Craigslist review: monopoly scam 15

Also, if Craigslist is exempt from any state or federal taxes, then they should pay taxes as every other for profit business.

http://www.craigslist.org/about/help/posting_fees

Craigslist is a for profit business with a .org site which is inaccurate and false.

Ebay is a for profit business.

The ebay / craigslist combination is a scam; they have de-facto control of classifieds.

The service is useful but the people running craigslist have too much power and they seem to abuse it; so some changes should take place to protect consumers.

By the way I am an Economist with an MBA from an Ivy League School and I am not a crook like some of those MBAers

its a de-facto monopoly; what matters is the market share and market clout that ebay and craigslist have of the classified market. There is no other big player who has a global presence like they do. All the other players are small and local or narrow in scope. Let's pretend we are in a world where walmart is the only big retailer in town and there are 10 small mom and pop shop; this is what craigslist and ebay are to the classified world today and their clout keeps increasing.

Another disgusting practice that Craigslist / Ebay use is to use unpaid volunteers to provide support for questions and complaints that craigslist users have. Of course they probably mix some paid employees with unpaid volunteers but the outcome is the same; anytime that the user complaints he or she usually gets two types of response from the craigslist "staff"
a) "go to hell" b) "tough luck, deal with it". Why are they allowed to get away with it? Because supposedly craigslist is a free service from a non profit company; however craigslist is not a free service as it has revenues from job ads and sex ads masked as "therapeutic services". The problem is that there is no real alternatives to craigslist and that is why the company needs to be broken down in separate pieces.

Also craigslist.org should disappear and replaced by craigslist.com or split the .org for the free services and the .com for the "therapeutic services" (sex ads mixed with other ads) and job ads.

this is also interesting

Craigslist — blacklisted my phone number for no reason

Regarding the shady customer support from craigslist. Many of the Craigslist customer support reps use the same abusive tone in their responses as user supadcy and others do in these comments. No wonder that Attorney Generals from many states went after Craigslist. Craigslist seems to knowingly help people break the law. Just go through some of the "therapeutic services" ads in many cities; really a decoy many times for prostitution.

And on top of it, Craigslist and Ebay profit from "therapeutic services" ads...

IronGrudge89 proof of what.
What is relevant is what I wrote in the complaint: craigslist and ebay scam consumers. help people break the law and profit from it.
They also have a more than dominant market power in the internet classified world; that is a de-facto monopoly.

As far as my MBA, I do not need to prove anything to you. you can choose to believe me or not. I am clearly not going to post personal information about me on the internet. Would you post your social security and date of birth if I asked to prove who you are.
Also if I started replying to everyone who tries to attack me it would be endless and useless and I have no time for that.

If you disagree with what I write, you can state the specific reasons why you disagree simple as that.

Your post avoids the issue: craigslist is a scam; they are not a non-profit; they are a .com not a .org; they should pay taxes; they make money still from sex-ads disguised as "therapeutic services"; and there is a reason why many State Attorney Generals have gone after craigslist / ebay; because craigslist disregards the law and tries to find ways around it. They scam consumers and competitors. Craigslist also abuses people and discriminates users based on the whim of their employees. There are others complaining about Craigslist "Inc." on this site and many more complaints will take place. If craigslist does not pay state or federal taxes they should pay like any other for profit business and no more .org; that is misleading.

If you disagree with any of the above paragraph you are free to express your opinion and share it with others.

Craigslist and Ebay scam competitors too...

if craigslist wants a .org they should only accept donations; not sell sex / therapeutic ads and job ads.
Monster.com pays taxes and craigslist / ebay is in the same for profit business as monster.com but they take advantage of a .org site; that is not right.

Disclaimer: I am a Craigslist user because I have no other choice. No one else has the same reach that they do.
Also I was never and I am not a Craigslist employee or competitor. I have complained to craigslist staff before through their website and followed their complaint "process"

.org is not for profit businesses; the sale of sex / therapeutic ads or the sale of job ads is a for profit business or any other for profit business. craigslist needs to be donation only if they want to use .org. Even if craigslist were to sell salami for profit instead of job ads; they should still have a .com site not .org. Which other .org websites are for profit companies like Craigslist/Ebay?
Whether it is sex ads, or salami ads, or jobs ads; if craigslist makes money off of it; then its a for profit .com or whatever else but not .org. And yes I do eat salami.

Also some feedback for complaintsboard.com; I already emailed it to them but no action. Posts that harass other people or use derogatory terms should be removed as they add nothing to the discussion. Also if a post receive the most votes that does not make it the "best advice". As an analogy, if a group of ignorant people votes yes on candidate A; does not mean that that person is the best candidate, just the most popular.

what is funny that there are about 20 responses to my complaint and none of these craigslist "fans" has argued with any of the points that I made; all they did was use a lot of words to call me names.

