Please Flag

I like Craigslist. Sure, it's ugly and its lack of fancy features sometimes makes it difficult to find what I want. But it works. Its best feature (aside from being free) is that it has such a large user base.

Not only does this large user base help the site maintain a large volume of content, it also helps keep the site "clean". Anybody using the site can "flag" any ad that they find inappropriate (or want to commend). After sufficient flagging, bad ads are removed.

But this only works if people are actively "flagging" the bad stuff.

Same goes for any social site that's based on consumer-generated content and user control. Facebook is only interesting or useful when people actually post information or make changes to their profiles or expand their network.

But back to Craigslist... I'm really tired of seeing bad ads. In some categories, you see the same ad being reposted over and over and over and over again. In other categories, there is always a huge volume of scams. As I've posted here before, the jobs/careers area is particularly bad ("sales" does not equal "marketing" darnit) for mis-categorized ads.

This tells me that not enough people are flagging. So, please, next time you're on Craigslist flag one or two ads that are"bad" in some way.