Craigslist users only agreed to have their content displayed on the Craigslist site, not on any other random site on the Internet who wants to relist their posting without the users explicit permission.
This is my expectation not only of CL, but of many sites. I understand that others may disagree. But, I suspect that my expectation of non-propagation of material is the default expectation for many or most sites that accept user submitted material.
If CL is somehow forced to let others scrape their content, I would welcome an option to turn on a switch that will block/hide/protect the material I contribute from external entities. On second thought, I would rather have the do not share option be the default and let me opt in to sharing everything always, share by material classification or one post at a time.
I can guess why. But could you tell us specifically?
Assume for the sake of the question that whereever the data may appear on the web, it would always have a "Source: " line to indicate its original source, i.e. the site to which you submitted it. Assume that the integrity of the data could also be verified, e.g., through a digital signature.
Of course, I realize that this must be tempered with the realization that there are situations where scraping CL and re-posting the information on another site may make sense for the original poster (e.g., a hotel ad).
Here are a few of the negative items that come to mind for just classified ads:
- When I complete a transaction and delete a CL ad, I do not want other interested parties calling, texting and e-mailing me hours, months or years afterwards
- I already dislike the 10-to-1-ish ratio of SPAM/scammer/nutjob banter to communications from legitimately interested parties. I suspect any proliferation of my postings beyond CL will only tend to increase this ratio.
- The text and images within my classified ads may be more easily accessible to scammers who just need some content to farm and post elsewhere (e.g., other classified forums, eBay, AirBnB, etc.)
- Sites which do the automated scraping of CL can directly be or can become a target and/or searchable repository for intelligence gathering and source for creating new or expanding existing personal identification databases
There are countless other scenarios ranging from good to bad regarding this subject. For now, I'm convinced that the potential for the bad, the incompetent, the annoying, the negligent, the criminal and other negative scenarios outweigh the good. This is really meant to apply to how I use CL. As I mentioned before, there are undoubtedly specific scenarios where many of the potentially negative items would be moot for specific CL users.
Obviously, there are other factors here too such as the commercial viability/legality/precedent of allowing non-CL entities to use CL resources with or without restriction to directly or indirectly profit. From my perspective as a user, it's not really that important other than an arguable matter of principle.
Maybe you just want CL to win? That's different from whether CL has a real chance of winning. This case is unlikely to go to trial. That's because CL has a lot to lose and 3Taps has very little to lose. Some believe the reason there are few lawsuits on these issues that are not settled out of court is because websites like CL are afraid of having a court decide on them. Why would they want to avoid having a court decide?
'any other random site on the Internet' is hardly the same as a single-purpose (native) app for making CraigsList listings easier to parse. I'm sure that most of the random Internet sites might not even be attributing the data back to CraigsList.
When it comes to apps like this, all Craigslist has to do to compete is make their UI for browsing/tracking listing better. If their interface was better, then people wouldn't feel the need to pay ~$3 for a separate app to browser their listings.
I'm not really arguing the legality of the issue though. I'm just talking about the spirit of what the content authors were trying to accomplish which I believe is: have some random person on the internet see their post and, subsequently, arrive at some sort of mutually beneficial arrangement with that person.
This is just like if telcos say 'go to some other provider if you don't like my terms and conditions'. except, they have a monopoly.
The hard part for you is creating a compelling enough competitor 15 years too late and also to make it worth people's while to start using your site vs. CL.
which is essentially why CL has a defacto "monopoly" - there is no way someone can come and make a different CL.
The users know CL is sharing it with the world and that's what the users expect. As the article says, CL is happy for search engines to access these. Just obviously not search engines that they don't like.
You don't get to pick and choose who accesses your website unless you put a password up. And if the content's not copyrightable...
And why would ad copy not by copyrightable? I don't see a creative commons license at the bottom of craigslist ads.
I'm not sure where all this entitlement comes from that you think you have a right to another company's database simply because it's index is public.
If Craigslist changes its name or sells its SF apartment listings to some site with a name you do not like, what can you do? Answer: Nothing, because you gave them an exclusive nonrevocable license to your data. If you really wanted control over your personally identifiable data then it would probably be wise not to submit it to a site that gets scraped and cached by Google (from which anyone can make fair use) and certainly not under a license that gave you no control over the data after it's submitted. You would want a site that has some sort of protections like passwords, that allows some degree of pseudo anonymity so your name is not embedded in an evergreen search engine cache; and you would want the right to tell the site to remove/delete the data at your direction, if that became necessary (e.g. in your example scenario).
In short, Craigslist really isn't in the business of protecting your data for you. Its terms are what they are because it's seeking to protect its own business, which relies on your data.