This user is complaining that Craigslist blacklisted his phone number. Craigslist — blacklisted my phone number for no reason I do not think that they blacklisted mine but something similar happened with my ads; i posted two perfectly fine ads. 1 to sell a camera and 2 to sell a scanner and craigslist ghosted them. What it means is that the ads show as active on my account but no one else can see them or find them in search results. I find other users who have similar ads to mine that can be viewed right now and searched. I emailed craigslist through their online form but of course no reply and no action. "Ghosting" is just one of craigslist discriminatory policies. Also another discriminatory policy is "phone blacklisting"; the reason why it is discriminatory is because craigslist will not notify the person whose phone was blacklisted via email because they know that they would be hit by a million lawsuits. Craigslist is run like a scam operation; when will the government or some attorney intervene?

Update: according to wikipedia and ICANN; although org was recommended for non-commercial entities, there are no restrictions to registration. http://www.icann.org/en/tlds/
"There are many instances of org being used by commercial sites." So Craigslist takes advantage of ICANN's poorly devised system

Here is a quick recap of the issues described above:

Craigslist: is a for profit business but they use a .org domain.
Although this is legal and admissible under ICANN rules; it appears to
me that it is misleading to the public.

still makes money off illegal sex and prostitution; craigslist/ebay charges for "therapeutic services" ads that are often a decoy for prostitution ads.

discriminates against people who post legitimate ads and abuse people with no recourse and shady practices

is a de-facto monopoly. No competitor seems to come even close in terms of geographical reach and number of ads and users. Monopolies in the United States hurt consumers. The government needs to force this company to be broken up. The fact that Ebay owns a stake in Craigslist as it is possible that there is some type of coordination between Ebay and Craigslist. Craigslist / Ebay stifles innovation and competition by contributing to create an environment where competitors cannot compete fairly.

Since Ebay bought Craigslist, Craigslist has changed. I have been a Craigslist user for many years and now Craigslist engages in many shady practices such as

a) phone blacklisting with no notification to the user
b) ad "ghosting" with no notification to the user
c) customer service that does not respond and does not act when alerted of abuse or errors or does not reply to inquiries
d) online help desk that is full of craigslist employees mixed with craigslist volunteers who at times harass those who ask questions

I do not think that craigslist blacklisted my phone number as some users complain on the internet but something similar happened with my ads; i posted two perfectly fine ads. 1 to sell a camera and 2
to sell a scanner and craigslist ghosted them.

What it means is that the ads show as active on my account but no one else can see them or find
them in search results. I find other users who have similar ads to mine
that can be viewed right now and searched.

I emailed craigslist through their online form but of course no reply and no action. "Ghosting" is
just one of craigslist discriminatory policies. Also another
discriminatory policy is "phone blacklisting"; the reason why it is
discriminatory is because craigslist will not notify the person whose
phone was blacklisted via email because they know that they would be hit
by a million lawsuits.

Craigslist is run like a scam operation; they discriminate against some people and hurt fair competition and innovation; when will the government or some attorney intervene?

The bottom line is that craigslist with the approval of ebay will engage in many practices that are shady and although technically legal or borderline legal seem to be designed to take advantage of the law or some users or competitors. Craigslist does this for its own benefit at the expense of their competitors or critics and the community at large.

Craigslist management seems to show a systematic pattern of deceipt; with processes that are purposely designed to take advantage of others for their own gain.

truthisnowtold you are correct; it would have been more efficient for the readers to post all details since the beginning; however this is how it happened. Thanks for your patience with it :-)

I hope that craigslist pays taxes like its competitors; under the law of the State of California and the law of the United States of America

Hello Sammy McG2011 much of what you say would be correct if Craigslist management were playing fair.
But my point is that Craigslist management purposely does not play fair; knowingly designs processes that are shady and anticompetitive and may also try to find ways to "break the law legally".

I just realized something and I guess earlier I was just trusting my instincts. Both of my ads ghosted by craigslist are for items that are sealed in the box brand new from manufacturer. So if I cannot sell on craigslist which alternative is left for me? Wow; the first that comes to mind is ... Ebay. So there you have it; craigslist may very well have an incentive to make ads like mine "unworkable" so that I am forced to advertise on Ebay. I may be wrong but given the fact that Ebay owns part of Craigslist it would be hard for craigslist or ebay to prove that I am wrong. Basically there are only two huge games/players in town; Craigslist and Ebay. The problem is that in fact they are the same player so they control or are trying to control all of the classifieds market from the mom and pop chair to the high end auction piece

Ebay should leave Craigslist alone and sell its Craigslist stake.

