Are You on Craig's List?

Community. It is one of those charged-with-meaning words that is meant to distinguish what happens on the Web with what happens in less virtual (and less virtuous) segments of the economy. One promise of the Web is that it blends the value of commerce with the values of personal interaction. Why be content to sell one-size-fits-all products to a disparate collection of individuals when you can meet the shared needs of a single community? Why be content to create a marketplace when you can create a "market space" that lets people swap ideas, trade experiences, learn from one another -- and then buy products that reflect their shared interests?

Community. It is one of those devoid-of-meaning words that inspires bemused grins from Internet insiders. Is a stock-market chat room a "community" -- or a rumor mill? Is a collection of customer reviews (of books, software, or cars) a community forum -- or just a bunch of ill-informed opinions from never-satisfied consumers?

Craig Newmark knows a community when he sees one -- because he's built one of the Web's most influential communities. If you ask around, you'll soon find someone who's participated in "craigslist" (www.craigslist.org), which acts as a virtual community bulletin board for the San Francisco Bay Area -- the unofficial capital of the Internet economy. It's the plugged-in place to find a job, a roommate, a neighborhood dog walker, or the latest Internet-industry schmooze. And hardly a week goes by without at least one plaintive posting: Is there a list like this in New York? Portland? Boston? Seattle?

Craig Newmark, 47, is a Java programmer who describes himself as a "recovering nerd." This self-proclaimed "Forrest Gump of the Internet" became the Bay Area's best-known online community organizer by "happy accident." Five years ago, while he was working as a computer-security architect at Charles Schwab, he took on the role of Internet evangelist. "I'd give talks about the Internet, saying that this is how we should do business someday," he says.

A year later, he started a small, informal "cc list" to keep his friends updated on local techie-art events. As more people joined, the number of posts snowballed, and the subject matter sprawled: from "Sublet my room!" to "We need a Web designer!" Today, the craigslist site receives 5 million page views a month from thousands of visitors and has more than 7,700 email subscribers, who receive the postings in their in-boxes every day. There are now so many postings that the list is divided into 27 categories, ranging from tech events to writing/editing jobs. "What we do," says Newmark, "is give people a voice, and that's pretty powerful."

And extremely valuable. What was once a Java programmer's part-time avocation is now a fast-growing nonprofit that receives full-time devotion from Newmark and five other staffers; it's run like a scrappy startup out of Newmark's Cole Valley flat. The business model is simple: Charge companies $45 to list job openings. All other listings are free. The community does the rest.

"Our intent is inclusive -- to humanize and democratize the Internet," Newmark explains. "Too much of life is whom you know. We're trying to open that up a little more." Part of that vision is to bring the community-building experience of craigslist to other cities -- the grassroots way. "We're not carpetbaggers," says Newmark. "We're interested in working with people in other places who want to do similar things. And we're creating technology that will allow people anywhere to build community sites, including neighborhood ones. We're trying to find the right ways to give this technology away."

In the Bay Area, craigslist has fast become a local institution, and Craig Newmark himself, much to his bashful chagrin, has become at once an urban legend and a local celebrity. Some people don't believe that there is a real guy named Craig, and they express incredulity when meeting him in person. Others seek him out to tell him how craigslist has changed their lives -- how a roommate became a spouse, or how a gig jump-started a career. "That feels pretty good," he says with characteristic understatement.

Newmark does concede that he knows a little something about organizing a community on the Web: "I've been trying to pay attention and to learn something about it along the way." He's even taught a course called "How to Create a Successful Online Community Web Site." In a series of interviews with Fast Company, Newmark explained what it takes to build a community on the Web.

How do you know a community when you see one?

Defining what constitutes a community -- as opposed to a crowd -- involves lots of subjective judgments. But I'd say that a community involves people who have the potential to interact with one another while having a shared experience. In a community, there's more than just communication -- there's a sense of connection, a sense of intimacy, a feeling that we're in this together.