Crucifying Craigslist

[David Farber <dave () farber net>]

Begin forwarded message:

From: Lauren Weinstein <lauren () vortex com>
Date: April 25, 2009 3:23:30 PM EDT
To: dave () farber net
Subject: Crucifying Craigslist



                           Crucifying Craigslist

             http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000554.html


    Category: Storage Services
       "I have a small, tightly padded box available for rent.
        You can put almost anything you wish into it.
        Rates available upon request."


Greetings.  As I write this, Google News shows over 2500 entries for
the search term "craigslist killer" -- and many more for similar
searches.  Was someone at Craigslist killed?  Did some at Craigslist
kill anybody?

Of course not.  As you probably know by now, "Craigslist Killer" has
become the media shorthand for references to alleged robber and killer
Philip Markoff, who reportedly used Craigslist to find potential
victims to finance what appears to have been a gambling obsession.

Since it has become so popular to blame open communications and the
Internet in particular for most of society's problems these days, it
perhaps was to be expected that mainstream media would home in on the
Craigslist connection.  But why?

Ads similar in every respect to the "erotic services" ads for which
Craigslist is being condemned are available from openly accessible
newspaper racks and vending machines in virtually every major city.
To the extent that prostitution is an issue, I've seen absolutely no
statistics to suggest that there have been measurable changes in its
incidence with the arrival of Craigslist in a city.  The world's
"oldest profession" has managed to flourish -- with all of its
attendant risks -- since the dawn of civilization, it is not a
creation of the Internet.  It will continue even if our technological
civilization collapses, so long as humans exist.

Media reports are spending at least as much time with their concerted
effort to crucify Craigslist as they are on the alleged killer
himself, and the gambling connection that apparently drove the
robberies eventually leading to murder.

In a particularly disgraceful interview example, ABC News' Martin
Bashir asked Craigslist founder Craig Newmark if he "regarded himself
as a law-abiding citizen of America."  One can only assume that
"enhanced interrogation techniques" might be next on the agenda after
a question like that.  (Full disclosure: Craig is a founding signatory
of my NNSquad [ Network Neutrality Squad - http://www.nnsquad.org ]
project, but I have never discussed with him nor anyone else at
Craigslist any aspects of Craigslist policies or operations.)

Rather than concentrate on the risks that persons placing ads
knowingly take, or on the gambling industry that has ruined and
continues to ruin vast numbers of lives via everything from casinos to
lotteries, the media focus on Craigslist represents a clear and
present danger to free speech on the Internet.

The implicit argument being made by Craigslist detractors is that if
Craigslist closed down its "erotic services" category, or someone
manually pre-approved the millions of ads that are posted in
Craigslist generally, that events such as the Markoff case wouldn't
exist.

But as the example ad at the beginning of this posting demonstrates,
there are myriad ways to camouflage erotic solicitations, in any
number of innocent appearing categories and manners.  The most likely
result of closing down the Craigslist erotic services category would
be the movement en masse of such ads to disguised forms spread
throughout most other categories, where persons uninterested in such
ventures will likely be confused in disconcerting ways.

At the very least, the collection of all erotic ads in a clearly
labeled category -- call it a red light district if you must -- helps
to avoid the kinds of misunderstandings that disguised ads could
easily engender.  And in fact, explicit ad categories have also been
an effective tool for law enforcement use.

More broadly, the "blame the indexer" sensibility that seems to be
spreading is of great concern, as legislators and other officials seem
to be increasingly viewing control over search engines like Google as
key avenues toward censoring what their citizens will be allowed to
learn about or access.  We're seeing an accelerating trend toward
blaming such services for the existence of content that they index,
rather than the creators and owners of the actual content itself.

This is not a totally black and white situation -- I have previously
suggested that very limited dispute resolution mechanisms be
considered to deal with unusual search query results problems
( http://lauren.vortex.com/archive/000255.html ).

But generally by far, blaming the messenger is an underhanded and
historically popular scapegoating technique used throughout the ages
as a diversionary tactic.

Trying to blame Craigslist for a gambling-induced, robbery-gone-wrong
murder of a victim who posted an erotic services ad may be great for
scoring quick political and popular appeal points, but it's completely
wrong-headed from the standpoints of logic, fairness, and ultimate
impacts.

    Category: Tools
      "I have a very long and hard post digger     available for rent.
       It will meet all of your gardening needs.  I can rent it out
       by the day or the hour.  Looking forward to discussing with
       you in more detail."


--Lauren--
Lauren Weinstein
lauren () vortex com
Tel: +1 (818) 225-2800
http://www.pfir.org/lauren
Co-Founder, PFIR
  - People For Internet Responsibility - http://www.pfir.org
Co-Founder, NNSquad
  - Network Neutrality Squad - http://www.nnsquad.org
Founder, GCTIP - Global Coalition
  for Transparent Internet Performance - http://www.gctip.org
Founder, PRIVACY Forum - http://www.vortex.com
Member, ACM Committee on Computers and Public Policy
Lauren's Blog: http://lauren.vortex.com
Twitter: LW1




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