Thanks truthisnowtold :-)

Sammy McG2011 in addition to my MBA; I am also a bit of a fraud expert in the sense that I have shown in the past to have a knack for identifying patterns of fraud; and Craigslist / Ebay management behavior, processes and practices remind me of fraudulent patterns. I also forgot to mention that once I went on the craigslist "help board" and made a complaint; eventually craigslist ended up removing the whole exchange from the site; I think I may have saved the screen shots somewhere...craigslist / ebay trying to hide something...

Thanks truthisnowtold I just posted two comments on here and for some reason they were not posted...

Craigslist customer service is ranked #402 out of the 442 companies that have a "CustomerServiceScoreboard.com" rating with an overall score of 20.04 out of a possible 200. This score rates Craigslist customer service and customer support as Terrible.
http://www.customerservicescoreboard.com/Craigslist

I once posted in the Craigslist "help desk". I received an avalanche of responses from "Craigslist volunteers" and apparently some Craigslist employee disguised as volunteer. They were all for the most part abusive.
In the end Craigslist removed the whole exchange from their website. I think I saved the screen shots somewhere; or at least I hope so. I wonder why does Craigslist tries to hide stuff and engage in cover ups.

oodle.com seems like a competitor to craigslist that has a big enough size to compete. I am looking into any viable competitors to craigslist. I am not affiliated with oodle.com and I would rather find an alternative to both craigslist and oodle given the fact that oodle is affiliated with facebook.

Other craigslist alternatives are pennysaverusa.com (small reach but loyal followers); backpage.com; and google checkout. None of the alternatives to craigslist come even close to craigslist reach but by posting an ad at the same time on
a) oodle.com or http://walmart.oodle.com/
b) backpage.com
c) pennysaverusa.com (very good)
d) google checkout
you have a good chance to sell your product. Lots of more work but it may be worth it.
Pennysaverusa.com seems to have a very strong brand like craigslist. Google should probably buy pennysaverusa.com or Walmart should.

Oodle.com wants to force you (or strongly encourage you) to sign up for Facebook. That is not cool.
Because if you are not a Facebook customer then you are "not verified" lol.

Other "alternatives"; are

e) recycler.com and...
f) "ebay classifieds";

yes the same ebay that owns 25 percent of Craigslist.

Also I found a connection between ICANN, the group that sets internet domain policy (.org, .com etc) and Craigslist. Esther Dyson, ICANN's founding chairman, and Craig Newmark, Craigslist founder, sit on the board of a foundation, the "Sunlight Foundation".

The guy behind the "Sunlight Foundation" is Pierre Morad Omidyar, a French-born Iranian-American

http://sunlightfoundation.com/about/funding/

who is also the founder of ... Ebay.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Pierre_Omidyar

So Craigslist, the largest for profit .org in the world, is connected with Ebay once again and ICANN. Shady...

another craigslist "alternative" that is worth exploring is

g) www.olx.com

So to recap if you want an alternative to craigslist you have to do a lot of work and the results will not be as effective or efficient:

a) ebay classifieds (not really an alternative since it is still ebay like craigslist)
b) oodle.com or http://walmart.oodle.com/ but oodle.com tries to force you to join facebook
c) backpage.com
d) pennysaverusa.com (very good)
e) google checkout (designed for shipping items rather than local face to face sales but I think can also be used for local sales)
f) recycler.com
g) www.olx.com

All of these craigslist / ebay "competitors" are significantly (and that is an understatement) smaller than craigslist. The classifieds market is a dream for craigslist / ebay because you have one very large player (craigslist / ebay) and tens of very small competitors with no market power.

So if you are like me and can't stand facebook then remove oodle from your list of craigslist alternatives; but if you already have facebook then feel free to use oodle.

If you are not a facebook member I would not sign up for oodle; not worth it.

Facebook is known for finding shady ways to grab people's personal information and store them forever; you can use ebay classifieds or pennysaverusa or others above.

Update: I am testing all of the services above; so far:

Oodle.com does not work for me because they discriminate my ads because I dont want to sign up for facebook

Recycler does not work for me because they require you to pay to post an ad online only.
So I eliminated oodle and recycler from my list and I am left with

a) ebay classifieds - ad placement works fine
b) backpage.com (still testing)
d) pennysaverusa.com (very good) - ad placement works fine
e) google checkout (still testing)
f) www.olx.com (still testing)

Final list of johnjustice recommended craigslist "alternatives":

a) ebay classifieds
b) backpage.com
c) pennysaverusa.com (very good)
d) www.olx.com

I eliminated google checkout because it requires registration. I also eliminated oodle because of their discrimination of non facebook users and recycler because they charge for online only ads.

