I haven't had any problems with craigslist. I often sell AND give items away for free and have never had a listing flagged. I sometimes give away things an item at a time, but more often I just run a listing saying that things will be placed at the curb, first come, first take.
While auto-flag software does seem a little underhanded, why would I care who gets an item I'm giving away for free? Whether they need it for personal use or want to resell it is no business of mine. All I care about is getting it out of my home or garage.
Some recommend freecycle, but I haven't had good experiences with it. Maybe our group is just too large, but any time I've tried to get something I never get a response of any kind, and when I've tried to give something, I've had dozens of responses. The worse is when I promise something to someone and they never show up. I don't have that problem with craigslist.
A total scam, I really think they have people working inside increasing the bids. I bought bids from this place, Bid when the timer was down to 2 seconds and lost, the person that bid won. I have been winning items when 1 second showed and did not win. Look at the auctions won, and the bidders had sometimes, 375 bids at 75 cent each. Who is really winning when you have 15,000 bids at 75 cents for an item worth wholesale, maybe $300.00. Stay away from this site. They can have my $22.50.
Maybe Craigslist could respond more flexible to flagging, like shifting the flagged post to a second tier, called "flagged section". There people could give positive flaggings, too, moving the posting to a higher ranking in the second tier, which makes is easier for customers to look for it.
"Partial list of items for sale and services the advertisement of which is not permitted on craigslist:
...
# Household pets of any kind including but not limited to dogs, cats, primates, cage birds, rodents, reptiles, amphibians, fish. Re-homing with small adoption fee OK
# Pet animal parts, blood, or fluids - including but not limited to stud/breeding service "
Interesting info. I'll keep it in mind if I ever venture into the CL Free section again. I used to list things for free all the time, but I got tired of dealing with the nutty people who would respond. TJ's "cesspool" description is pretty accurate. I've been using Freecycle and find that it is a whole different world. People are polite, they actually show up, most of them say "thanks" for an item.
Guest @28, you crack me up! Did you really think I was "adding up the wealth of three Democrats" when I said Obama, Pelosi and Reid controlled $3.5 trillion a year? I was talking about the federal budget, my friend, not their personal wealth! Sometimes I wonder whether left-wingers simply don't know the difference between a Billion and a Trillion. That would explain why it's so easy for them to throw the taxpayers' money around so freely!
I realize that, to some people, anybody to the right of Karl Marx, and especially anybody who respects the Constitution and principles of personal freedom, is "far right," and that's OK. We're all entitled to our own opinions, at least so far. But what, exactly, about my posts in this thread are "far-right" - just to give us a standard of measurement?
Or is your style of argument entirely ad hominem? I wonder if the Democratic Central Committee hires people to monitor blogs and accuse anybody who deviates from Obama's talking points of being in the hire of the Republican Central Committee? Did the DCC hire YOU to do that? Did the DCC hire CommonSenseEtc.? Are you and CommonSenseEtc. one and the same? Don't answer. I don't care.
Wouldn't it be more productive of intelligent discussion to tackle the arguments, whoever makes them, than engage in pointless paranoid ruminations about the motives of the arguers? Do you refuse to eat vegetables, just because Hitler said they were good for you? Or do you consider the value of vegetables on their own merits? An ad hominem argument is the last resort of someone who has no better one.
As for my work schedule, at this stage in my life, I work very efficiently, get paid a high hourly rate and spend modestly. That follows years, or rather, decades of working long hours and spending/saving with some (imperfect) self-discipline. To a left-winger, that makes me evil, I know. But this is a personal finance blog, and just maybe people who have done alright under our current economic system have some useful thoughts to share.
It seems to me that several of the previous posters, while zealous in their assertions, lack one fact. That being - the rich by mere virture of that fact get better results with anything related to finance.
Is this wrong? I guess it depends on how you look at it. I would forward that it is at least unethical. However most advisors (insurance, stock, legal, etc.) get paid based on volume of dollars captured or saved for their clients. This means that they will out of necessity focus on wealthy client to ply their trade.
Again, is this wrong? Probably not, however the goal of a true "Financial Professional" should be to better the financial positions of everyone they come in contact with.
