Join the discussion
Write your take first — we'll ask for email only when you're ready to publish.
- Hacker News
- That is beautiful! I hope to be able to be well off enough some day to give to causes I believe in (to start I would fund a ton of open-source engineers on projects that I use).
Love news like this, happy tears!
by ElijahLynn - Yeah, if there's a commercial site running on FOSS, it seems a disservice not to give back to support those efforts if the option comes up. Closes the loop. Every web page should really have a crypto address attached to it, or at least the ones that are open to receiving something back.
Maybe a DNS-like system for crypto addresses would be a good thing for Craig to setup? One probably already exists. Maybe something like [existing domain].coin - and people can claim their .coin domain by verifying their [existing domain] first.
What happens if 100 billionaires start wanting to offload cash? How can that be efficiently and effectively managed?
Speaking or CL - lots of dormant cities. Shouldn't there be a https://cityname.craigslist.org/feed link to get RSS updates if/when something actually gets posted? Good way to help "starting up" cities.
by adrianwaj - Craigslist is the pinnacle of web sites. True brutalist web design.by LeoPanthera
- McMaster-Carr has entered the chat...by mizzao
- Pinnacle because it was a simple, functional website back when it started in '95. Back when UI design didn't cost millions of dollars with MBs of crap JS clogging things up.by 1970-01-01
- > True brutalist web design.
Concrete web design? What does that mean?
I guess you mean the site is simple but that's not what brutalism is.
by driverdan - > He doesn’t own a car and takes public transportation in New York City.
Mr. Newmark gets it! I hope he's as nice in person as he comes off in this article.
by nunez - Very on-the-spectrum (PS: and proudly so) IIRC. That has to mitigate the sociopathies that typically accompany great wealth.by bluebarbet
- I appreciate any and all support for (independent) journalism. Craig Newmark Philanthropies has been very generous in that regard.
Were I king, I'd (also):
A keen observer may notice my proposal mirrors the right-wing ecosystem built up over the last 50 years.- Create endowments for journalistic orgs. Sufficient that they can maintain financial, and therefore editorial, independence. - Award lots of grants to independent journalists, to simply do their thing, no strings attached. This ensures plenty of content for those independent orgs.Currently, investments by non-right-wing donors to non-right-wing orgs are contingent. Metrics, strategy, ideology, blah blah blah. Whereas the right-wing ecosystem doesn't get bogged down by the money chase, endless self-justification, navel gazing, consensus building, etc.
by specialist - I'd be curious to know how the economics of craigslist works, such that he's made so many hundreds of millions of dollars. It only charges a modest fee for a small fraction of transactions, but presumably the denominator is big enough that this adds up (and of course he would have subsequently invested the proceeds).
I had assumed that the fee portion of the site was substantial enough to cover all costs, and generate perhaps tens of millions of profit (he's well known for having given away money to media, so obviously there's some profit). But I didn't realize that it made hundreds of millions of dollars.
Are there any articles that break down how this pencils out?
by apparent - He and James made hundreds of millions of dollars off ads for prostitution. Knowingly.
Throwing money at military veterans doesn't erase the stain of having a hand in the explosion of human trafficking and sexual exploitation Craigslist (and Backpages) enabled.
The FBI arrested Gambino family members for child prostitution, and one of their top ways of soliciting Johns was via paid ads in Craigslist. One state AG counted 200,000 ads a year and estimated the revenue to be almost $2M, in their state alone.
by KennyBlanken - I suppose some of it is due to craigslist being around for 30+ years. At $25-$30 million a year, it adds up over time. And then if he invests most of it, 30 years of compounding interest does the rest.by Jblx2
- A few details are given here: https://fox4kc.com/business/press-releases/ein-presswire/799...
Revenue peaked in 2018 at $1 billion.
by layer8 - I think he has given away a whole lot more than half a billion dollars when you think of the opportunity squandered to grow CL the way other unicorney companies grewby foobarian
- > opportunity squandered to grow CL the way other unicorney companies grew
squandered?
how about: decided not to become an asshole billionaire like many of the other unicorn asshole billionaires, and help other people instead
- > to grow CL the way other unicorney companies grew
By hiring McKinsey to tell them they need to start selling and and acquire their competitors? That is the only way the unicorns established their position.
by rchaud - it was an intentional choice to not go big. I can seriously respect that. I feel like all these "big tech leaders" like Zuck or Musk have some pretty blatant mental health issues, its a path with significant drawbacks because that level of absurd wealth causes issues.by Quarrelsome
- Craigslist is one of the few sites with a UI even better than HN. Totally fits that Craig would have this type of character.by xnx
- Is Craigslist still the go-to classifieds site in some places?
