Yahoo is trying to convince its 500 million users worldwide to join Freecycle.org and use the Internet to match people unloading "junk" with those that want the stuff, media reported Monday.
"Our mission is keeping things out of landfills," said Deron Beal, who started Freecycle in 2003 and is its lone staff member. "Junk only becomes junk after it no longer has any use. It is amazing what things people find uses for."
The new alliance is a natural given that Freecycle members communicate via Yahoo Groups, private Internet forums that include community emails.
People post or email about what they are seeking to get or give in their Freecycle groups, which are broken down by geography so members are basically communicating with neighbors.
Members interested in offered items respond with messages telling why. Givers choose recipients, who pick things up in-person. There are Freecycle groups in 85 countries managed by volunteers using their own computers.
"Freecycle is run out of my guest bedroom here and about 10,000 other guest bedrooms worldwide," Beal said.
Yahoo is spotlighting Freecycle on an environmentally-themed Yahoo Green website launched a year ago and is enticing people to join by seeding groups with giveaways including an electric car and organic groceries.
Freecycle ranks in the top three Yahoo online searches in the conservation category, coming in behind recycling and global warming.
Source:Xinhua/Agencies
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