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PadMapper Gets C&D From Craigslist Over Apartment Listing Maps
First time accepted submitter Autumnmist writes "Craigslist has
sent a Cease and Desist to PadMapper, a site that does a mashup of Craigslist (as well as Rent.com, Apartments.com) apartment listings and Google Maps. Craigslist is great, but apartment hunting through Craigslist has always been a needle in a haystack proposition, because all apartments for an entire city area are shown in a giant list. PadMapper made Craigslist better by locating each listing on a Google Map of the area.
From PadMapper: 'I recently received a Cease and Desist letter from Craigslist, and wasn't able to get a meeting or convince Craigslist's lawyer that PadMapper was beneficial to Craigslist and apartment hunters in general. They allow mobile apps to display their listings if you buy a license from them, but not websites."
HousingMaps.com has been doing this for something like 5 years. I'm sure there are probably others like it too.
Not only is this a major bummer for me, as I love using PadMapper, I don't see why craigslist would do this. Not only did it make craigslist apartment listings actually usable, but it must be driving a fair amount of traffic to them as well. Perhaps if craigslist was about to launch something similar I could understand, but I think we all know that is not going to happen.
The more people using Craigslist the worse craigslist will abuse it's market share.
No doubt if Craigslist was some how paid before hand, they wouldn't care to send their sharks.
Best advice, people should convince their friends to stop using Craigslist and start using something else.
Padmapper is the first site I've ever seen that makes apartment hunting on Craigslist actually useful!!!!
WTF?!?
I'm looking for a house in a specific neighbourhood and it's absolutely impossible to do via Craigslist directly!!! If Craig offered a map, I would at least understand why they might issue a C&D, but seriously...
Padmapper links directly into craigslist and displays the full-screen whenever you click on the listing. It's not like they're aggressively scraping content! It's just a searching service.
This is terrible, Craigslist!! Terrible!
Yeah, why don't they have seven different competing nav bars and three layers of epilepsy-triggering flash ads?
The plain text UI is *exactly* why CL is popular.
Wait, are you serious?
The volume of garage sales in major cities dropped substantially in recent years, according to a study I saw, most likely due to Craigslist (and to some extent, eBay).
Classified advertising in most major newspapers declined by 90% or more, almost exclusively due to Craigslist.
Most real estate listing services have gone to a free-to-view model because of (primarily) Craigslist. Most use car listing services have gone out of business or to a free-to-use model because of (presumably) Craigslist.
Who the hell doesn't use Craigslist?
Why is craigslist still stuck in the 80's with their user interface?
Who says ?
Just because everyone else has to use every single latest scripting language, technique, eye-candy, whatever doesn't mean it is actually useful.
I can't tell you how many times I've tried clinking on a navigation link only to have some whiz-bangy thingy pop-up and block my mouse click - yeah no matter how you maneuvered your mouse, it triggered the pop-up and you were somewhere you didn't want to be.
It's the typical thing that developers fall into time and time again: there's a language or platform feature and they need to use it somehow regardless of its necessity - just because it's a "Cool" thing to do.
Sounds like you're one of the idiots who posts an ad on craigslist and omits all of the information possible. It's not a newspaper ad limited to 20 words. You can actually tell me a little something about the car you're trying to sell.
"Van for Sale" does not a good ad make.
Tell me what works, what doesn't, what year it is, what brand it is, what model it is, how good the tires are, yes, whether it runs or not, how many miles. Don't omit pertinent facts and I won't have to email you to ask stupid questions. And yes, even if this is a $1000 beater. Take the 30 seconds to write a meaningful ad and take decent pictures and your stuff will sell in a reasonable amount of time with minimal hassle. Also use big words that confuse rednecks.
It's unfortunate that Craigslist is the most popular wanted-ads site on the Internet, since they insist on remaining stuck in the past, and making it as hard as possible for people to access their content.
Their obsession with "localism" and consistent refusal to implement an all-aread search feature (and consistent breaking of third-party sites which do this) is especially problematic. I collect electric fans from the 1980s, which often don't show up on eBay because people don't think they are worth anything, but commonly appear on Craigslist. An all-areas search would be extremely helpful, but every time one appears, Craigslist either threatens them or does something on their site to break it. If someone doesn't want to ship (I usually offer them extra money in addition to the actual shipping costs if they are willing to do so), that's fine, but it should be their choice, not Craigslist's.