Around here it’s (very sadly IMO) been almost completely replaced by Facebook Marketplace, to the extent that people make Facebook accounts just to use Marketplace.
by jrmg - I've been told that it is a regional thing.by vvpan
- I found Karrot to be a better experience than FB Marketplace.by g8oz
- In Wisconsin and Illinois, I had far better luck both buying and selling on CL. I moved to CA fairly recently but the story seems to be the same here.
As a seller, FB marketplace is just a neverending stream of "Is this still available?" "Yes" and then radio silence.
I also found it far less common for CL sellers to share a different price in DMs than they list in the ad. CL users are also better about taking their ad down when the item is sold.
Going to a separate website and (gasp!) sending an actual email or calling someone, those are strong filters for intent that FB Marketplace lacks.
by ryukoposting - I use both in the Bay Area and have never succeeded in selling anything on FB. Craigslist usually connects me with some buyer and if not I go to eBay.by jeffbee
- I only sell on Facebook marketplace because being able to see someone’s profile means a lot less time spent selling the item.by lotsofpulp
- I use ND first, then CL. I've used FB a few times, but mostly it's been scammers (though I have friends who swear by it).by apparent
- I sell on CL and FB Marketplace. Some items that I listed for months on CL sold in days on FB, but I prefer CL. FB search results are inferior often because FB posters created misleading ads and don't delete ads for events that have already occurred. Never tried Nextdoor because they required I give them my cell phone number. My landline number was not enough.by memcg
- I remember in the early days of Craigslist, I interviewed for a job with someone who advertised there. After the third interview, they offered me a job--with no money. They wanted to pay in shares of this tiny startup. I had explicitly asked them--I took good notes--in interview #1 if they had an actual opening for an actual job.
I filed a lawsuit in Santa Clara county for "Fraudulent Misrepresentation" and they settled with me for $5,000. (California law is very good on this. They broke two laws with no cash wages and a non-compliant job posting.) But I also told Craig Newmark, because they had their job listing on Craigslist. He pulled their job listings, and sent me an email assuring me that nobody associated with the company would ever be able to advertise on Craigslist again. I was very impressed.
by fortran77 - Sadly, I think Craig might have done MORE for society by simply improving Craig's List and removing/reducing the amount of spam and junk posts it allows.
I can't claim the changes would be easy to implement, but if they made a FEW small changes the result would be 1000x better.
For example if you want to sell something on Craig's List they do some "you can't make this post because it looks too similar to a previous posting" kind of thing AND you might need a mobile number but somehow someone can stuff 1000 random keywords into a for-sale posting that's not at all about the item? So if you're looking for a "Miata" you'll end up getting listing for a bunch of other cars since someone is gaming the system?
Or it's an option to "reject duplicates" -- why do duplicates or clone postings even show up if they have their "this is too similar to another posting" capability?
Or, Craig's List lets AutoTrader and other "commercial" sites post items but if you want to actually message someone now on AutoTrader you need to upload your DRIVERS LICENSE just to send them a message? So Craig's List is OK with a reciprocal arrangement with a vendor who does not honor the same "equality" rules Craig's List was built on?
Sadly, many years ago I would send feedback to Craig's List and Craig himself would reply. I don't know if he's completely checked out of his site now, but if you're out there Craig a few simple changes could restore the utility of the service which you created. People like me would even PAY to see these improvements.
by vrinsd - If you're going to talk about societal impact then you need to also look at how much they enabled sexual exploitation and human trafficking, worldwide, by serving as an ad site for pimps.
Craig and James knew damn well where most of their revenue was coming from, and pimps were able to get increasingly bold with their slang, moving from "model" to "escort" to just outright saying "prostitute" because Craigslist didn't care.
They only did something about it in 2010 when public outrage grew and prosecutors - around the world - started investigating.
Craig and James belong in jail cells, not having their di...er, egos, stroked for giving away their money to organizations that help veterans - the most lazy, non-controversial target for a non-profit.
by KennyBlanken - This is right. The good he was doing society was the product Craigslist.org. It touched hundreds of millions of lives for the better and, sometimes, worse. He had no great lever. I'm skeptical the non-profits/charities had any where near the societal benefit. The article seems light on what he actually accomplished by giving away $500Mby abunner