Rich Skrenta has posted an excellent deconstruction of Craigslist – the online classifieds portal many newspaper publishers credit with hurting their classified business. Skrenta’s analysis is more valuable and readable than the spin and bitching passed off as journalism published about Craigslist in some newspapers.
While Craigslist is yet to have any impact in Australia, publishers are prepared, having learned from the experiences of their US counterparts. Fairfax has Cracker, a free classified site with many Craigslist like elements. News Ltd has truelocal and a host of commercial classified websites which I’d expect to see brought together in the next few months. Sensis (Telstra) is even ready with their Trading Post website – even if their value proposition, beyond brand recognition is not that compelling.
As Skrenta points out, Craigslist is the Internet equivalent of the notice board at the laundromat or corner shop, except that entries, notices, are exceptionally well classified.