Who the hell doesn't use Craigslist?
The Whole Wide World outside of US of A.
Well, had you bothered to read before posting you'd notice that they would pay, if they were allowed to.
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
TERMS. OF. USE. VIOLATION.
Nowhere in that statement is anything to do with copyright, trademark, or patents.
"If you want to use our service, you will not do the following..." - "Oh, you violated our agreement. Stop it."
For large sets, this will be our guide even unto death, for the LORD will work for each type of data it is applied to...
I'm always amused when I see people, mostly web professionals, bitch about CraigsList.
The VC and bizdev types hate CL because "CL is just leaving money on the table. They need to understand how to make a profit."
Webdevs hate them because CL doesn't adopt whatever new design trend comes along, therefore CL "doesn't get UX", or webdevs hate them because of situations like this, where some webdev can't build his business off of someone else's platform.
This, compadres, is why you don't take your business public. CL has a staff of less then 20 people, they make plenty of bank while at the same time staying true to their own ethos, whether you agree or not. And the consumers seem to be coming back over and over. And yes, I have heard many people say that this is because CL has been around so long, that they are the 500 lb Gorilla that will never be moved. Uhh, are we on the same Internet? Tell that to Yahoo, MySpace, etc etc.
Here's a Wired article from 2009 that covers the exact topic of CL and site scraping. Maybe PadMapper should have read it first.
Wired Interview with Craig Newmark
I'm always amused when I see people, mostly web professionals, bitch about CraigsList.
No, users bitch about Craigslist, because their site lacks distance search, and users want it. And yes, I know this is deliberate, and no, I don't agree that it makes sense. And therefore, if they won't permit scraping, they're assholes and I wish they would go the fuck away so that someone who will do a more functional site has a chance to get enough users to make it worthwhile.
"You're right," Fisheye says. "I should have set it on 'whip' or 'chop.'"
Um... I hate to tell you this, but ANYBODY is free to create a similar website, with any business model behind it that they want.
Your argument doesn't hold water, because nobody else has built anything that beats them. Therefore, by simple logic, CL *is* what people want.
Build it better, make a fortune. Nobody is stopping you. Until then, quitcher bitchin'.
well, maybe Craigslist is awesome where you live. But here in Los Angeles, and probably in most of the big cities, Craigslist sucks donkey dick due to spam and scammer posts.
I'm looking at the Los Angeles apartment/housing section now, and it's about 70% spam, 15% scammer (con artist) and 15% legitimate posts.
Now the sections that they require payment to post ads - such as jobs - are fine and spam free. But for much of CL, trying to find something is a royal pain in the ass. Makes you wonder why they don't require at least a small payment for posting an ad. That would end pretty much all spam instantaneously.
Not only is the low barrier to entry for posting an ad (actually there is no barrier) causing a spam-fest, it also has a negative effect on legitimate posts. Since it costs nothing to post an ad, and you can post as many as you want for as long as you want, sellers develop a tendency to price their items ridiculously high in hopes of landing a sucker. The Motorcycle section for instance, is full of guys dreaming... seriously. And they post the same ads again and again (because their overpriced items don't sell).
Example: back in late April, a guy advertised his 2007 VFR800 for $8500. I remember it well because that was one of the models I was searching for. The guy was dreaming, $8500 is well above Blue Book value and a realistic price would be $6500 for a *pristine* bike in excellent condition. Since nobody bought it, he would keep reposting the same ad again and again every few days. Once in a while he would lower the price a bit.
The ad is still there, 2 months later. The price is now $7500. Nobody's bought it yet still.
Back in the days of paid classified ads, this would never happen. Sellers would price their items realistically, since they paid money for the ad and wouldn't want to waste it on a very low percentage gamble.
Another interesting bit is how spamming on CL has become a cottage industry. If you go to Freelancer.com or Elance.com (sites where you can hire programmers from India), you'll see many projects for Craigslist scrapers and auto-posters and so on.
So yeah... CL isn't the wonderful unicorns and flower petals some people think it is. I wish it would die already and something similar (but more sensible) take its place.