How Craigslist Costs Newspapers Money

Allnighterking writes "Well you knew it would happen, Now that eBay has purchased 25% of craigslist, the news is out and suddenly newspapers are claiming that it's costing them money (50-65 million U.S. dollars a year). The original Slashdot coverage is here."

Comments

Irony is more than proper clothes care

[BrynM]

Anyone else find it ironic that this is being reported by Internet Week - an online magazine that has no print version? Maybe it's time the papers realize that re-printing their content online and requiring everything down to maternal shoe size for access is not a great business model. If some large paper, say in a big city like... um... New York had beaten Craigs to the punch or tried to compete in a similar manner instead of being stagnant in a dynamic medium, this wouldn't be a problem. I guess the old way didn't translate very well into a new medium.

Oh.. and Go Josh! Woohoo! Congrats!

and in other news...

[tupshin]

A recent study shows that craigslist has directly saved consumers 50-65 million dollars in advertising costs, and many more 10s of millions of dollars indirectly by enabling direct human-to-human transactions with a minimal effort.

Hmm...this Internet thing seems to be a disruptive technology...whoda thunk it.

So what?

[drdanny_orig]

This is kinda "dog bites man" ain't it?

This is getting old...

[confusion]

Yet another example of fundamental changes happening to some market segment, and the displaced groups crying. How many times have we seen this?

I can't wait for the NPIA (news paper industry association - there has to be one, right?) to start kicking in doors with the FBI trying to quash the rouge, free exchange of want-ads.

Jerry
http://www.syslog.org/

Cost the Newspapers?

[nathanh]

What a bizarre way of looking at it. IMO a better way to look at it is "newspapers no longer extorting $65 million per year from local residents". Or "$65 million once wasted on newspaper classifieds now available for health, education, other productive uses".

Rather than Craigslist costing newspapers $65 million per year, I think the newspapers have been costing the local residents $65 million per year. Hooray for Craigslist. Boo to the newspapers.

Hm...

[kaitou]

Thats rather sad really. They are claiming lost profit as if it is the fault of craiglist, not just them loosing out in competition.

When have you seen "LA Times blames NY Times for a 30 Million dollar revenue loss"? It makes no sense. It's a (mostly) free market, and Craigslist is in competition with the papers for it. Their model works better, so they get the traffic, and the newspapers dont.

They really have no place to whine here at all.

Newsflash:

[Valar]

You do not have a right to profits! Seriously, this is what an economist would call "competition." In capitalism, it is supposed to happen.

So what, newspapers are on deathwatch anyway

[Ars-Fartsica]

Read your local lately? You'll find maybe ten percent new local content put alongside 90% of yesterday's wire service stories. This is just a transport mechanism for the dozens of advert flyers that are the real purpose of the paper. LET THEM DIE.

The new mega-corporate business model

[Anonymous Coward]

What we're seeing now is the manifestation of the new mega-corporate business model.

At some point, if a company becomes large enough, it apparently is granted some form of "seniority" in the marketplace and is no longer required to be competitive. When these companies find themselves in such positions, in lieu of being innovative or fiscally responsible, many whine and complain that their right to profit (or as Noam Chomsky says it's spelled "jobs") should be protected. From airlines to car companies, this has been happening for decades. Taxpayers subsidize the slow death of badly run businesses.

The amount of "corporate welfare" in the form of various tax incentives and trade protection to mega-corporations is exponentially greater than all other entitlements combined, almost all of which are designed to give corporations advantages in lieu of being more competitive in the marketplace.

The funny thing is that if it were a smaller company complaining about waning competitiveness, people would be unsympathetic. However, larger entities seem to not have to play by the same rules.

Let this be a lesson to would-be entrepeneurs: If at some point you employ X amount of people and purchase Y amount of political clout, you no longer have to be that concerned with the viability of your products and services.

Re:Here's a newsflash for all you dipshit MBAs

[z80kid]

Let me add one to your seried of events: #0 Asshole lops you on the head and takes your gun instead of your PDA. #0.1 Asshole sees you put up a fight and shoots you. The first rule of being street-smart is realizing that carrying a weapon merely puts a weapon into play.

Moronic. I've heard this a dozen times from people who are against gun use, but never once from anyone who actually knows anything about guns (or street fighting, for that matter). I wouldn't take any "rules of being street smart" from someone who takes this scenario seriously. He gets his street-smarts from the movies.

In a robbery type situation, the "asshole" is just looking to get some easy money. If he sees you pull out a gun, he's not going to fight you for it Bruce Lee style - he's going to cut and run. Even armed assailants normally don't hang around and play gunfight.

As soon as the gun comes into play, everyone gets a reality check and instinctively tries to get away from the situation alive.

I've carried (legally licensed) for 10 years. Thankfully, I've never had to shoot. But I have diffused two situations by drawing the weapon. And I can tell you that neither of the men who came after me had any notion of "lopping" me on the head and taking my gun. The gun came out, everyone scattered, end of problem.

Let me add one more thing - It's not "fun" like the movies. It's a absolute last resort.