by Abram Sauer
This entry is dedicated to all of us without enough coin for Match.com.
For those who don’t know, Craigslist personals (m4w, w4m, m4m, w4w, mw4w, etc.) is a skin and bones, system-text-heavy site for finding a date. It is as basic as BASIC was. And though pictures are not required for posting, they increase the chances your ad will get clicked. Picture / No-Picture ads are identified with a small yellow “pic” denotation.
But it has become common practice to attach a photo to a post just to get the “pic” denotation, without that pic actually being of you, or even of a human. For whatever reason, and despite there being hundreds of millions of available pictures, many of these fakies get reused. And so OddBlog gives you the Craigslist Personals Reused Pics Hall of Fame.
1) Fat Lady Sat on Her Dog Posting a Lost Puppy Poster.
While occasionally used by a BBW date seeker, this pic is most often accompanies a response posting about how a BBW’s expectations are out of whack with her date value. Harsh.
2) CAPTCHA
It is unknown why CAPTCHA (Completely Automated Public Turing test to tell Computers and Humans Apart) images are popular pic ruses. Especially since the particular CAPTCHA images used seem to come from Craigslist posting procedure itself.
3) Fat Bearded Naked Guy Online
The brother photo to #1, this is rarely used by actual posters, but by retaliating posters re: expectations. Probably meant to convey the point that this is what the male Craigslist Personals community actually looks like. (It is unknown if this is accurate.)
4) “two girls in Bay Ridge”
This picture has actually shown up only once to our knowledge but it instantly entered the Hall of Fame. The image is named after the actual Sept. 8th posting it accompanied titled “”two girls in looking for guys to go out tonight in Bay Ridge – 23″
5) Niagara Falls: Illustrated
Because it’s a famous honeymoon spot? Because crashing water is sexy? Because desperate people throw themselves over it?
6) The Legend of Sleepy Hollow
Not really a single, reused picture as much as it is an treatment of a picture. Also known as “The Whistle Blower” photo.
7) THE Sunset
The grand champion of re-used Craigslist Personals pics. Nobody knows where it’s from or who first used it. Used by those seeking no-strings-attached sex to the marriage minded, it is so reused that it has become mythic.