, anonymous, ability to run without JavaScript. If Craigslist decided to modernize today, they could potentially disrupt the state of things on the internet. Facebook is trying to move in on their territory for sure. Unfortunately, I don't think they will. If a new-kid-on-the-block could offer anonymity, reliability, and free regional market based transactions, with preferably integra…

> ability to run without JavaScript.

Genuinely asking - is that still an important quality as of today?

Re: Craigslist Is Ugly, Janky, Old School, and Unbeatable

#18

Post by fnovd »

smallgovt wrote: post #8

I find it interesting that there's a general undertone that CL is being "honorable" by choosing to not make more profit. I have no doubt Craig's intentions were honorable, but in reality, his refusal to make money to fund the site's innovation is hurting society. His users are screaming "TAKE MY MONEY AND MAKE THE SITE (MY LIFE) BETTER", but he refuses to do so and everyone is worse off because of it! In a way, it's…

Or perhaps Craig simply understands his business better than you do.

Are the loudest users the ones providing him with the most profit? If not, then why not ignore them?

Would being involved as a true middleman leave them more open to liability when things go south? If so, why open yourself to that risk if you are already making profit?

If you really think CL is so under-utilized, why hasn't a larger company bought them out, improved the site, and raked in increased profit?

Re: Craigslist Is Ugly, Janky, Old School, and Unbeatable

#19

Post by csharpminor »

I actually think that Craigslist will come to see tough competition from Facebook Marketplace.

Facebook has the existing user base to get a network effect, has a much better UI, notifications, and solves for the worry of meeting someone who is a complete unknown.

Will be interesting to see if Facebook chips away at the Craigslist user-base over the next few years.

Re: Craigslist Is Ugly, Janky, Old School, and Unbeatable

#20

Post by 37 »

grapevines wrote: post #3

Network effect, reliability, free, anonymous, ability to run without JavaScript. If Craigslist decided to modernize today, they could potentially disrupt the state of things on the internet. Facebook is trying to move in on their territory for sure. Unfortunately, I don't think they will. If a new-kid-on-the-block could offer anonymity, reliability, and free regional market based transactions, with preferably integra…

>If Craigslist decided to modernize today

I misread this as "decided to monetize today" and interpreted an IPO.

Has Craigslist ever thought about this?

Any thoughts?

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