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* I far, far, far prefer Craigslist interface to anything else in that space. It's clear and focused Its search engine too - I get things I search for in the a

• greenie_beans 4y ago
  you gotta search other locales to find what you want. search nashville craigslist for guitars, search rural areas for agricultural equipment, search lake areas for boats, etc
• rcpt 4y ago
  Used to feel this way but I really like OfferUps built in chat. With Craigslist you end up with people who expect phone calls or emails or texts and it's never clear which is which
• xahrepap 4y ago
  A local media company runs a "classifieds" on their online site. It dominates locally. Craigslist has been worthless for ages here because of it. However, Facebook Marketplace seems to be slowly gaining traction. Which I hate for all the reasons you mention. I dread the day it takes over :(
  • nerdponx 4y ago
    Facebook Marketplace has completely taken over in most parts of the US. It sucks.
    • defterGoose 4y ago
      As I noted above, not as much of a problem here in LA, but I totally believe you that it's true elsewhere. And honestly, I'm probably missing some great stuff not perusing FB and OfferUp. But there's one simple, guiding principle that I'm always following. And that's refusing to reactivate my FB account.
      • mikestew 4y ago
        Much like 25 years ago when I said to myself, "there's nothing on the internet that I need to see so badly that I'll install RealNetworks", I'll put stuff on the curb with a "free" sign before I'll reactivate my long-deactivated FB account (or buy new, depending on the direction of the transaction).
        • ghaff 4y ago
          Honestly, especially for bulky stuff, I’ve had great luck leaving things at the end of my driveway with a free sign. I wouldn’t get much money for them and they’re out of my house with almost zero effort.
          • bombcar 4y ago
            And if it doesn’t move with “free” put a $5 sign on it and it’ll be gone in the morning.
        • atlasunshrugged 4y ago
          I was right there too but all the rental apartments are via FB marketplace now to the point I literally could not find a place without getting back on it (DC). Absolutely pain, I miss craigslist
          • njarboe 4y ago
            Same here in the Roaring Fork Valley. Two months of Craigslist, apartments.com, bulletin boards, etc. Finally I posted a "Place Wanted" on some local Facebook groups and I got something pretty quick. Tons of scammers on Craigslist here.
  • hn_throwaway_99 4y ago
    I'm curious where you live. After all, craigslist famously decimated classified advertising in the US, primarily because classified ads in newspapers are hella expensive, and craigslist is usually free.
    • mrkstu 4y ago
      Probably KSL Classifieds in the Utah market: https://classifieds.ksl.com/ https://classifieds.ksl.com/
      • xahrepap 4y ago
        Yup. :)
    • martyvis 4y ago
      Interesting. In the late 1960s in Australia a classifieds-only paper called the Trading Post grew and absolutely dominated this space by the 1990s. My Dad would buy it every week to look for bargain junk, cars, etc. I'm sure the main newspapers took a hit because of it. They had local versions for each region. It was eventually bought in 2004 by Sensis (they were part of the main telco Telstra) for $636M which also owned the Yellow Pages with the intent of going online. It totally bombed and is surplanted here by Gumtree (now owned by eBay) and FB marketplace. https://www.theage.com.au/business/sensis-confident-of-online-advertising-success-20041220-gdz85a.html https://www.theage.com.au/business/sensis-confident-of-onlin...
      • technion 4y ago
        I will never be able to look marketplace or even Craig's list without wondering whether the great Australian joke about buying jousting sticks from the trading post would work in their place.
        • cookie_monsta 4y ago
          In case anybody out there missed the most faithful reproduction of Australian culture to be captured on film: https://youtu.be/dik_wnOE4dk https://youtu.be/dik_wnOE4dk
  • hedora 4y ago
    In fairness, the only valid complaint I've heard about Craigslist is that it diverted classified ad revenue away from reporters, destroying local newspapers, and then local elections. With Craigslist, this always felt like an unintended consequence. With facebook, it seems like one of their top ten strategies for getting us to devolve into mineshaft dwelling mole people that live in the metaverse.
