Craig looks beyond the Web
NY Times: Craig (of the List) Looks Beyond the Web. (NY Times photo) Excerpt:
There is a real Craig in Craigslist, and lately he is looking at life beyond his little list that happens to be the seventh-most-popular Web site in the United States.
It is also a site that is deeply tied up with the fate of newspapers — indeed, many in the newspaper industry blame the site’s founder, Craig Newmark, for the downturn in their classified-advertising business.
An ardently no-frills, ad-free, user-sensitive site, Craigslist has, by the estimate of its chief executive, Jim Buckmaster, generated more than 600 million free classified listings. (Though nearly all listings remain free, Craigslist has added modest fees for job listings and real estate brokers in certain big cities, and from those fees the company generates $80 million to $100 million in annual revenue. It has a staff of 25, including Mr. Newmark.) ...
In the face of this expansion, Mr. Newmark is becoming more of a public figure, capitalizing on his success to promote causes that include supporting the Barack Obama campaign and financing investigative journalism — not, he insists, to compensate for any damage Craigslist has done to the newspaper business, which he calls “an urban myth.”
Actually, citizen journalism is entirely Web-centric, and Craig's user-centric community-minded approach should be emulated by every site on the Web.
May 11, 2008 in Web/Tech | Permalink
| 
Comments (1)
| 
| 
TrackBack
TrackBack URL for this entry:
http://www.typepad.com/t/trackback/5767/28991284
Listed below are links to weblogs that reference Craig looks beyond the Web :
Comments
FWIW, you may want to hear Craig's response to my question about the Internet v. Printing Press when I interviewed him at the Tech Policy Summit last March. It's probably the most original answer I've received since I began asking writers on the picket line during my writers strike podcast.
http://brave-new-media.blogspot.com/2008/04/bnm-update.html
Posted by: T. Barnes | May 12, 2008 9:28:40 AM
