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Posts Tagged “
Jim Buckmaster
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craigslist
Would an in-house attorney keep Craigslist in line?
Hookers and eBay, shares and cops. If Craig Newmark and Jim Buckmaster, had an attorney on staff with them, would that have prevented questionable legal moves by the founder and CEO of the world's most reliable housemates and hookups platform? More »
hires
Jeremy Zawodny left Yahoo for Craigslist
While former Yahoo database engineer Jeremy Zawodny might prefer FriendFeed to Twitter, he'll be commuting to the offices of Craigslist from his home in San Jose. He was recruited via email by CTO Eric Scheide while still at Yahoo, and met with founder Craig Newmark and CEO Jim Buckmaster before leaving Sunnyvale for the Inner Sunset. He'll help maintain and expand the company's ever-growing MySQL database. Because the last thing someone trying to sell a baby needs is for a PHP mysql_fetch_array() call to fail when posting their ad. (Photo by David Weekly)
craigslist
Jim Buckmaster's curious category system
It looked like an unassuming boast-post on the official Craigslist blog touting the site's fast page load times as computed by Alexa. But it's the post's category tags that caught my eye — Harassment and Philanthropy. Could be nothing, could be a subtle backhand to critics. You decide.
jim buckmaster
Craigslist CEO an expert time-waster
Jim Buckmaster, the suspiciously tall CEO of Craigslist, hates meetings. "I've always found them to be at best unproductive and boring, and at worst toxic and destructive," he tells FT Deutschland. "The people who want to show off do, the brown-nosers brown nose, everyone else wastes their time. I also think the larger the meeting, the worse it is." Buckmaster prefers to email or IM, even while in the same room as his electronic correspondents. When forced to attend a meeting, he finds ways to kill time: "Meetings are excellent for doodling. I can remember doing some really, really spectacular doodles." Doesn't this explain so much about how eBay's relationship with Craigslist soured?
nerdfight
Craigslist whines like a toddler in countersuit against eBay
Craigslist has filed suit against eBay in San Francisco County Superior Court, alleging trademark infringement, breach of fiduciary duty, anti-competitve trade practices and deceptive advertising. Why California? Because the state has some of the strictest antitrust and competition trade laws in the country. Craigslist is asking the court to award damages and force eBay to divest from the online classifieds site. Also alleged? That eBay was a big meanie. The best parts: More »
party report
This is what I remember from last night's VentureBeat party: A social network for golfers announced a round of funding at the event. A social network for golfers? Is this what blogging has come to, I asked founder Matt Marshall. He gamely held his ground and ducked the question. As Kara Swisher documented in the clip above, VentureBeat's party at the Ambassador in San Francisco was a bubbly affair, packed wall to wall with free drinks for all comers — until the bar turned cash. That kept the event, paid for by sponsors, profitable, Marshall explained. I'm glad the blog bought me a drink. I needed it when I ran into Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster later that evening. He was perfectly civil, but it's disconcerting to talk to a man to whom one only comes up to clenched-fist level.
For VentureBeat, a profitable display of excess
This is what I remember from last night's VentureBeat party: A social network for golfers announced a round of funding at the event. A social network for golfers? Is this what blogging has come to, I asked founder Matt Marshall. He gamely held his ground and ducked the question. As Kara Swisher documented in the clip above, VentureBeat's party at the Ambassador in San Francisco was a bubbly affair, packed wall to wall with free drinks for all comers — until the bar turned cash. That kept the event, paid for by sponsors, profitable, Marshall explained. I'm glad the blog bought me a drink. I needed it when I ran into Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster later that evening. He was perfectly civil, but it's disconcerting to talk to a man to whom one only comes up to clenched-fist level.
