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Free idea: Craigslist alerts

1 points by goofygrin ↗ HN
I'm sure this has been written... but a (very) quick search didn't turn up anything.

I've been on the lookout for some stuff and wished I could get alerted when a posting was made for these items... of course I could use RSS, but that's not KISS for normal people.

7 comments

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Tichy
The problem with that kind of thing is polling the servers of Craigslist, I suppose. Would Craigslist allow it? Suppose you have thousands of items to poll for every day.
goofygrin
Ya... I think they busted that one guy that was doing the CL pictures... Maybe you could use the google cache of CL? Seems the site is indexed quite quickly...

Not sure how to monetize it either...

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gscott
Maybe a person could suggest they keep there system "pure" the way they want it and let you setup some "enhancements" that people would pay for or would be ad supported (by google adwords (ads on the ads, I know that sounds kind of strange)) then share the revenue.

I believe they just don't want to lose control but at the same time they want to keep there system "pure".

ALee
We've been thinking about this idea for a long time. For example, I'm in the market for a platform bed (because right now my mattress is on the floor), but I'm not going to check every day. This application would probably be similar to EBay's "Want It Now" application, but would be more geographically based. It's a great idea, and I think we put it on our YC application (as one of the ideas we thought about).
goofygrin
Ya... exactly what I was thinking... for what I need right now, I wouldn't travel to Austin or Houston (I'm in the Dallas area), but for other things (cars), I would want to know when a 68 corvette comes into Austin, Houston or Dallas.