Agreed. I’ve made a day trip to the neighboring state to buy a used car from a CL listing, but I probably wouldn’t travel to the other side of the country for it.
Similarly, for many things I wouldn’t travel more than an hour to get them.
The distance radius really needs to be adjustable per search to be useful outside of densely populated areas.
It seems like on CL the city labels are mostly for human readable convenience and behind the scenes it’s by distance. You can set a distance from any point:
One thing I would find valuable is mechanisms to dissuade the listings with obviously false prices. So many things on CL that aren’t really free or $1.
My use of eBay is closer to my use of Craigslist instead of being like an auction. I don’t like to wait for the long bidding windows used online. I also don’t like haggling on prices. In this case, people post what they’re selling, and if I decide to buy it a third party payment platform is used to transfer funds.
The differences are that CL is usually items I pick up personally instead of being shipped (but not always), and some CL sellers only accept cash. I have also picked up eBay purchases locally.
That saying too often gets used as an excuse to not even try moving away from patronizing a harmful business, as though it isn’t worth any inconvenience since we’re screwed no matter what.
Thank you for the difficult public service you do.
The DOJ is actually joining with the plaintiffs in asking the judge to fix the ruling so that the disclosure isn’t required. Copy of the filing here: PDF