Not because I think its a better service, or anything. In the end, I think that Craigslist just has too much inertia, but, I suppose if anyone has the clout and mainstream awareness — and the corporate willingness to spend on advertising and marketing to make it a fair go of it, I think it would be eBay.
But that’s besides the point.
The reason why my vote is with eBay is because I would like nothing better than to see Jim Buckmaster and Craig Newmark challenged on their hippie ethos at Craigslist. You know — the “we’re not in the business of maximizing revenues” approach to things? The “People should go where they get the best service — even if its not us” tack on things?
All fine and good.
And easy when you’re the biggest kid on the block, whose very size makes it all but impossible for any real competitors to sink their teeth into you.
But now that eBay has put on the gloves? I’m real interested now, because this has the real makings of a real fight. Real competition. Maybe forcing Craigslist to do some real innovating, or re-think their ideals.
That is to say, perhaps forcing them to answer an unanswered question many people are thinking: what *would* a company do, which has a “delightful communist” at the helm, which has stated that things like “advertising” and “marketing” and other capitalistic practices are antithetical to its values — if it were ever given serious competition? What would happen if its market share dropped 10%?
… 20%?
… or how about 40%?
Would this cause Craig Newmark to sweat? Would they start doing something about it? Or would they happily put a sign up linking to Kijiji because — clearly — *some* people *do* find that they’re better at being Craigslist than Craiglist?
Call me cynical, but I’m a little bit skeptical of the whole Craigslist message. Its fine and convenient to have when you have no real competition. But when push comes to shove, will they still uphold these values?
July 4th, 2007 at 1:07 pm | Permalink
Kijiji — Worst.Name.Ever.
July 4th, 2007 at 1:10 pm | Permalink
[…] says he hopes Kijiji succeeds, if only so that someone can challenge Craig and Jim on what he calls “their hippie ethos.” Craigslist, eBay, kijiji | Share This | Related […]
July 4th, 2007 at 1:13 pm | Permalink
I honestly hope eBay will do more with Kijiwhawhat [sic]than they’ve done with the Gumtree here in the UK. Although the Gumtree is growing in popularity and has gained track, especially among travelers and backpackers in London, it’s still is way undermarketed and eBay kinda disappointed me with the Gumtree, they could do much better.
Even though they managed it to partially knock out the online version of TNT Magazine when it comes to private ads, qualifieds not managed by large agencies, outside London no one knows or uses the Gumtree.
So lets hope they combine their UK knowledge when jumping to Craig’s throat.
July 4th, 2007 at 2:54 pm | Permalink
I couldn’t agree more. I really like using Craigslist, but some of their policies are utterly ridiculous. I was trying to find a tech writer, so I figured I’d post in both SF and NY - both good venues for such a thing. My 2nd post was blocked because it was a duplicate entry. So I rewrote the entire thing and posted it in NY. Within hours some I’ve-got-too-much-time-on-my-hands-Craigslist-troll-fanboy took it down for violating some ethos nonsense.
It’s one thing to block spammers, it’s another to put up obstacles such that legitimate uses become too painful.
The irony of it all? I was trying to find volunteer writers to help me on a green-tech blog I was trying to get going, which was aimed to be, wait for it - not-for-profit!
July 4th, 2007 at 3:03 pm | Permalink
As much it would be good to see a viable rival to Craigslist, I think it “owns” the market - much like the Blackberry owns mobile e-mail. Not to suggest Kijiji (terrible, terrible name!) won’t be successful but it will be a challenge gaining a meaningful foothold.
July 4th, 2007 at 5:13 pm | Permalink
Mark,
No question that Craigslist is big, and you’re right it does “own” the market in many respects. On the other hand, eBay has the pockets, it has the will, it has the existing brand name, and its had an eye in Craigslist’s boardroom (such as it has been) for the past 3 years.
I suspect that if anyone is a legitimate contender, its eBay — dumb name not withstanding.
July 4th, 2007 at 5:16 pm | Permalink
Jeremy,
Thanks for stopping by with your sad, but un-intentionally funny tale of woe. ;)
Let us know how things turn out with things!
Cheers
tony.
July 4th, 2007 at 5:19 pm | Permalink
franky,
Time will tell as to whether eBay can make a real go of it. But they’ll need to get their crap together if they do. Which I hope they do. ;)
July 4th, 2007 at 5:19 pm | Permalink
rslux,
Agreed.
But its gotten people to talk about it, hasn’t it? :)
July 5th, 2007 at 9:37 am | Permalink
If you guys get to SF, spend a few minutes with Craig over coffee. You’ll find that he does mean what he says and losing market share would not affect his behavior. Regardless of that, he’s sufficiently communistic (really Anarchistic in the very old sense) that eBay won’t be willing to lose enough money for long enough to even make a dent in him.
July 5th, 2007 at 10:12 am | Permalink
Scott,
I have no doubt that even in person, Craig believes what he says.
The question is if he remains true to his beliefs if they are challenged in a real way. Its easy to be all communist / anarchist / non-capitalist while you’re sitting at the top of the heap.
And that’s the reason why I’m hoping eBay brings it. Sure, there are loads of reasons why Kijiji will fail / “not make a dent in him”. But I think if anyone could, it’ll be eBay.
July 17th, 2007 at 6:46 pm | Permalink
I predict, based on nothing but intuition, that CL will no longer be the 800 lb gorilla (izzat the right figure of speech?) in three years. Not because of eBay, but because more and more people are going to find the things they used to find on CL elsewhere — whether that is facebook or some other SNS (even eBay has a 2.0 quality to it now). Most people would rather join a community of people they can ‘get to know’ and sell/buy/ask/answer/engage with/to/from them, and craigslist doesn’t really seem to offer that opportunity. Also, I’ve always been surprised that CL doesn’t offer basic features that would greatly enhance its effectiveness. For instance, when you’re looking for a room or an apt, there could be fields for basic things like dimensions, windows, closets, etc. Once I looked for rooms in NYC and ended up looking at a lot of tiny airless rooms that probably were closets! If dimensions had been posted, I wouldn’t have wasted my time.
August 18th, 2007 at 11:14 am | Permalink
Many of Craigslists policies are unreasonable but Ebay is not any better. I can’t count the number of times I have been utterly pissed off at Ebay or Paypal.
My first Ebay SECRET NICHE is revealed at
http://www.DayJobNuker.com