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In Founders at Work, Craig Newmark mentioned there were a lot of downsides in running Craigslist as a non-profit. I haven't done much research on why this is bu

In Founders at Work, Craig Newmark mentioned there were a lot of downsides in running Craigslist as a non-profit. I haven't done much research on why this is but was wondering if you could elaborate on whether the search for funding is limited by your non-profit status? Would it be easier to run your organization as a for-profit group like Google.org? On another note, it would be helpful if you described your organization's purpose/ mission. Some friends and I are in the very early stages of starting a social venture that would help non-profits, not with financial funding, but with access to smart people to help out in various tasks at the organizations. You can write to me at dskhatri =shift-2= google's email. Good luck!

aaronsw 18y ago
Craiglist isn't a nonprofit and never really has been to my knowledge, so I don't know what you're talking about.
- natrius 18y ago
  Founders at Work, page 250: In the end of '97, I was approached by some volunteers, and they said, "Hey, let's run craigslist and see if we can run a nonprofit." To make a long, painful story short, that effort failed. I kind of knew it was failing, probably midway through 1998, but I was in denial. A couple of our biggest job posters took me out for lunch and said, "Hey, this isn't working. Get real and make this more serious." It took me a couple months, but I got out of denial, made craigslist into a real company--got off to an OK start. But again, it wasn't until Jim became management that we got good.
pchristensen 18y ago
Craigslist isn't non-profit, it's a for profit business whose goal is user satisfaction, not revenue maximization. For instance, apartment listings are free everywhere except NYC. NYC landlords and brokers asked Craigslist to charge for listings, because it reduced the amount of spam and fake listings. Since users were asking to be charged, they started charging. The money from these few exceptions (like jobs in SV and a couple other markets) makes more than enough money to pay for everything else. They make something like 600-800K per employee, hardly non-profit.
- dskhatri 18y ago
  Well, yes, they are not a non-profit but actually tried running the organization as a non-profit at one point. Craig Newmark mentioned that it was a bad idea but didn't explicitly give the reasons why. That's what I was alluding to. I should have been clearer, but thanks for your comment.

aaronsw 18y ago

Craiglist isn't a nonprofit and never really has been to my knowledge, so I don't know what you're talking about.

natrius 18y ago
Founders at Work, page 250: In the end of '97, I was approached by some volunteers, and they said, "Hey, let's run craigslist and see if we can run a nonprofit." To make a long, painful story short, that effort failed. I kind of knew it was failing, probably midway through 1998, but I was in denial. A couple of our biggest job posters took me out for lunch and said, "Hey, this isn't working. Get real and make this more serious." It took me a couple months, but I got out of denial, made craigslist into a real company--got off to an OK start. But again, it wasn't until Jim became management that we got good.

pchristensen 18y ago

Craigslist isn't non-profit, it's a for profit business whose goal is user satisfaction, not revenue maximization. For instance, apartment listings are free everywhere except NYC. NYC landlords and brokers asked Craigslist to charge for listings, because it reduced the amount of spam and fake listings. Since users were asking to be charged, they started charging. The money from these few exceptions (like jobs in SV and a couple other markets) makes more than enough money to pay for everything else. They make something like 600-800K per employee, hardly non-profit.

dskhatri 18y ago
Well, yes, they are not a non-profit but actually tried running the organization as a non-profit at one point. Craig Newmark mentioned that it was a bad idea but didn't explicitly give the reasons why. That's what I was alluding to. I should have been clearer, but thanks for your comment.