How is this possibe? The biggest way is through public education, service, and good advice. The only way to make it economically feasible in most cases is to make the advice somewhat generic, the education en mass, and the service cut rate.
However there are other options, especially today with the internet. Just about anyone who wants access to the internet can get it at their work, local library, or internet cafe.
The interent has a plethera of good resources that can help to educate them, inform them of other options, and provide excellet services. This is done by the scope and volume of the potential clients, the lower cost of client acqusition, and the removal in many cases of brick-and-mortar distrubution outlets.
I for one appreciate the free exchange of information and appluade all of the participants for doing just that. Hopefully we will all be better informed, and therefor more capable in dealing with our personal finances and those of our loved ones.
It seems that any WiseBread article that references wealth in any way gets a flurry of comments pushing spiteful right-wing rhetoric with a whole spectrum of logical fallacies, ad hominem in particular. What's up?
ok i read all the comments and ppl thoughts....and most of them said they will quit the jobs...
awww according to my age(19) i don't have that much experience but i think i will never quit a job yah mab b lad off for time being beacuse money can give u lurxarious life but it can't give u peace unless u spend it for good cause...
if i won million of dollar i would like to built a hospital in the name of DIANA where poor people will get free treatment but not the rich one. i don't have interest in cars or houses even though i m girl. i will divide mi money equally in 3 parts one for me, one for mi relitives and one for my country.
one more thing if i know that i will never going to die may be then i was interested in making lots of money but i know i have to die eventually one day so there is not point in making lots of money.
Glen Beck, commentators on CNBC, O'Reilly are the ones that have been stocking class warfare for time. Calling people who are behind on their mortgages losers is class warfare. Reagan also played the game of class warfare with terms such as "welfare queen."
AnnJo appears on other boards, with the same far-right talking points each and every time. She adds the wealth of three democrats to make a point, as if all republcians are regular "Joes." The RNC has paid posters. I am not sure if she is one, but it is odd that she admitted to only having to work 10 hours a week on another board.
I cancelled everything from Wisebread except for Brewer's blog wanting to escape such far-right talking points.
My parents got whole life in 1991 with equaltible. Just last year an agent came to our house and told them that their whole life insurance had been changed to term about 8 years ago. He told them that the company had switched over and the reason why they are just now telling them is b/c the insurance company had been behind. I was wondering is it legal for the insurace company to do that b/c when the policy switched to term it stoped gaining face value which was a lose for my parents.
Craigslist is a cesspool these days. Just try posting ANYTHING in the pets section. The flaggers are rampant.
Freecyle is awesome! You can post both wanted items and offered items. The postings are moderated and you don't have to worry about your ad being flagged by someone who is unscrupulous.
When I give away an item or items, I usually wait 12-18 hours so that everyone has a chance to request the item and then I'm free to give it away to who I want.
Isn't it frustrating when people do underhanded things like this! I wish that Craigslist made some change such as only removing items flagged 3 or more times.
I am looking into buying 2 converter boxes but I am doing some research on the converter boxes first and trying to get information about it. Does anyone know how many channels you get for sure with the converter box? Would I happen to get channel 48 which is Nick on Cable? My son like's to watch Sponge Bob and the other shows on Nick. Would I get TNT? I like watching Charmed and that show is on TNT. Just trying to figure out if I would get some of the channels we had when we got cable because if I do then that would save me alot of money instead of trying to get cable again. All I really care about is how many channels I will get for sure. Hope someone can help me out. Thanks alot.
Steven, very interesting article/link. Your polite response is the face of ridiculing comments is inspiring to me. I would not have handled it as well. I guess that since you are not a 'creative,' producer, or doer--like we have over at AIG and Goldman--you value to society is nil, according to some here.
It would appear that small is relative in terms of expectations. 1200 sq ft is small?? my partner is 6ft 8 and i 5ft 10, we have 3 children and 2 large dogs. Our cottage is approx 750 sq ft and we are only just feeling like we need a bit more space. Some people are spoiled!!
