How Do You Opt Out of Craigslist Terms of Use?

Dear Rich: I was curious how someone would 'opt out' of the Craigslist user agreement. It seems to me that being forever tied to a changing user agreement, if one isn't posting ads anymore, isn't right. There seems to be some confusion as to whether a Craigslist account can be terminated. Craigslist doesn't appear to have a posted policy. Some maintain that sending an email to CL's tech support will eventually do the trick. Others propose various workarounds such as changing your profile to include a fictitious email address or simply being inactive for four months which deactivates (whatever that means) an account.
Constantly changing EULA. As for your comment about the end user license agreement (EULA) that's constantly changing, we assume you know that's par for the course on the Internet where most EULAs reserve the right for the website to change terms arbitrarily. Look for a statement such as "Company reserves the right to modify and/or change any of the terms and conditions of this EULA at any time and without prior notice." The simplest solution to avoid having these newer user terms enforced against you is to stop using the site for all purposes.

Can Terms of Use Limit Public Domain Reproduction?

London Street Fiddler 1880

Dear Rich: What if a public domain image is on a site that has its own terms of use restricting what can be done with images from that site? It might be hard for someone to prove that another party who used the photograph came from the contractually limited site, but don't we need to respect contracts? We should respect legally enforceable contracts but we don't think a "terms of use" statement at a website would create such an agreement. We think that the end user must enter into an agreement -- that is, must 'click to agree' or otherwise demonstrate some assent. Recently we posted what public domain expert Steve Fishman had to say about the practice in his excellent public domain guide.

"Many copyright experts believe that licenses imposing copyright-like restriction on how the public may use public domain materials should be legally unenforceable. This is because the federal copyright law prevents people from using contracts to create their own private copyrights. However, almost all courts have ignored the experts and enforced these licenses."

Craigslist Won't Let Me Google Search

Dear Rich: Craigslist just sent out a bunch of cease and desist notices to people who display Google results in their sites using Google's 'custom search engine tool' where the results are craigslist listings. Many of these sites (such as my own site - CraigZoom.com), did have 'craig' in the name, so I can see where Craigslist could go after that. However, I'm not sure they have grounds for going after search engines. The problem with Craiglist is that they only offer local search, and many people want to find items either nationally, or throughout a state. Going to each Craigslist micro-location url is very cumbersome. I've taken down my site and forwarded the url to http://247classifiedads.com, where I've posted part of the cease and desist notice so that my users can see why the site is down. I have over 300 comments on the site already, and everyone is clearly upset that Craigslist is going after us. I'm thinking about putting the site on a new domain. Can URL forwarding can be considered copyright infringement? In answer to your last question, courts have found that forwarding a URL or linking to a URL can be copyright infringement if the person creating the link knew or had reason to know that the link was for unauthorized copying and encouraged it. Even though we don't think you were threatened with copyright infringement -- Craigslist's standard cease and desist letter is based on a breach of the user agreement, not copyright infringement -- we still think the same principles of unauthorized behavior apply. So, If you dont want to get mail from Craigslist attorneys, avoid URL forwarding or linking to mirror sites.
The End User License. We're not sure how cases like yours will resolve in court but we believe Craigslist has a strong argument regarding enforcement of its end user license.  Everyone who joins Craigslist is faced with the screen shown above before joining -- and by clicking "I  Accept" you entered into an enforceable agreement (which Craigslist believes you breached). As you correctly point out, your situation is further weakened by the use of "Craigs" in your site name and domain name. Craigslist's attorneys don't like that because it implies an association or endorsement. We're sorry to report that you may have to rethink your business model.
PS. We've looked at similar Craigslist issues (and examined the end user license) in January and March 2012,