    • lotsofpulp 4y ago
      Blaming technology for obviating business models is not a valid complaint. In this case, I would say the participants of the local society are responsible for paying for journalism and working to support local elections. But even then, you could come up with arguments such as so and so population was too poor and had to work two jobs and did not have time to attend city/county/state meetings, or were not sufficiently educated or literate to understand them, etc.
      • lkrubner 4y ago
        You write “Blaming technology” in response to a comment that does not mention any technologies. You might want to examine what your preconceptions are, that you would see “technology” in a comment that does not refer to technology. You were responding to a comment that describes two business strategies, perhaps you should respond to that.
        • throwaway743 4y ago
          They're either assuming printed local classifieds were overtaken by a website, or that CL is a site that performed better than the local classifieds website. Not hard to extract, nor worth getting heated about.
        • lotsofpulp 4y ago
          I wrote technology on purpose, to cut through useless information. It is not relevant that “Craigslist” obviated classified ads. The root problem newspapers were solving was a seller being able to provide information to a wide audience of buyers. Technology brought about a better way of solving this problem, so the root problem newspapers were getting paid to solve with classifieds no longer exists. Not having local newspapers/journalism causing problems with the local civic process is a separate problem, that has nothing to do with technology enabling sellers and buyers to reach each other more easily.
  • graupel 4y ago
    Found the Utahn in the room! :)
• yamtaddle 4y ago
  Facebook Marketplace seems to have all but killed it, here. You have to check Facebook anyway because schools, HOAs, businesses, even local governments often treat it as their primary outlet for information, as in, stuff gets posted there first, and sometimes only there. Though IG is taking over some of that (but of course that's still Facebook) Luckily my wife does that, so I can get away without having an account, but I'd basically have to have one otherwise. If you've already got one and already have to visit Facebook sometimes, may as well use FB marketplace....
  • soperj 4y ago
    I don't know why anyone would want to attach their name and everything to stuff they are selling.
    • CharlesW 4y ago
      I personally deactivated my Facebook account, but note that this less anonymity is a benefit for buyers. It makes Craigslist a far more attractive target for scammers.
    • Spooky23 4y ago
      It’s more that you’re more likely to have some context as a buyer that you aren’t meeting a scammer or criminal. Craigslist attracted drug dealers, hookers and fences for a long time. People like that figure out that it’s easier to scam a buyer than do the honest work of stealing shit to sell.
    • NikolaNovak 4y ago
      To be fair; lack of anonymity CAN increase confidence and safety in the transaction/meetup. (I'm not saying it always does, or that it cannot be exploited, or that it won't eventually be scammed beyond usefulness, etc; but it's not always a clear negative today).
    • behnamoh 4y ago
      It helps buyers to know who the seller is. FB suffers from bot sellers and scams. I check the person’s profile before proceeding and it gives me a sense of confidence in my purchase/sale.
• aerovistae 4y ago
  Weird. On the east coast it's still as populated and reliable as it ever was. Although I don't typically buy consumer goods on it.
  • JohnFen 4y ago
    In my stretch of the west coast, it's still as good as it always was, too.
• boatsie 4y ago
  Related, so many sellers are now “pro” sellers like what happened to eBay. Keyword stuffing, prices that are comparable to sale prices of new, constant automated reposting, etc.
  • TheRealPomax 4y ago
    Right, which is great: because CL forces folks to say whether they're a private owner or a dealer you can filter for those properties. And not hidden and tucked away either: it's the absolutely very first top-most set of options on the search results page. See those three [all] [owner] [dealer] buttons? Click "owner". You're welcome.
    • QuarterReptile 4y ago
      I've always wondered: what is the mechanism keeping people honest about being owner vs dealer?
      • philovivero 4y ago
        Nothing. Dealers know to check the owner button. Whenever I'm buying something on CL, like say a car, I always ask the person who answers the phone: "I'm calling about the car. Tell me X about it." If they reply "Which car?" then you've reached a dealer, not an owner.