Promotions can really screw things up for mid-level people who arranged their work life in their old positions so they had as little to do as possible (eg, fobbing off as much of their work on a combination of their own secretaries, interns, and virtual assistants based in the Third World a la Timothy Ferriss). Clueless higher-ups think the outsourcing workers has an impressive output, and so they get promoted and risk having all their tricks exposed.
@Kelja You might be surprised, but in 1989 I was actually offered the full-time, benefited job of Direktoro de la Centra Oficejo by the Esperanto League for North America (now Esperanto-USA) -- it's a non-profit educational organization that runs a book service and responds to information requests about Esperanto in the US. It didn't pay very well then (and still doesn't pay a lot) -- especially given that the office is in the San Francisco area -- but it isn't the only job for Esperanto speakers: the World Esperanto Association has several paid staff positions in the Netherlands and there are offices with paid staff doing Esperanto in other countries as well, including Belgium and Brazil.
And, of course, there are many jobs where you can get paid to write in some made-up languages (like C, Perl, PHP, and Java) that actually pay quite handsomely.
I didn't take the job, BTW, and instead went back to graduate school and got a PhD in science education. I do alright.
... I thought I ought to mention that Steve Brewer is my brother. He does speak Esperanto better than I do, but I'm working on catching up.
In any case, I think his point is well taken: The uniqueness of your capabilities has little to do with the remuneration that you can expect. However, before pointing at the "market" as the inevitable arbitrator of wages and salaries, be sure too observe just how much power relationships influence the matter. It's well worth reading the Dean Baker article he links to, which persuasively lays out the case that all sorts of things that are thought of as property rights can be instructively analyzed as government regulation.
I haven't had any problems with craigslist. I often sell AND give items away for free and have never had a listing flagged. I sometimes give away things an item at a time, but more often I just run a listing saying that things will be placed at the curb, first come, first take.
While auto-flag software does seem a little underhanded, why would I care who gets an item I'm giving away for free? Whether they need it for personal use or want to resell it is no business of mine. All I care about is getting it out of my home or garage.
Some recommend freecycle, but I haven't had good experiences with it. Maybe our group is just too large, but any time I've tried to get something I never get a response of any kind, and when I've tried to give something, I've had dozens of responses. The worse is when I promise something to someone and they never show up. I don't have that problem with craigslist.
I stopped using eBay because of the sniping.
Don't pay off your credit card to save money for a layoff? Or avoid it getting canceled?
Someone need to graph this out. You'll have significantly less money in even a year from now if you follow this advice.
A total scam, I really think they have people working inside increasing the bids. I bought bids from this place, Bid when the timer was down to 2 seconds and lost, the person that bid won. I have been winning items when 1 second showed and did not win. Look at the auctions won, and the bidders had sometimes, 375 bids at 75 cent each. Who is really winning when you have 15,000 bids at 75 cents for an item worth wholesale, maybe $300.00. Stay away from this site. They can have my $22.50.
Maybe Craigslist could respond more flexible to flagging, like shifting the flagged post to a second tier, called "flagged section". There people could give positive flaggings, too, moving the posting to a higher ranking in the second tier, which makes is easier for customers to look for it.
AnnJo - great point! Most people have no ideaq how big 1 trillion is. To put it in perspective consider the following:
1 million seconds ago was 11.57 days ago
1 billion seconds ago was 31.70 years ago (or 1977)
and
1 trillion seconds ago was 31,709 years ago...think cave man without fire or the wheel.
That means if the government was only spending 1 trillion dollars we would only need to earn a dollar a second for 31,709 years to "earn" it back.
Yes, the math is correct and yes that is crazy!
re TJ
Most pets are not allowed to be sold/traded/etc. via Craigslist. See http://www.craigslist.org/about/prohibited.items
"Partial list of items for sale and services the advertisement of which is not permitted on craigslist:
...
# Household pets of any kind including but not limited to dogs, cats, primates, cage birds, rodents, reptiles, amphibians, fish. Re-homing with small adoption fee OK
# Pet animal parts, blood, or fluids - including but not limited to stud/breeding service "
Interesting info. I'll keep it in mind if I ever venture into the CL Free section again. I used to list things for free all the time, but I got tired of dealing with the nutty people who would respond. TJ's "cesspool" description is pretty accurate. I've been using Freecycle and find that it is a whole different world. People are polite, they actually show up, most of them say "thanks" for an item.
