The biggest difference between Craigslist soon-to-be defunct "erotic services" and the new "adult services" sections will be human monitoring.
Jim Buckmaster
Craigslist on Wednesday announced that the Web classifieds site will do away with its controversial "erotic services" section and replace it with a new "adult services" section. The move comes after Craigslist managers were pressured by several state attorneys general to help remove from their site the posting of numerous ads for prostitution.
All the texts and photos within ads submitted to the adults section will be reviewed by a Craigslist employee before being posted, said CEO Jim Buckmaster in an interview with CNET News. With erotic services, Craigslist relied on users to flag questionable ads and also required those who submitted ads to use a credit card. The thinking behind the idea was that wrong doers would be less inclined to post ads if they had to provide identification.
The first thing the new changes will mean is that it should be much harder to post prostitution ads to the adult section. Filtering text and photos means that ads will also take much longer to appear on Craigslist than in the past.
"There will be a wait," Buckmaster said. "It's not going to be like the rest of the site where ads will go up in 15 minute or less. We don't know exactly what that wait will be long-term. It will probably be longer (than 30 minutes initially). New ads will only be reviewed during business hours. Ads posted outside of business hours will wait until business hours will resume."
Another major change will be the cost to post. Postings to adult services will cost $10, but once approved, will be eligible for reposting at $5. The cost to post to the soon-to-be banned erotic services section was $5.
Buckmaster and Craigslist's founder Craig Newmark have always prided themselves on keeping the site's operating costs down. That's why, for most of its existence, Craigslist has employed barely two dozen people to operate a site that services millions of people in the United States and about 50 countries. The site now has 30 employees. How many staff members Craigslist plans to add is still undetermined said Buckmaster.
Those critical of the state attorneys general who pressured Craigslist to make the changes, including AGs from Illinois and South Carolina, say that sex workers are likely to respond by just posting more discreet ads in other areas of the site. Buckmaster said the service is prepared for that.
"We're going to be looking for that," Buckmaster said. "We have blocking and filtering technologies in place site wide. And of course our flagging system remains fully in effect across all the categories, but we will be monitoring that situation."
Asked what kind of impact these changes will have on prostitution, Buckmaster would only talk about Craigslist.
"We're optimistic this will be the right balance," he continued. As always, we never consider our work to be done. We continue to evaluate all aspects of the site."
"What we're trying top do is strike a new balance with respect to all of the feedback from the concerned groups, including the attorneys general," Buckmaster continued. "Trying to incorporate all of that feedback and reach the best possible balance we're able to, is what we've sought to do with this new set of measures."
Craigslist, the online classifieds publication much loved by users for declining to charge a fee for most of its services, issued a statement Wednesday about the closing of its "erotic services" section and the opening of a new "adult services" section:
Striking A Balance
As of today for all US craigslist sites, postings to the "erotic services" category will no longer be accepted, and in 7 days the category will be removed.
Also effective today for all US sites, a new category entitled "adult services" will be opened for postings by legal adult service providers. Each posting to this new category will be manually reviewed before appearing on the site, to ensure compliance with craigslist posting guidelines and terms of use. New postings will cost $10, but once approved, will be eligible for reposting at $5.
Unsurprisingly, but completely contrary to some of the sensationalistic journalism we've seen these past few weeks, the record is clear that use of craigslist classifieds is associated with far lower rates of violent crime than print classifieds, let alone rates of violent crime pertaining to American society as a whole.
The relative safety of craigslist compared to print classifieds is likely due to some combination of:
* Measures such as blocking, screening, and telephone verification
* Community moderation via flagging system
* Electronic trail ensures violent criminals are quickly caught
* Personal safety tips prominently posted
* Unusually high level of cooperation with law enforcementCommunity moderation as exemplified by our flagging system is arguably the most successful system ever conceived for eliminating inappropriate activity from a massive internet community. Working in tandem with various other protective technologies, it is an inescapable force to be reckoned with for anyone set on abusing free internet communications across a broad array of posting types.
However, with respect to this new paid category for advertising by legal businesses, we will experiment with some of the methods traditionally employed in paid print classifieds.
We'd like to thank everyone who has provided helpful input over the past few weeks, all of which we've closely considered:
* Our users, whose suggestions have shaped every aspect of craigslist
* Attorneys General, who have provided valuable constructive criticism
* Law Enforcement officers nationwide, who have been hugely supportive
* Legal businesses concerned at their right to advertise being questioned
* EFF and other legal experts defending free speech and Internet lawWe are optimistic that the new balance struck today will be an acceptable compromise from the perspective of these constituencies, and for the diverse US communities that value and rely upon craigslist.
