After weeks of pressure from state and local law enforcement officials, Craigslist is announcing today that it will remove its controversial erotic services section permanently. In its place, the classifieds site has created an "adult services" category for which every new listing will be manually approved. Currently most ads on the site are posted without review.
As of today, the erotic services section will no longer accept new ads and will be removed completely in seven days. Posts to the adult services section will cost $10, twice as much as those for erotic services listings. Craigslist had agreed to donate proceeds from the erotic services listings to charity but says that rule will not necessarily apply to the new ads.
Craigslist Chief Executive officer Jim Buckmaster said in an interview that the site had come to the decision after carefully weighing input from law enforcement, users, legitimate online businesses and free speech advocates.
"It was a balancing act where we’re trying to respond to feedback to constituencies that we felt were important. When you’re talking about attorneys general who are the top legal authority in their respective states," he said, "That was feedback that we felt was important to take into account."
