Craigslist To Remove Erotic Services Ads
I know I’m a little behind on this but I came across it the other day and somehow wasn’t surprised after the idiot in New England murdered a girl who’s ad was posted on Craigslist. Ever since the District Attorneys for the 40 some-odd states bent Craigslist over their knee to comply with tracking ads, I wasn’t surprised it came down to this. Of course they are just renaming the section but now they will manually screen the posts.
Obviously this is a bad move for Craigslist and a bad move for Internet free speech, or net neutrality. The company has now put themselves into a position that they will be taking some sort of liability by actually posting the ads manually, even though they have no control to the act the person ends up doing after getting a customer through the site. I am all for free speech on the Internet and the whole guidelines that the 1996 Federal Communications Act helped create by protecting the businesses that had web sites run by user generated content, but this is taking a step back and bending for the government so that they have more control. Prostitution is going to happen, no matter how hard you try to stop it. I think Craigslist made some of the police departments around the country kind of lazy because to them, it was like shooting fish in a barrel!
I, personally, used to post ads on Craigslist years ago and stopped when they first started cracking down (especially after I got busted myself) and haven’t really been back since. To me I did it because I had run out of all other options and it was slow around town and walking through casinos and sitting at bars made me really nervous. I just don’t see what the big deal was on there. Men would call up immediately on the phone as soon as it was posted (mostly locals) and were trying to see how far their $150 would go, but then would act extremely insulted when I said that would be okay for a starting point. It rarely got me decent $ and all of the clients had a holier-than-thou attitude. I like it when people treat me on the same level, not like they are so far above me… so I got annoyed quick and after going to jail for it, I stopped.
The funny thing is I found out about this from my new favorite website, http://www.textsfromlastnight.com on a post over here . If you have a spare few hours, the site is hilarious.
Tags: craigslist, net neutrality
I’ll miss it. Lotta great tail on CL.
May 15th, 2009 at 6:35 pmWell, I look at it from the perspective of a massage therapist. I get pissed off when prostitutes advertise themselves as massage therapists online or in the yellow pages. They’re the reason the licensing process for therapists is so fucking draconian here in the valley (not to mention expensive!) And of course, you get the clients who have the wrong idea about the kind of services I provide. In an ideal world, prostitution would be completely legal and prostitutes could be honest in their advertising, too.
May 16th, 2009 at 5:10 amI would totally understand the frustration you go through just trying to be a massage therapist here. I have a friend as well who has a license and just to set up a booth somewhere at an event she has to jump through flaming hoops just to set up a chair and offer massages obviously out in the open. As far as licensing, it seems to all be expensive in this town 🙂 I know of some agencies in the past who advertise as massage but when you call they explicitly say they are not licensed therapists but more for entertainment purposes, but I know not everyone is so honest.
I am also frustrated at the massage thing from a customers perspective, especially being female. Yes sometimes I would like to have a decent massage at odd hours but not pay outrageous resort prices. I have had luck at some asian places around town, but what I hate is how they treat me like crap because they know they cant get the extra $40 for happy endings. Arrggh I just want my knots worked out!
May 16th, 2009 at 5:17 amIt’s a huge pain in the ass, with no unified codes or laws. Each jurisdiction in the valley has its own licensing, and each license costs money. At least it’s finally legal now to do cross-gender outcalls in the Clark County jurisdiction! Drop me an email if you’d like a professional, therapeutic massage, I won’t get pissed at the lack of a happy ending request, believe me! 😉
May 16th, 2009 at 8:37 pmYea.. and a lot of people don’t realize that Las Vegas, the city, is very small. It’s only downtown until Sahara.. the rest is some whacky township that no normal person has ever heard of. You never realize how whack it all is until you go to the county code desk for some sort of business application.
May 18th, 2009 at 6:12 pm