
Show HN: WindySurf – windsurfing, kitesurfing listings scraped from Craigslist - alexS
http://windysurf.com
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gamblor956
So your entire business consists of scraping another site? Specifically,
Craiglist?

This will not end well for you. Craiglist is notorious for blocking scrapers
that use their data to offer competing services (even if those services only
compete in a very small vertical).

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ed
I have some experience in this area. If you build a mobile app you can try for
a license with CL. Otherwise expect a C&D shortly, CL's lawyers are pretty on
the ball.

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alexS
not true, there are a few mapping services that use data from CL but use
snippets that link back to their source instead of full descriptions for
example.

this is a not-for-profit fun idea that I hacked together for the windsurfing
community.

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alexS
btw, i highly recommend windsurfing for everyone here. it's one of the funnest
sports i've ever tried and lots of other programmers seem to be involved (that
i've met at least). very affordable to get started. people usually give away
free but old long boards and sails from the 80s. they will get you going.

the windsurfing fit is also great, you feel good and a bit buzzed from the
adrenaline rush. today i learned a jibe (a way to turn) that i practiced for 2
hours.

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angeNoble
I was not expecting Lincoln, Nebraska to have 59 pages of wind surfing
equipment.

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thomasvarney723
Did you write your own scraper or use a library? If so, which?

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alexS
BeautifulSoup3 -- and .select() in Python which gives me fancy jQuery-esqe
selectors.

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alexS
here's (part 2) a video of my development on the project:
[https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nzDJ8EZZZs&feature=youtu.be](https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2nzDJ8EZZZs&feature=youtu.be)