Guest @28, you crack me up! Did you really think I was "adding up the wealth of three Democrats" when I said Obama, Pelosi and Reid controlled $3.5 trillion a year? I was talking about the federal budget, my friend, not their personal wealth! Sometimes I wonder whether left-wingers simply don't know the difference between a Billion and a Trillion. That would explain why it's so easy for them to throw the taxpayers' money around so freely!
I realize that, to some people, anybody to the right of Karl Marx, and especially anybody who respects the Constitution and principles of personal freedom, is "far right," and that's OK. We're all entitled to our own opinions, at least so far. But what, exactly, about my posts in this thread are "far-right" - just to give us a standard of measurement?
Or is your style of argument entirely ad hominem? I wonder if the Democratic Central Committee hires people to monitor blogs and accuse anybody who deviates from Obama's talking points of being in the hire of the Republican Central Committee? Did the DCC hire YOU to do that? Did the DCC hire CommonSenseEtc.? Are you and CommonSenseEtc. one and the same? Don't answer. I don't care.
Wouldn't it be more productive of intelligent discussion to tackle the arguments, whoever makes them, than engage in pointless paranoid ruminations about the motives of the arguers? Do you refuse to eat vegetables, just because Hitler said they were good for you? Or do you consider the value of vegetables on their own merits? An ad hominem argument is the last resort of someone who has no better one.
As for my work schedule, at this stage in my life, I work very efficiently, get paid a high hourly rate and spend modestly. That follows years, or rather, decades of working long hours and spending/saving with some (imperfect) self-discipline. To a left-winger, that makes me evil, I know. But this is a personal finance blog, and just maybe people who have done alright under our current economic system have some useful thoughts to share.
It seems to me that several of the previous posters, while zealous in their assertions, lack one fact. That being - the rich by mere virture of that fact get better results with anything related to finance.
Is this wrong? I guess it depends on how you look at it. I would forward that it is at least unethical. However most advisors (insurance, stock, legal, etc.) get paid based on volume of dollars captured or saved for their clients. This means that they will out of necessity focus on wealthy client to ply their trade.
Again, is this wrong? Probably not, however the goal of a true "Financial Professional" should be to better the financial positions of everyone they come in contact with.
How is this possibe? The biggest way is through public education, service, and good advice. The only way to make it economically feasible in most cases is to make the advice somewhat generic, the education en mass, and the service cut rate.
However there are other options, especially today with the internet. Just about anyone who wants access to the internet can get it at their work, local library, or internet cafe.
The interent has a plethera of good resources that can help to educate them, inform them of other options, and provide excellet services. This is done by the scope and volume of the potential clients, the lower cost of client acqusition, and the removal in many cases of brick-and-mortar distrubution outlets.
I for one appreciate the free exchange of information and appluade all of the participants for doing just that. Hopefully we will all be better informed, and therefor more capable in dealing with our personal finances and those of our loved ones.
It seems that any WiseBread article that references wealth in any way gets a flurry of comments pushing spiteful right-wing rhetoric with a whole spectrum of logical fallacies, ad hominem in particular. What's up?
ok i read all the comments and ppl thoughts....and most of them said they will quit the jobs...
awww according to my age(19) i don't have that much experience but i think i will never quit a job yah mab b lad off for time being beacuse money can give u lurxarious life but it can't give u peace unless u spend it for good cause...
if i won million of dollar i would like to built a hospital in the name of DIANA where poor people will get free treatment but not the rich one. i don't have interest in cars or houses even though i m girl. i will divide mi money equally in 3 parts one for me, one for mi relitives and one for my country.
one more thing if i know that i will never going to die may be then i was interested in making lots of money but i know i have to die eventually one day so there is not point in making lots of money.
Glen Beck, commentators on CNBC, O'Reilly are the ones that have been stocking class warfare for time. Calling people who are behind on their mortgages losers is class warfare. Reagan also played the game of class warfare with terms such as "welfare queen."
