4 ms·

If you want to see the non-rent-seeking version of a local marketplace, look at Craigslist. Their service is completely free to most participants. Craigslist h

by qq66 12y ago

If you want to see the non-rent-seeking version of a local marketplace, look at Craigslist. Their service is completely free to most participants. Craigslist has a lot of things going for it, but the "rent seekers" are able to create other advantages that Craigslist can't. They can staff people to bring businesses onboard, get everyone's metadata formatted in the right way, take business photos, handle payment disputes, etc., that they wouldn't have the resources to do without charging a fee on the transaction. For some, Craigslist is better, for others, the Thumbtack experience is better.

zaroth 12y ago
Craigslist is an interesting example. It shows how absolutely little you need to provide real value to a lot of people, but it certainly seems like they aren't even trying to make it better. I think if it was open source you would actually see a lot more interesting and useful features continuously being added. I mean, how long did it take for them to add a map to their rental listings? The software will eventually exist to properly format the meta-data automatically for the vast majority of cases. Also things like providing pluggable viewports / templates so it doesn't have to be one-size fits all. There's nothing to prevent add-on services being used in a decentralized market. For example, payment escrow is absolutely essential for many purchases, and payment escrow services themselves would be discovered and ranked through the same code base. But if you don't need it, you shouldn't have to pay for it. Discovery, search, storage, connectivity, etc. is all done using the local compute and storage resources and leveraging network neutrality. This is an absolutely huge problem space, I've been thinking about it for years, and am hoping to start working on it at least part time later this year. For example, my dad had to move a car last month. He didn't know at the time, but the guy he hired was actually a broker who took 30% of the cost as a finder fee. "Car Transport" is just a simple category in a vast field of services, but you can imagine the interface to collect leads is trivial, and the interface to select vendors, agree on a contract, and commit to the service would be mostly common platform code. Obviously the biggest problem is getting people to use it. The advantage of an open source and distributed p2p approach is the burn rate is basically zero. I can afford to work on it pretty much for the rest of my life at this point, and it would be reward enough to see people using it and benefiting it. Well, we'll see how it goes. :-)
mreiland 12y ago
plus I don't trust Craigslist, but I won't give a moments thought to purchasing anything from Amazon or from a 3rd party through amazon. And yes, paying an extra 10% is ABSOLUTELY. FUCKING. WORTH IT. It's exactly like paying for insurance. Insurance is peace of mind.
- zaroth 12y ago
  Amazon is an incredibly powerful band, and brands can do that. But there's also no reason a distributed system can't also have a brand which evokes the same level of trust. In many ways, distributed trust can be stronger and more resilient than centralized trust.
  - jstandard 12y ago
    I'm curious, what do you mean by "distributed trust"? A big reason why I find a brand trustworthy is exactly because my trust is consolidated in one entity that produces repeatable, desired results. Taking Craigslist as an example, Craigslist isn't trustworthy to me precisely because its trust system is distributed. It doesn't police the interactions, moving trust into the realm of peer-to-peer, where definitions of trustworthiness tend to vary greatly. Craigslist in effect has built a well-known brand with overtones of "buyer beware!" because of this distribution of trust.
    - mreiland 12y ago
      That's how I perceive Craigslist. And by no means do I avoid Craigslist. I've purchased plenty of things off of it ranging from coffee tables to what I lovingly call my "man couch" to the occasional video game. But whereas with Amazon I just purchase with the assumption of quality and SAFETY, with Craigslist I do due diligence first. There's a good reason why I buy things locally that I either go pick up or they deliver. It allows me to inspect the goods before completing the transaction. Now, I think in general people selling on Craigslist aren't out to specifically hurt you, but they're not out to do right by you either. It's just a completely different arena. I recently purchased a brand new PS4 off of Amazon. No way would I do that off of Craigslist. Do you know that PS4 died within 5 hours of me having it? Amazon replaced it no questions asked. There's a reason why I would never dream of purchasing something like that through Craigslist, even if many people do it successfully, the cost savings isn't worth the risk (for me personally).

by qq66 12y ago

zaroth 12y ago

Craigslist is an interesting example. It shows how absolutely little you need to provide real value to a lot of people, but it certainly seems like they aren't even trying to make it better. I think if it was open source you would actually see a lot more interesting and useful features continuously being added. I mean, how long did it take for them to add a map to their rental listings? The software will eventually exist to properly format the meta-data automatically for the vast majority of cases. Also things like providing pluggable viewports / templates so it doesn't have to be one-size fits all. There's nothing to prevent add-on services being used in a decentralized market. For example, payment escrow is absolutely essential for many purchases, and payment escrow services themselves would be discovered and ranked through the same code base. But if you don't need it, you shouldn't have to pay for it. Discovery, search, storage, connectivity, etc. is all done using the local compute and storage resources and leveraging network neutrality. This is an absolutely huge problem space, I've been thinking about it for years, and am hoping to start working on it at least part time later this year. For example, my dad had to move a car last month. He didn't know at the time, but the guy he hired was actually a broker who took 30% of the cost as a finder fee. "Car Transport" is just a simple category in a vast field of services, but you can imagine the interface to collect leads is trivial, and the interface to select vendors, agree on a contract, and commit to the service would be mostly common platform code. Obviously the biggest problem is getting people to use it. The advantage of an open source and distributed p2p approach is the burn rate is basically zero. I can afford to work on it pretty much for the rest of my life at this point, and it would be reward enough to see people using it and benefiting it. Well, we'll see how it goes. :-)

mreiland 12y ago

plus I don't trust Craigslist, but I won't give a moments thought to purchasing anything from Amazon or from a 3rd party through amazon. And yes, paying an extra 10% is ABSOLUTELY. FUCKING. WORTH IT. It's exactly like paying for insurance. Insurance is peace of mind.

zaroth 12y ago
Amazon is an incredibly powerful band, and brands can do that. But there's also no reason a distributed system can't also have a brand which evokes the same level of trust. In many ways, distributed trust can be stronger and more resilient than centralized trust.
- jstandard 12y ago
  I'm curious, what do you mean by "distributed trust"? A big reason why I find a brand trustworthy is exactly because my trust is consolidated in one entity that produces repeatable, desired results. Taking Craigslist as an example, Craigslist isn't trustworthy to me precisely because its trust system is distributed. It doesn't police the interactions, moving trust into the realm of peer-to-peer, where definitions of trustworthiness tend to vary greatly. Craigslist in effect has built a well-known brand with overtones of "buyer beware!" because of this distribution of trust.
  - mreiland 12y ago
    That's how I perceive Craigslist. And by no means do I avoid Craigslist. I've purchased plenty of things off of it ranging from coffee tables to what I lovingly call my "man couch" to the occasional video game. But whereas with Amazon I just purchase with the assumption of quality and SAFETY, with Craigslist I do due diligence first. There's a good reason why I buy things locally that I either go pick up or they deliver. It allows me to inspect the goods before completing the transaction. Now, I think in general people selling on Craigslist aren't out to specifically hurt you, but they're not out to do right by you either. It's just a completely different arena. I recently purchased a brand new PS4 off of Amazon. No way would I do that off of Craigslist. Do you know that PS4 died within 5 hours of me having it? Amazon replaced it no questions asked. There's a reason why I would never dream of purchasing something like that through Craigslist, even if many people do it successfully, the cost savings isn't worth the risk (for me personally).