        • TheRealPomax 4y ago
          And then, of course, you go back to CL and flag their post, right? ...You do report abuse on this free platform so that everyone's experience can be improved, right?
          • kd0amg 4y ago
            Does that button... do anything?
• defterGoose 4y ago
  CL is still alive and well here in LA. It's possible it's just in the markets I'm looking in (tools, machinery, cars, etc), but I've always preferred it over things like FB, OfferUp etc. I feel like the people I meet from CL are generally much more knowledgeable about what they have and its value. Other platforms often feel like a relative selling grandpa's stuff and have done the bare minimum of research to find a price point. Usually if someone on CL lacks knowledge, it means I'm getting a great deal that day rather than waiting for them to realize they're asking too much in a small market.
  • malingo 4y ago
    I think it's the certain markets that determine how useful CL is--I'm also in LA. I've mainly dealt in furniture & electronics, and CL in other cities, particularly Minneapolis, was a dream, so good in fact that I didn't know FB marketplace existed until I moved to LA and had to look elsewhere after seeing how bad the CL market for used stuff was.
    • 6stringmerc 4y ago
      The musical instruments page for Dallas-Fort Worth gets about 3-5 pages a day of valid new postings. I went down to San Antonio and there were about 5 a week during the same relative time period. Thus I validate the notion that it’s market dependent. SA is not a tech hotspot but there are a lot of musicians there.
  • acchow 4y ago
    Try to find a used computer or phone or really any other electronic. FB Marketplace has 5x the inventory.
    • Maursault 4y ago
      Facebook's interface is heavily burdened with ugly templates, is needlessly complex and clunky. Page crashes! Facebook is also draconian about logging in, can't see much if you're not logged in, thus FB is elitist. You're required to you hand over your identity and submit to forced content and advertising. I personally fully retreated from Facebook permanently by 2009. Good for you, if you don't mind giving up privacy and being a product, but it is not for me. Craigslist's interface isn't sexy, but it is impressively fast and stable. No page crashes, ever. No forced content. No login necessary to search, often no account necessary to contact sellers. If an account is required to contact a seller, it is anonymous and disposable. Craigslist works the way the Internet used to work before it was taken over by advertisers, tracking and javascript. I hope it never changes, and I wish more web developers would take their cues from its simplicity and potency, because the more complex and tricky a website gets, the worse it is, unilaterally.
• _dain_ 4y ago
  >Craigslist is a desert, a void, an oasis of empty search results. it's a desert and an oasis at the same time?
  • bombcar 4y ago
    "Oasis of Empty"
    • z9znz 4y ago
      ... which would work if the stuff outside the oasis was cluttered with something. But the stuff outside the oasis is also approximately empty. So where does the desert of empty end and the oasis of empty begin?
      • bombcar 4y ago
        The desert has nothing; the oasis lacks even that.
  • zuminator 4y ago
    I get that you're saying the metaphor is strained, but in point of fact, oases are parts of deserts, no?
    • _dain_ 4y ago
      Yes but the whole point of them is that they are non-deserty bits inside of deserts
  • NikolaNovak 4y ago
    yes. (Also, don't forget, a void :-)
• TheRealPomax 4y ago
  Although unfortunately, it doesn't understand the fairly typical non-urban "yes, you found something that's less than 10 miles from me as the crow flies, but is about 80 miles away if I need to actually drive there because of the fact that my car can't cross a river/strait/lake on its own". Even after 25 years, that part can still do with improvement.
  • sleepybrett 4y ago
    They wouldn't have to update the interface to do that, but they could give you 'crow-flies' and 'driving' distances for sure.
    • TheRealPomax 4y ago
      Not really: the search parameter is "km/miles from location", not "within a radius of..." (the circle is just a visual estimate). The distance in km/miles from A to B is not as the crow flies, it's the number found in any of quite a lot of datasets that gives you all the real world distances between two places so you can do proper distance filtering.
    • jaredhallen 4y ago
      Well since Facebook seems to update the user interface about every 15 seconds anyway, that shouldn't be a major roadblock. I swear if I'm on marketplace and I take a sip of coffee, the UX has changed somehow. Seems like they just have a pool of different interface designs and they just serve them up at random.