AnnJo appears on other boards, with the same far-right talking points each and every time. She adds the wealth of three democrats to make a point, as if all republcians are regular "Joes." The RNC has paid posters. I am not sure if she is one, but it is odd that she admitted to only having to work 10 hours a week on another board.
I cancelled everything from Wisebread except for Brewer's blog wanting to escape such far-right talking points.
My parents got whole life in 1991 with equaltible. Just last year an agent came to our house and told them that their whole life insurance had been changed to term about 8 years ago. He told them that the company had switched over and the reason why they are just now telling them is b/c the insurance company had been behind. I was wondering is it legal for the insurace company to do that b/c when the policy switched to term it stoped gaining face value which was a lose for my parents.
CAN ANYONE SUPPLY ME WITH THE REGION FREE CODE FOR A STAND ALONE DVD PLAYER ASDA # DVD1072UK
HEARS HOPING THANK YOU
http://www.freecycle.org/
Craigslist is a cesspool these days. Just try posting ANYTHING in the pets section. The flaggers are rampant.
Freecyle is awesome! You can post both wanted items and offered items. The postings are moderated and you don't have to worry about your ad being flagged by someone who is unscrupulous.
When I give away an item or items, I usually wait 12-18 hours so that everyone has a chance to request the item and then I'm free to give it away to who I want.
Isn't it frustrating when people do underhanded things like this! I wish that Craigslist made some change such as only removing items flagged 3 or more times.
Thanks,
Nate
I am looking into buying 2 converter boxes but I am doing some research on the converter boxes first and trying to get information about it. Does anyone know how many channels you get for sure with the converter box? Would I happen to get channel 48 which is Nick on Cable? My son like's to watch Sponge Bob and the other shows on Nick. Would I get TNT? I like watching Charmed and that show is on TNT. Just trying to figure out if I would get some of the channels we had when we got cable because if I do then that would save me alot of money instead of trying to get cable again. All I really care about is how many channels I will get for sure. Hope someone can help me out. Thanks alot.
Above should read: "Your polite response IN the face of ridiculing comments is inspiring to me."
Steven, very interesting article/link. Your polite response is the face of ridiculing comments is inspiring to me. I would not have handled it as well. I guess that since you are not a 'creative,' producer, or doer--like we have over at AIG and Goldman--you value to society is nil, according to some here.
It would appear that small is relative in terms of expectations. 1200 sq ft is small?? my partner is 6ft 8 and i 5ft 10, we have 3 children and 2 large dogs. Our cottage is approx 750 sq ft and we are only just feeling like we need a bit more space. Some people are spoiled!!
Promotions can really screw things up for mid-level people who arranged their work life in their old positions so they had as little to do as possible (eg, fobbing off as much of their work on a combination of their own secretaries, interns, and virtual assistants based in the Third World a la Timothy Ferriss). Clueless higher-ups think the outsourcing workers has an impressive output, and so they get promoted and risk having all their tricks exposed.
@Kelja You might be surprised, but in 1989 I was actually offered the full-time, benefited job of Direktoro de la Centra Oficejo by the Esperanto League for North America (now Esperanto-USA) -- it's a non-profit educational organization that runs a book service and responds to information requests about Esperanto in the US. It didn't pay very well then (and still doesn't pay a lot) -- especially given that the office is in the San Francisco area -- but it isn't the only job for Esperanto speakers: the World Esperanto Association has several paid staff positions in the Netherlands and there are offices with paid staff doing Esperanto in other countries as well, including Belgium and Brazil.
And, of course, there are many jobs where you can get paid to write in some made-up languages (like C, Perl, PHP, and Java) that actually pay quite handsomely.
I didn't take the job, BTW, and instead went back to graduate school and got a PhD in science education. I do alright.
... I thought I ought to mention that Steve Brewer is my brother. He does speak Esperanto better than I do, but I'm working on catching up.
In any case, I think his point is well taken: The uniqueness of your capabilities has little to do with the remuneration that you can expect. However, before pointing at the "market" as the inevitable arbitrator of wages and salaries, be sure too observe just how much power relationships influence the matter. It's well worth reading the Dean Baker article he links to, which persuasively lays out the case that all sorts of things that are thought of as property rights can be instructively analyzed as government regulation.