The Craigslist Lawsuit
We really need a non-profit organization that provides a data store with an api for common things like classified listings, sms messages, pictures, likes, etc.That can help us move away from this sort of chicken and egg problem with user generated data. These companies are basically hogging it because they were able to build the user base.If we can get the data in a non-profit store with a licensing scheme that basically says you must as a part of using this data add any user-generated data submitted to your website back to this store so other developers can build products on top of it, we could really innovate in classifieds and social networks.Perhaps something like that can be funded by EFF or related organization... because then we can potentially apply governance to that user generated data which has not been possible with private companies.The chicken and egg problem can be solved if big non-profit tech and civil rights brands like the ACLU, EFF, Wikipedia, etc. all get behind this and market it.