By Peter Zollman

We’ve got a category at the AIM Group we call YACLWs — “yet another Craigslist wannabe.” Today we’re officially adding a new category: “Yet another ‘Aw shucks, I’m just little ole me, Craig Newmark’ interviews.”

This week’s offender is Inman News, a site we generally admire tremendously. Yet the ridiculous, for-no-apparent-reason Craig Newmark interview this week on Inman News is just silly. Or stupid. Or really, offensive, since none of the important questions that could have been asked of Newmark were asked.

Inman, a real estate site, plopped the interview down on the site without explanation about why it felt it was worthwhile, why now, why Newmark instead of Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster (who actually runs the site, which is obviously of great interest to real estate agents and brokers)?

What would we ask Newmark or Craigslist CEO Jim Buckmaster, if we could ever get them to  answer our questions?

— “With profits in the tens of millions of dollars annually, what does Craigslist do with its money?”

— “You voluntarily eliminated ‘adult services’ ads in 2010, although you were under a lot of pressure from law enforcement officials and anti-trafficking advocates to do so. Do you still feel that was the right choice? Do you feel Backpage.com should eliminate the ads as well? If so, why? And if not, why not?”

— “Now that you’re closing the Craigslist Foundation, will Craigslist be increasing its support of the Craigslist Charitable Fund?” (Craigslist Inc., owned primarily by Newmark and Buckmaster, has donated more than $11.2 million to Craigslist Charitable Fund since 2008. The fund, in turn, makes direct donations to hundreds of charitable organizations.)

— “And what about your personal charitable contributions?” (None of our business, or anyone’s, we suppose, but we’d still ask.)

— Newmark has launched a site, CraigConnects.org, that serves as a technology support platform for non-profit organizations and a blog for his thoughts on charitable needs. “How’s it going? What’s it accomplished? Any specifics?”

(We used to talk to Newmark and Buckmaster from time to time, but ever since we started publishing our annual Craigslist revenue reports, they ignore us or put out nasty comments about us on Buckmaster’s blog.)

The questions in the Inman interview — it’s here, but why bother? — range from the simple “what is one mistake you made” to the asinine: “What’s one thing most people don’t know about you … ?” which brought the equally asinine response, “I actually exist.”

Yeh, Craig. So you exist. But what do you have to say about substantive issues? You’re great at ducking those questions — the ones with any real meaning.