      • smegger001 4y ago
        ah facebook the AB testing hell.
  • rightbyte 4y ago
    Careful what you whish for. That sounds exactly as one of those fuzzy algorithms that will hide posts randomly due to stupid reasons. Eg. some address has a glitched road and Google Maps believes it is only reachable by boat or helicopter.
• tempestn 4y ago
  FBM also has some glaring deficiencies in its search. For example, you can't do a keyword search within a category. So they have a bunch of categories like Vehicles or Electronics, but within those you can only use predefined filters. If you want freeform keywords you're stuck with the general search.
• pmelendez 4y ago
  > Until about... 5-6 years ago That kinda correlates to when they moved away from the personals business
  • wwweston 4y ago
    CL personals had a seedy rep (maybe with good reason), but I found it to be undervalued as a straight-up friend-making and normal dating tool. It's the only platform I've seen that focused primarily on text instead of photos, which was a unique niche and opportunity. People seem to gravitate towards photo-focused swipe-to-date apps... but most women and a bigger majority of men will tell you that they all hate them and how shallow they are. And of course, the seedy stuff and trafficking happens on a whole host of other platforms that appear untouched by the policy push that took down CL.
    • RunSet 4y ago
      > It's the only platform I've seen that focused primarily on text instead of photos, which was a unique niche and opportunity. I have created such a platform since CL killed their personals and you can find it in my account history. Since I've already mentioned it once in this discussion I'd rather not do so again lest I be mistaken for a lowly shill. Photos are not permitted in posts for multiple reasons. One is to emphasize the content of the post body. (Another reason is that I don't have the wherewithal to vet whether any given photo depicts someone of 17 or 18 years' age but I digress.)
• spaniard89277 4y ago
  In Spain all old craiglist equivalents are mostly gone or full of spam. We've got Wallapop though, and it's fine. It feels modern, not too clunky, and IMO it's a right balance. Until someone decides it needs to be more flashy.
• mardifoufs 4y ago
  Yeah, craigslist never really had any marketshare (at least not for the past decade) in Montréal. Kijiji was king, and honestly I prefer it to CL but even then it is getting dominated by Fb marketplace. I'm not often on Facebook, so I sometimes miss kijiji but honestly the fact that you can at least know a little bit about the seller on Facebook is a huge plus, even if I fully understand how that can also be a huge problem for some. The seller ratings, plus the ability to see what else they are selling/sold can be super helpful to make sure you aren't getting scammed or buying a stolen item.
• debaserab2 4y ago
  The killer feature that Facebook marketplace has is the fact that you can do some basic verification of the person you are selling or buying an item from.
  • s1artibartfast 4y ago
    Interesting. My impression has always been Facebook is somehow more riddled with scammers than CL despite the associated accounts. It seems like it has more to do with the transaction. It is hard to scam someone with an in person exchange of cash for goods. Annecdotally, many CL sellers have told me to just get the item from their yard and put the cash under their doormat
    • snek_case 4y ago
      > It is hard to scam someone with an in person exchange of cash for goods. You would think so, but some asshole tried to do this to me. We had agreed on a price ahead of time, and when he showed up, he tried to low ball me with a 50% lower offer. I refused to sell the item to him, and then he became aggressive and I had to call the cops to get him to leave. I won't get into the details, but based on what I saw, I think this guy runs kind of a side-business acting as a middle man reselling tech gear. I think he does this routinely, probably low balls people and then tries to re-sell the same stuff on marketplace afterwards. I think tech gear attracts assholes/scammers more than anything else because it has a potentially high resale value. So, just be careful out there. Never share your phone number with people from marketplace, and don't reveal your home address if at all possible. Try to have a friend over if you have people coming for transactions or do it in a public place.
      • s1artibartfast 4y ago
        That's a shitty situation, but I don't really think it is a scam or trick.
