By far the largest section of craigslist is its Jobs listings. Every day on the pages for major cities, thousands of jobs are posted in 33 current categories. A lot of them are real, but then again that's a rather vague distinction. Many craigslist job posts are real in the same sense that a number of Women Seeking Men posts are real. Sure, this particular post was written by a real person who is actually looking for a date with a man on craigslist, but there's a pretty good chance that the stats and/or picture in the post are either not representative of the poster at present or were never true to begin with. Just like Personals terms like Average, Curvy, HWP and Not A Supermodel all translate to Fat, Ugly and Full of Lies, the job posts are sustained by all kinds of misdirection and double-speak.

The first indication that the craigslist job post in front of you is for the worst job on the planet (or is just a scam) is the fact that it doesn't actually mention a real job in the post title. Take, for instance, A Real Career With A Real Future. That title is connected to a hastily typed paragraph that, despite being about 100 words long, doesn't even begin to describe what the job actually is. It's full of alarm words like Energetic and Outgoing, and it spends a sentence or two reassuring readers that it isn't a scam or a gimmick. I mean, if I had to convince someone I wasn't lying, the first thing I'd do is ramble on for a couple minutes about how I'm totally telling the truth.

The next indicator that you've stepped in a steaming pile of not-a-real-job is any and all use of the exclamation mark. Maybe they just didn't go over this one in 10th grade composition class, but "!" is the quickest way to convince any reader with half a brain that you can't be taken seriously. The exclamation point is the only punctuation the sole purpose of which is to convey emotion. Seeing "!" in a job description means that somebody is trying way too hard to make the job seem exciting and the employer fun. Maybe I'm just a bitter, old fuddy-duddy, but work isn't fun. If it was, we wouldn't have to pay people to do it.

But by far my favorite sign of a bad or fake job on craigslist is gratuitous use of the dollar sign. It usually shows up in titles like $Great Part Time Job$ that describe gigs like canvassing and door-to-door political contribution jobs. Worse yet, the dollar sign sometimes shows up as part of a word, like $TART MAKING MILLION$!!!

Dangling off the end of the Jobs section like some kind of tumor, the Gigs section entices job-seekers away with promises of quick, one-off contracts and a be-your-own-boss mentality. The truth is that most of the Gigs section is comprised of people looking for free labor or questionably legal exchanges. Some are hilariously ill-conceived. Take the following:

Talented writer for exchange

I'm a very talented young writer last year I won the Dartmouth College award for my auto-biography. My problem is that I'm pretty (not being shallow), but I have horriable acne scars on my chin and nose. I only have DSHS coupon which won't cover my laser treatment. I'm willing to exchange my writing skills or child care skills for my laser treatment. I really need it done and am heart broken that my insurance won't cover it. please email me if you are interested, or want writing samples.

So THIS is the unqualified genius who beat me in last year's run for the coveted Dartmouth College award for vague literature! My auto-biography was pretty stunning, if I do say so myself. The Dodge Challenger is a fascinating vehicle, but I guess the above poster just out-wrote me. Seriously, you have an entire website full of fertile scamming ground and this is what you settle on? What special kind of stupidity does it take to choose the unnecessarily elaborate and easily dismissed option over the tried-and-true standards?

I'm not suggesting that there are no real jobs on craigslist. There are plenty of genuine listings and you'll probably do better there than you would on one of the dedicated career sites, but the pitfalls are ever-present. Scams, lies and stupidity abound in every section of craigslist. I should know, it's my TOTALLY AW$OME JOB!!!! to wade through the site.