Codex Perductum

Life is changing. Part of the changes in my life have been a reorganization of my computing resources. I had a Pentium II desktop computer at home that has become unused now that my family is running off of laptops. I was then faced with the eternal dilemma of how to dispose of a dual-headed-CRT tower computer that was somewhat obsolete. Being a responsible fellow, I won't put them in landfills because computers are filled with hazardous waste. (I know that no one else cares) So typically disposing of these things costs ~$50.00 and a bunch of time trying to find the right place to take them. (Side note: There's been news recently that sometimes these computer-dropoff places are just dumping the junk in Africa [NY TImes][blog][primary source], not recycling them, but still, I try to do the right thing)

So I took a few camera-phone shots of the thing, wrote a description of the guts and posted it on craigslist as a "free" item. Within 5 minutes of the ad going on the web, I had a list of 6 people who wanted to come by my house and take the computer off my hands! In fact the phone was ringing so often I freaked out and pulled the ad off of craigslist before I got anymore interest. The first guy that contacted me was at my house in less than an hour, carting it off.

So I asked myself, did I make a mistake? Was this computer worth something? So I looked on ebay to see the going prices of the components and pretty much convinced myself that between the profit that I would have gotten on the good parts and the cost of disposing the bad parts I would have come out even and spent a lot of time shipping stuff.

The moral of the story is: If you have marginally valuable stuff that you want to get rid of quickly, put a classified ad up on the local craigslist and stand by the phone. It worked in Seattle, it worked in Orange County with this computer and it's worked in Orange County in the past with a bunch of moving boxes I got rid of the same way. Props to craigslist. I still don't know what that means.