All four alternatives above make it easy and fast to post an ad online. I will wait and see if I get any responses to see about their effectiveness.

Update:

After posting ads on

Final list of johnjustice recommended craigslist "alternatives":

a) ebay classifieds
b) backpage.com
c) pennysaverusa.com (very good)
d) www.olx.com

it seems that none of them works. So craigslist is the only game in town but is run by abusive people who abuse their market power: the result is that the American consumer loses as there is no real alternative.

Clarification: Google Checkout requires credit card registration and that is why I eliminated it from my list of possible craiglist alternatives.

Also I do not feel comfortable giving my phone number to craigslist and ebay because they are for profit companies that seem to have no problem abusing and discriminating people.

Wow my complaint is number 3 on the top ten list of worst rated complaints of complaintsboard.com; all the craigslist "fans" must be voting pretty hard

For clarification; the core issue here is not if craigslist is a for profit or not. That is just an example of a shady Craiglist practice and it is not accurate to compare Craigslist to Goodwill or a credit union in my opinion. Let's not forget that a major global corporation owns a piece of Craigslist that is not the case for Goodwill or credit union so the comparison does not apply and it is misleading.

The real issue is that craigslist and ebay dominate classifieds and abuses its market power with shady and discriminatory practices. Craigslist uses shady practices and discriminates people; for example they ghost ads from some people without notifying those people that their ads were ghosted. That means if you post an ad on Craigslist and you have complained in the past with them; you risk your ads being ghosted; they appear on your end as published but they are actually not published. There is no standard and Craigslist can pick and choose who to abuse. That is just one example. Even craigslist terms of use clearly state that they can do whatever they want including discriminating people.
Also they collect your phone number and email address in their database. If there were any real alternative to Craigslist all of the above would not be a problem but there is no alternatives that work.
For example, the DOJ just blocked the ATT and TMobile merger on grounds that it hurts consumers.
Well Ebay and Craigslist by far dominate the classified market together and the combined Ebay/Craigslist is by far more powerful in the classified industry than the combined ATT/Tmobile; yet nobody seems to care about Ebay and Craigslist. Although Ebay and Craigslist have not merged; Craigslist has a dominant position in the classifieds market and abuses its market power.

Correction of the post above:

For clarification; the core issue here is not if craigslist is a for profit or not. That is just an example of a shady Craiglist practice and it is not accurate to compare Craigslist to Goodwill or a credit union in my opinion. Let's not forget that a major global corporation, Ebay, owns a piece of Craigslist; that is not the case for Goodwill or a credit union so the comparison does not apply and it is misleading.

The real issue is that craigslist and ebay dominate classifieds and craigslist abuses its market power with shady and discriminatory practices.

Craigslist uses shady practices and discriminates people; for example they ghost ads from some people without notifying those people that their ads were ghosted. That means if you post an ad on Craigslist and you have complained in the past with them; you risk your ads being ghosted; they appear on your end as published but they are actually not published.

There is no standard and Craigslist can pick and choose who to abuse. That is just one example. Even craigslist terms of use clearly state that they can do whatever they want including discriminating people.
And there is no recourse. Craigslist' customer service has been consistently rated one of the worst in the nation. This is by design not by accident. If Craigslist had a functioning customer service; then they would not be allowed to discriminate their customers as easily.

Also Craigslist collects your phone number and email address in their database.

If there were any real alternative to Craigslist all of the above would not be a problem but there is no alternatives that work.

The DOJ just blocked the ATT and TMobile merger on grounds that the merger would hurt consumers.
Well Ebay and Craigslist by far dominate the classified market together and the combined Ebay/Craigslist is by far more powerful in the classified industry than the combined ATT/Tmobile in the telephony/data industry; yet nobody seems to care about Ebay and Craigslist.

Although Ebay and Craigslist have not merged; Craigslist has a dominant position in the classifieds market and abuses its market power. In fact Craigslist alone is far more powerful in the classifieds industry, and especially in the free classifieds industry, than the combined ATT/TMobile are in the telephony/data industry. The US free classified industry is fragmented with a myriad of small and weak players and one big player, Craigslist.

The large number of players in the classifieds industry does not make the classifieds industry more competitive than the telephony/data industry. What matters is the combined relative market power of the smaller companies as opposed to the dominant company. Craigslist dominates and abuses its dominant position; all the other classifieds companies combined pose no threat to Craigslist today.

Josh FREEDOM I read your post above; read mine just above so you can see that your comparisons, although possibly well intentioned; are inaccurate and possibly misleading. Thanks.

Oh by the way. if anyone is interested in trying to get a hold of someone at Craigslist try their automated customer service number Phone: [protected] and good luck getting through.