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How Craigslist changed NYC

This great New York Metro article encapsulates many of the changes that Craigslist has wrought on NYC, from escort services to apartment brokers to reality TV to human subjects research:

It Helped Set Off the Vintage-Furniture Craze
Is it coincidence that Craigslist’s ascendancy dovetailed with the rise of midcentury-modern mania? “It’s like a giant yard sale,” says Andrew Eutsler of Cosmo’s Cosmos furniture shop in Brooklyn, whose best finds include six Saarinen tulip chairs for $75. And it’s not just midcentury stuff. An employee at Steven Sclaroff in the West Village tried in vain to snag a mahogany T. H. Robsjohn-Gibbings chest for $15. (A refinished one at the store costs $3,225.) “People don’t know what they’ve got, and then it’s gone,” says Eutsler. But sellers are wising up. A few years ago, he slipped and told some how happy he was to get such a great deal. They raised prices on the spot. Buyers also realized better deals can be had from Eames-era grandmas with DSL. Craigslist’s a “threat,” admits David “Jake” Jacobs, of Two Jakes in Williamsburg. It “probably has blown the bubble on things that we as retailers could’ve gotten more money for.”

Link

(via Kottke)

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