process.
Livingston: How did you first come up with the idea of flagging?
Newmark: I forget. I think it was my customer service team, not me. I don’t
recall, it was so long ago.
Livingston: But it worked pretty well?
Craig Newmark 251
Newmark: Yes. It works great in all sorts of ways, and it’s also an expression of
our values. Mutual trust. This is kind of democracy in real life. Everyone wins,
except for the bad guys.
Livingston: Do you remember a time when you wanted to quit?
Newmark:...

money. But that doesn’t matter now.
Livingston: Who were the first craigslist employees?
Newmark: Just a handful of people that I found in ’99.
Livingston: Did you work with them? How did you find them?
Newmark: I think through the site.
Livingston: How did you grow the features on the site? Did you always add
new features based on user feedback?
Newmark: When it comes to features visible from the outside, yes. Internally,
we figure out on a continuous basis . . . we figure out what tools we need, and
...

all sorts of things, all the bad things we’ve talked about, and they would also do
things to try to evade our tools—which worked, by the way, except I have a volunteer
who looks at things. They would post using multiple email addresses,
that kind of thing. I just kept blocking them and blocking them, and they got
tired of being blocked and they finally approached me and said, “Sorry about
this.” And it’s working now.
Craig Newmark 253
Livingston: So they didn’t just go away; they changed.
Newmark: Yes. That is...

Newmark: The other people on my team do, yes. Since I’ve had such bad luck
in interviewing—that’s because I’m not suited to it—I have no role in the hiring
whatsoever.
Livingston: Is there anything about craigslist that people misunderstand?
Newmark: People sometimes still think we’re a nonprofit, even though we tell
people that we’re not. Sometimes people think that we sold part to eBay, and
that’s a misconception I have to fix now and then.
Livingston: eBay is letting you do your thing, right?
Newmark: Yes.
Livingston: What advice would you...