jim buckmaster
Responding to eBay, Craigslist CEO digs hole deeper
Jim Buckmaster has just set himself up for a messy court fight. Responding to eBay's lawsuit against Craigslist and its board — the board being Buckmaster and founder Craig Newmark — he has claimed that he and Newmark issued additional shares in the company to themselves "for the sake of protecting the long term well-being of the Craigslist community." Let's leave aside the question of how the community benefits from Buckmaster and Newmark increasing their ownership. Craigslist is registered as a for-profit company; as such, its only legal responsibility is to its shareholders, not its users. More »
craigslist
Why Craig Newmark had better not piss off Jim Buckmaster
eBay's lawsuit against Craigslist, alleging that founder Craig Newmark and CEO Jim Buckmaster conspired to squeeze eBay out of the company, is fascinating for many reasons. It reveals Buckmaster and Newmark's naked greed: They issued shares of the company to themselves to increase their stakes and decrease eBay's.But it also shows how tight the two have been with Craigslist's workers. eBay owns, or owned 28.4 percent of the company, a stake acquired from early Craigslist employee Philip Knowlton. Knowlton sold his shares in part because Buckmaster and Newmark were trying to squeeze him out, too. (Are you beginning to see a pattern?) The two, acting as Craigslist's board of directors, issued themselves one new share for every five they already owned, a move which pushed eBay's ownership stake down to 24.85 percent — a level which, among other things, eliminated eBay's ability to elect a director for the company. Do the math, and it becomes clear that Craigslist's other shareholders — presumably its employees — own about 3.3 percent of the company. That's a miserably small portion of equity to give employees of a tech startup; normally, about 20 percent of a company's equity is reserved for employees. More »
feuds
Details of eBay's complaint against Craigslist revealed
The text of eBay's complaint filed in a Delaware court [PDF] has made its way online, and in it, eBay "seeks equitable and legal relief" from Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster and founder Craig Newmark for:[B]reaching their fiduciary duties of care, loyalty, and good faith by implementing certain self-dealing transactions challenged herein which were designed specifically to benefit themselves to the detriment of eBay.Allegedly Buckmaster and Newmark attempted to issue themselves new shares in order to keep more of the profits to themselves, instead of sharing the 28.4 percent eBay can demand for their stake in the company, as Valleywag predicted. After the jump, the blow-by-blow account as detailed by the Wall Street Journal. More »
sex trade
Craigslist CEO admits site used for date "transactions"
At last, some straight talk from Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster on his site's role in the "erotic services" business:Unlike the typical Internet site, just about every function on Craigslist, if you're successful in your transaction, is going to involve you meeting the other person in person; whether it's for a job interview, or to look at an apartment, or to buy a used sofa or to go out on a date.[Marketplace]
geek love
After Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster flexes muscles at eBay, fan offers to rub away the soreness
Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster fired back at eBay on the official Craigslist blog last night, asserting that the auction giant, the owner of a large stake in Craigslist, didn't bother to contact anyone at the company before filing suit. eBay's action, wrote Buckmaster, "hints at ulterior motives." Dozens of commenters left notes in support of the online classifieds site. My favorite is from one Genevieve McGill:Dear Craig's List, I LOVE U VERY MUCH!!! PRETTY-PLEASE let me know if I can do ANYTHING to support you. I am a Powerful,Licensed Massage therapist in FL who will use ALL of My intellectual BICEPS & anything I've got to be your dutiful minion.And I bet she's only one of many fans who'd be happy to help release the hunky Buckmaster's eBay-taunting tension.
lawsuits
eBay sues Craig Newmark as Craigslist tries to squeeze it out
Expect a rash of headlines accusing auction giant eBay of bullying saintly Craig Newmark. eBay has sued Newmark, his business partner Jim Buckmaster, and Craigslist. The charge? Craigslist has allegedly diluted eBay's 28.4 percent stake in the company, which the auction giant acquired from a former Craigslist employee. The part of the story Newmark and Buckmaster don't want anyone to hear: The pair made about $16 million in the process of letting eBay buy the stake in their company. The deal included a shareholder-rights agreement which ought to prevent Craigslist from diluting eBay's stake in the company, people familiar with the deal have told Valleywag. By squeezing out eBay, Newmark and Buckmaster appear to be having their cake and eating it too. Relations between the companies had already deteriorated: eBay had a seat on the Craigslist board, at one point occupied by founder Pierre Omidyar, until last year. More »
great moments in pr
Craigslist CEO pretends to be British for his PR girlfriend
We've heard of in-house PR, but this is ridiculous. Susan MacTavish Best, who is both the girlfriend of Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster and his company's PR rep, is also a director of Glasshouse, a nonprofit which produces events meant to educate entrepreneurs. Educating entrepreneurs at an event tonight: Buckmaster. The fireside chat is meant to highlight U.K. Web entrepreneurs. Buckmaster's only plausible U.K. tie? His girlfriend, MacTavish Best, is British. All very cozy, and absurd. What we think really happened here: MacTavish Best couldn't come up with any other speakers, and Buckmaster filled in.
Craiglist CEO Jim Buckmaster now admits he's a jerk
"There was no need for me to act like a jerk." — Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster, finally admitting what everyone else had long thought about him, in defending his efforts to shut down a blog critical of Craigslist [Craigslist Blog (the official one)]
"There was no need for me to act like a jerk." — Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster, finally admitting what everyone else had long thought about him, in defending his efforts to shut down a blog critical of Craigslist [Craigslist Blog (the official one)]
jackpot
Is Craigslist worth $5 billion?
Disgraced stock analyst Henry Blodget pauses to dream up a fantasy valuation for Craigslist, and comes up with $5 billion. The numbers he relies on are faulty, starting with Craigslist's revenues. Blodget relies on a recent report by Classified Intelligence, which pegs its revenues for 2008 at an estimated $81 million. That's extremely low; insiders tell me the real figure for last year was in the range of $100 million to $150 million. More »
blogging for dollars
Unofficial Craigslist blogger threatened with shutdown by Craigslist
Starbucks has an unofficial blog, as do Apple, Google. But Craigslist has not had a blog, unofficial or otherwise (unless you count Craig Newmark's thoughts on national politics). That changed last month when Tim White launched the unofficial Craigslist Blog. Now White's blog has been countered with an official one, written by CEO Jim Buckmaster. Between posts, Buckmaster decided to threaten a lawsuit. Chilling Effects suggests Tim White, the blogger behind the unofficial site, might have a case for saving his site's domain name. Buckmaster's letter, and White's feisty response, after the jump: More »
sex trade
