VentureBeat

Wired takes on Craigslist founder, who promptly walks into a door

Wired writer Gary Wolf has done the best job ever of capturing the enigmatic, inspiring, yet clumsy personality of Craigslist founder Craig Newmark. If you’ve ever met Craig at a party and found it hard to hold a conversation with him, don’t feel bad. Charlie Rose had the same problem on national TV.

Wolf’s assessment of Newmark’s business is that Craigslist has refused to evolve, in part because Newmark is happier replying to customer support email… Continue Reading

Craigslist strikes back at attorney general, seeks restraining order

South Carolina Attorney General Henry McMaster hit Craiglist with an ultimatum earlier this month: “Remove the portions of the Internet site dedicated to South Carolina and its municipal regions which contain categories for and functions allowing for the solicitation of prostitution and the dissemination and posting of graphic pornographic material” within ten (10) days.”

“If those South Carolina portions of the site are not removed,” McMaster said, “the management of craigslist may be subject to criminal… Continue Reading

Roundup: Google calls out quitters, Craigslist’s feelings are hurt and more

Here’s the latest action:

Google knows you’re quitting before you do — In the wake of recent brain drain, the search giant has devised an algorithm that combines employee reviews, promotion histories, pay and other factors to predict which employees are most likely to leave. The WSJ has more.

Unity Semiconductor finds chip alternative – After seven years of research, the company will provide flash memory said to have four times the storage capacity and five to ten… Continue Reading

Craigslist confirms: no more fancy hookers

In April, a medical student in Boston was charged with killing a "masseuse" he met through Craigslist’s Erotic Services classified ads. This morning, Illinois’ attorney general, who with her counterparts from Connecticut and Missouri had met with Craigslist execs last week, told the Associated Press that Craiglist will be shutting down the category, which largely serves as a clearinghouse for paid sex.

Craigslist publicist Susan MacTavish Best emailed us the statement below, in which she explains… Continue Reading

Roundup: An Apple netbook hoax, a BlackBerry sales victory, and more

Here’s the latest action:

Is this the new Apple netbook? — Cult of Mac published an image from “a trusted contributor.” But no, it actually turned out to be a student-created wooden model. Oops.

RIM’s BlackBerry Curve unseats Apple’s iPhone in sales – One of the big drivers of this victory? An aggressive “buy one get one free” campaign by Verizon.

FTC looks at overlap of Apple and Google boards — The question is whether those ties reduce competition between… Continue Reading

Roundup: Pleo is dead, Twitter spreads swine flu, Google Earth solves plane crash and more

Here’s all the latest action:

Verizon iPhone in the works — Apple and Verizon have been talking about launching an iPhone for the Verizon network as early as next year. USA Today has the story.

Tragedy strikes as Pleo, the magic dinosaur, is liquidated — Ugobe, maker of robotic dino Pleo, has filed for Chapter 7 bankruptcy and will liquidate its intellectual property.

Cleantech funding not so miserable — Investor Rob Day questions the reported 84 percent drop in cleantech investing… Continue Reading

Roundup: Virgin Mobile acquires Helio, Starbucks to stop music sales and more

Here’s the latest action:

New partnership brings Helio to Virgin Mobile — Virgin Mobile USA will acquire the U.S. arm of South korea-based SK Telecom, namely, a mobile operator called Helio, according to the Financial Times. Both mobile operators have been struggling to make money by piggybacking on the infrastructure of existing carriers. This announcement doesn’t offer any sense of how they might bounce back; it just seems loaded with more bad news, like the estimate that… Continue Reading

Roundup: Icahn may go proxy on Yahoo, Craigslist countersues eBay, and more

Here’s the latest action:

Icahn considers his own proxy war for Yahoo — Billionaire investor Carl Icahn began buying massive amounts of Yahoo stock last week — up to 50 million shares — and now is thinking about using that influence. He is considering replacing some of Yahoo’s board members (not quite the full replacement Microsoft was considering) with those of his own choosing, according to CNBC. Such a move could potentially force Yahoo to sell to… Continue Reading

Roundup: Yahoo braces for a return to normal life, GTA IV, and more

After a crazy 13 weeks, Yahoo hopes life will start to calm down — That’s the gist of this message to company employees from Yahoo chief executive Jerry Yang, after he and its board of directors rejected Microsoft’s purchase offer. Yahoo may get punished in the stock market today, but still, “I’m so proud of how this company has come together, put the noise aside, and showed the world that we have the resolve and… Continue Reading

Craigslist sued by part-owner eBay [Updated]

Updated with a blog post from Craigslist chief executive Jim Buckmaster, below the article

Craigslist, the lucrative online listings marketplace, is being sued by its part-owner, eBay, according to a number of reports.

EBay, the dominant marketplace property on the web, bought a 28.4 stake in privately-owned Craigslist in 2004 from an outgoing Craiglist executive. Since then, eBay has launched a competing listing service called Kijiji.

The lawsuit alleges that Craiglist founder Craig Newmark and chief executive Jim… Continue Reading

Jobster to serve Facebook exclusively — targets Craigslist

Jobster, the Seattle job search engine, armed with $50 million in financing and aiming to be profitable this year, announces two big moves tomorrow (Thursday).

First, it jettisons its comfy neutrality with other sites. Until now, it has remained a search engine, listing excerpts from job postings at Monster and CareerBuilder, and sending users to those sites to view the full postings. Going forward, Jobster will still do that. But it will also let employers post… Continue Reading