  • jimt1234 4y ago
    My sister does a fair amount of Craigslist-like transactions, but she abandoned Craigslist years ago, in favor of Facebook Marketplace, for this exact reason. She had a few scary situations from sketchy people via Craigslist, says that never happens with Facebook Marketplace. (My sister flips baby strollers as a side-hustle. Seriously. She makes money with it, too. Not enough to retire, but enough to keep her home, raising her kids. She's been doing it since her first child was born 12 years ago, when she realized how expensive decent strollers are. She buys broken strollers for near-nothing, keeps an inventory of her own replacement parts, fixes them herself, then sells them. New mothers love it, because, once again, baby strollers are friggin' expensive.)
• 8jef 4y ago
  CL lost Canada to Kijiji a few years ago. Now FB is taking over. I'll probably eventually stop looking for classified ads because of that.
  • dewert 4y ago
    Oddly enough, Kijiji never took off in Vancouver. We just went straight from CL to FB.
  • Tiktaalik 4y ago
    Excepting Vancouver for some odd reason.
• JJMcJ 4y ago
  CL isn't as useful as it once was, but the interface is still very straightforward. Compare e.g. https://sfbay.craigslist.org/search/sof#search=1~list~0~100 https://sfbay.craigslist.org/search/sof#search=1~list~0~100 for Bay Area software jobs, compared to something like Dice. Once again, NOT the quality of the jobs listed, just the ease of scanning for something of interest.
• SL61 4y ago
  Craigslist is basically unusable in my area if you're selling something. 90%+ of the people who respond to you will express interest, chat about the item, set up a time to meet, and then no-show and ghost you. I don't know what they're getting out of it. It's not worth the time for me to go through 5-6 of those people for everything I want to sell. Maybe Facebook, etc., have this problem too, but I gave up on selling things locally. These days I just try to pass things on to friends and family.
  • SQueeeeeL 4y ago
    I'm not trying to justify or validate this behavior, but in my own experience you basically want the ability to buy the item, but may change your mind. So you string a buyer along while you make up your mind. (personally, I've found myself doing this and then having to stop because the seller isn't some big mega corp, but just some random other working class friend)
  • spookthesunset 4y ago
    Dunno why the downvotes when this is something I experience too.
    • pavon 4y ago
      Yeah. All of my posts have some flake that is stringing me on but can't set a time to meet. Nearly a quarter of scheduled meets end in no shows. One was after I drove 30 miles to meet someone halfway. I won't meet more than 5 minutes out of my way after that - you want the item you can come get it.
      • bombcar 4y ago
        I got two kids bikes for the price of one and he dropped that one by half because I was the only one to say I was coming and actually show up.
      • jrnichols 4y ago
        my last craigslist experiences were similar, they either flaked or they showed up with less cash and said "how about a discount" even after the price was said to be firm. I've said "nope" and walked away from cash sales that try that nonsense. and the whole experience soured me on Craigslist for quite a while. also, around here there are a ton of small businesses that basically flood the listings with whatever they can. it's not even a person selling the stuff, it's a storefront.
• mytdi 4y ago
  To me it seems like CL never cought on outside of the bigger cities in Canada, but Kijiji became very popular. But I agree, Kijiji is not as clean with the results as CL, and yes, Facebook Market Place is a mess. Varage Sale is a small player in certain regions of Canada.
• SN76477 4y ago
  Did you find the results you were looking for? *Would you like to see results for Books, Used, Sorted by publisher instead? *Often purchased together with ___ + ___ + ___
• jaredhallen 4y ago
  The FB algorithms drive me bonkers. I can be looking at a listing on one computer, and then search using the exact same terms and filters on another computer moments later, and be completely unable to get the search to deliver the same listing. Absolutely infuriating.
• wkjagt 4y ago
  What I do like on Facebook Marketplace is that it seems to understand what I’m looking for. On Kijiji I have to do try all the different ways someone might have written something, including common spelling mistakes. And since I live in Quebec, I have to do this in two languages. On FB Marketplace it seems to find all variations in one search.
