4 ms·

Alright. That sounds very anti competitive. And if they truly have a monopoly likely illegal as well. I really wish, we had proper laws to deal with all these

by ralfn 14y ago

Alright. That sounds very anti competitive. And if they truly have a monopoly likely illegal as well. I really wish, we had proper laws to deal with all these vendor lockin tricks. Its as if the free market, without proper regulation just ends up promoting innovation in loopholes that give an unfair advantage. Everyone wants to be a cable company these days, and be selling access to customers. Instead of contributing something of actual value themselves, they just want to tax others when they do. Hijack the customer, and be the middle man. They all essentially implement the same bussiness model as the mob.

zopa 14y ago
It's not really anti-competitive, and it's very unlikely to be illegal. It's just a fairly classic natural monopoly. There's only likely to be one major classified ad company, because advertisers want to use the site with the most users, and users want to use the site with the most classified ads. That's hard for a competitor to break into, not because of anticompetitive behavior by Craigslist, but because of the nature of the market. As for the law, the general rule of thumb, in the US at least, is that it's not illegal to have a monopoly, but it is illegal to use your monopoly to dominate a second market.
- ralfn 14y ago
  Is it not abuse of your monopoly if you demand that their suppliers do not supply competitors? Because thats essentially what this "exclusive" liscence entails?
  - alttab 14y ago
    I read it as this posting is exclusive. I can make a similar posting somewhere else. Sure, I can't copy-pasta, but if CraigsList thinks that because I post on their site that I can't post it on other sites as well I would LOVE to see them try to sue me.
    - ralfn 14y ago
      You cant copy pasta your own content. I totally agree though: this will never hold up in court. If they want to "own" user submitted content, they need a signature. Just putting some terms up will not suffice, unless the site "sell us your exclusive content" with big "make CL own this content" buttons.

by ralfn 14y ago

zopa 14y ago

It's not really anti-competitive, and it's very unlikely to be illegal. It's just a fairly classic natural monopoly. There's only likely to be one major classified ad company, because advertisers want to use the site with the most users, and users want to use the site with the most classified ads. That's hard for a competitor to break into, not because of anticompetitive behavior by Craigslist, but because of the nature of the market. As for the law, the general rule of thumb, in the US at least, is that it's not illegal to have a monopoly, but it is illegal to use your monopoly to dominate a second market.

ralfn 14y ago
Is it not abuse of your monopoly if you demand that their suppliers do not supply competitors? Because thats essentially what this "exclusive" liscence entails?
- alttab 14y ago
  I read it as this posting is exclusive. I can make a similar posting somewhere else. Sure, I can't copy-pasta, but if CraigsList thinks that because I post on their site that I can't post it on other sites as well I would LOVE to see them try to sue me.
  - ralfn 14y ago
    You cant copy pasta your own content. I totally agree though: this will never hold up in court. If they want to "own" user submitted content, they need a signature. Just putting some terms up will not suffice, unless the site "sell us your exclusive content" with big "make CL own this content" buttons.