Note: Our announced intention to contribute 100% of net revenues for the "erotic services" category to charity has been fulfilled, and will continue to be fulfilled, notwithstanding criticism questioning our good faith in this regard. However, in light of today's changes, and to avoid any future misunderstanding, we are making no representation regarding how revenue from the "adult services" category will be used. Our commitment to philanthropy remains however, and craigslist will continue to develop its charitable initiatives.
Updated at 7:15 p.m. PDT with comment from Amazon.com.
Amazon.com recently delisted from its sales ranking system gay and lesbian book titles that it deemed "adult," raising the ire of some who characterize the move as online censorship.
Author Mark R. Probst wrote on his blog Sunday that he noticed the change a few days ago:
On Amazon.com two days ago, mysteriously, the sales rankings disappeared from two newly-released high profile gay romance books: "Transgressions" by Erastes and "False Colors" by Alex Beecroft. Everybody was perplexed. Was it a glitch of some sort? The very next day HUNDREDS of gay and lesbian books simultaneously lost their sales rankings, including my book "The Filly." There was buzz, What's going on? Does Amazon have some sort of campaign to suppress the visibility of gay books?
Probst, the author of a novel with gay characters in the Old West, said he was perplexed by the move and used his status as a publisher to contact Amazon for an explanation. He said he received the following response from an Amazon Advantage service representative:
In consideration of our entire customer base, we exclude "adult" material from appearing in some searches and best seller lists. Since these lists are generated using sales ranks, adult materials must also be excluded from that feature.
Of course, being delisted from the rankings doesn't mean that the book giant has stopped selling the title; it just means that the title won't show up with a public sales ranking or in the best-seller lists--often a factor in how shoppers make their purchases.
An Amazon representative characterized the move as a mistake but declined to elaborate.
"Essentially, there's a glitch in our system and it's being fixed," Amazon spokesperson Patty Smith told CNET News.
Certainly, one could make an argument that deranking titles with "adult" themes would make a reasonable policy for a site that attracts a wide range of the Internet population. But as demonstrated by an online petition that has already attracted more than 4,000 signatures, the policy appears to be biased against books with gay, lesbian, and transgendered characters.
Here's a sampling of books titles that the petition's backers noted are still ranked in the listing system (all notes and descriptions on the titles are supplied by the petition supporters):
• "Playboy: The Complete Centerfolds" by Chronicle Books (pictures of over 600 naked women)
• Rosemary Rogers' "Sweet Savage Love" (explicit heterosexual romance)
• Kathleen Woodiwiss' "The Wolf and the Dove" (explicit heterosexual romance)
• Bertrice Smal's "Skye o'Malley," (which are all explicit heterosexual romances)
• Alan Moore's "Lost Girls" (which is a very explicit sexual graphic novel)
The petition supporters note that the following titles with gay and lesbian themes are no longer ranked on Amazon:
• Radclyffe Hill's classic novel about lesbians in Victorian times, The Well of Loneliness, and which contains not one sentence of sexual description;
• Mark R. Probst's YA novel "The Filly" about a young man in the wild West discovering that he's gay (gay romance, no sex);
• Charlie Cochrane's "Lessons in Love" (gay romance with no sex)
• "The Dictionary of Homophobia: A Global History of Gay & Lesbian Experience," edited by Louis-George Tin (non-fiction, history and social issues)
• "Homophobia: A History" by Bryan Fone (nonfiction, focus on history and the forms prejudice against homosexuality has taken over the years)
The move has raised the ire of heterosexuals, including Kassia Krozser, who wrote an open letter to the online retailer:
Somehow, the brain trust of your company has decided to protect the "entire" Amazon customer base by restricting access to content that someone (who?) decided was offensive. In your zeal to protect me from myself, of course, you managed to leave content that I find singularly repulsive online (really, exploring the human condition is bad, but Mein Kampf is just fine?).As a heterosexual, happily married adult female, I am deeply offended by this decision. As a customer, I am angered enough to take my business elsewhere, and I'd like a refund on my Kindle since, despite reports that your database sweep was not complete, you have decided to limit my ability to purchase books -- from literary classics like Lady Chatterley's Lover to newesque titles like Tipping The Velvet and Running With Scissors.
It's unclear what--if any--impact this backlash will have on Amazon, but certainly many are troubled (and should be) that the bookseller is apparently trying to make certain books harder to find.
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