• cyanydeez 4y ago
  Network effects+ Astroturf
• AussieWog93 4y ago
  I really, really like Facebook Marketplace's fuzzy searching. Random people listing stuff on local classified sites don't always use the correct keywords, and it's in everyone's best interest for these listings to actually get a good amount of views. I suspect this "fuzzier" algorithm accounts for the far lower amount of spam too. A search for "heat pump dryer" on Gumtree will return 25 listings in a row from the same shop in Oakleigh, whereas Facebook will show different products from different sellers (some businesses, but mostly randos) - not to mention the people selling their heat pump dryer without including those magical two words in the title. It's uncanny how good this algorithm is at returning what the buyer is actually looking for.
  • NikolaNovak 4y ago
    I think it depends how specific your buying is. If I'm searching for Scooter, it may be good that it returns also mopeds and motorcycles. But if I'm searching for Nikon d850, and get first 10 entries for Nikon d750, Nikon d610, canon 5dMkii, Sony rx100, and then finally a d850, then its really really annoying; and that's 80 percent of my experience. For the other 20 percent, When I do want to search for something generic like bicycle or synthesizer, I frequently want to see new entries since the last time I searched - I don't want to see same synthesizer (or heat pump dryer:) day after day after day. Instead, Facebook's fuzzy algorithm fill cheerfully show me what it thinks is the best answer day after day and week after week, even though its a crappy casio that shouldn't even be listed as a synthesizer and it's been there for 7 weeks and is actually sold; it will refuse to show me chronological list so I can see what's new and added. It will then cheerfully ignore geographic distance and get me excited about something 4 hrs away. So for me at least it's a lose lose scenario - our experiences clearly differ radically, and it may be simply down to how specific of a thing we want to. I typically want something specific, and if I want generic, then I'd like a category please, something which Facebook also sucks at as others have pointed out :). (and I lied in my example to give FB a chance... In reality shen I search for "scooter" , I get motor scooters, electric scooters, the Segway wannabes, and six other types of things I don't want, so even then fuzzy search fails me :)
    • AussieWog93 4y ago
• dieselgate 4y ago
  It’s a great option in the states. The only other country I’ve heard of it being used is Mexico and people say it’s mostly used by non-Mexicans.
• baby 4y ago
  I still use craigslist for finding a place to rent, works really well (at least in SF). For the other stuff, I moved to facebook marketplace, although the UI is really awful (as a seller also), especially on mobile. I think kijiji was never a thing outside of Canada from my experience.
• novaleaf 4y ago
  I was starting to move to OfferUp, but got a rude awakening when I tried to give away some old Garage Sale signs. They block posting anything that might encourage "outside sales". No thank you. Craigslist 4 life.
• jdwithit 4y ago
  It seems regional. In my community in Colorado, there's an extremely active Craigslist market. Where I used to live in New England, it was dead and Facebook ruled the scene. I really love Craigslist's search, minimalist UI, lack of arbitrary moderators approving (or ignoring) your membership to local selling groups, and so on. It has its own problems of course, but I'm happy to live in an area where it's still a viable alternative.
• jbverschoor 4y ago
  Fuzzy is shit anyway. Suggestions are fine, but the whole point of search is to limit results quotes in google should be standard
• As_You_Wish 4y ago
  >Nothing is on Craigslist anymore in my area (Greater Toronto Area). Until about... 5-6 years ago, I could find comparable number of photography, computer, music & kids stuff on Craigslist and Kijiji. Today, Craigslist is a desert, a void, an oasis of empty search results. I totally agree. There are a few areas where it is still good. Stuff for sale is actually quite good. For example, I got a great microwave oven, almost brand new, for $15. But everything else is garbage. For example, I go on craigslist to look for an office space, and it is complete and total spammed for Regus, Bannister and other executive office suites. There's utterly no owners renting out space. The job placements are shit. Everyone is on indeed, or linkedin or anything else. Advertising...I went to advertise my services a month or so ago on craigslist. I listed multiple times, and all I get is spam from people pretending to be interested. I did that 3 or 4 times before I finally caught on.