Getting rid of the spam would certainly be nice, though I know it's not as easy as it seems on the surface. It is something we'd all like to see them do. But like you said there are other classified sites and they aren't pulling people away from Craig's List in significant numbers. There are reasons why. The value of a classified grows with the quantity of people using it as long as the content remains above a certain quality. CL has that. The site isn't pretty and there are things about it that can be improved, but it works and works well for the people who use the site.
I agree that going niche is the way to build your own classified site. Going niche provides more opportunities to tailor the site to a core audience and won't require as large a user base to get going.
Bookmarks