In these parts the local councils combat fly tipping (i.e. people dumping rubbish anywhere illegally) by arranging to collect any and all rubbish put out by households at set times, usually a couple of times a year. There is one of these events in progress as I write and people are piling their junk at the sides of the road ready for collection.
Of course this attracts the usual crop of totters who pick over society’s discards in the hopes of finding something of value, or that might be repaired/recycled to become valuable. Actually I’ve done this myself! In the past I’ve collected several monitors a good few working computers… one with a hard drive that contained pictures and details of a young girl and her friends… a lesson to always remove the HDD prior to disposal – or at least to shred anything on it!! I’ve had chairs, bookcases recipe books, old records… it’s amazing what people throw out!
This time our original pile can be seen in the photo but has since been added to by a computer table on wheels… which went within minutes! 🙂
One of the things of note is the number of monitors. I threw out 6 which were either broken or ‘surplus to requirements’.
Now while I thought I might have been a bit odd (oi… I heard that!!!), I have at least been messing with the hardware for years so could be expected to have a few more than usual. However, as I’ve wandered around the estate I see I’m not alone. Other people have thrown out multiple monitors, television sets, and the like. Seems times really *are* a changing.
I’m assuming the collapse in the price of LCD’s etc has a hand in this and that IT upgrades are now meaning the old CRT’s are being replaced by bright new light. flat displays. I know that’s happened to me. The two new machines came with 22″ monitors and they are truly a spectacular improvement on the older screens… even my giant old 22″ CRT had nothing on this and I can promise I don’t miss it. The new one sits quietly in the corner unobtrusive and clear while the old one was *huge* and filled the desk. It was also noisy since it needed its own fan to keep the workings cool.
So… what’s the next stage? Flexible roll up models? Ones we can pin to a wall or the desk? Or maybe just headset sized displays fitted on glasses… that would allow the easy deployment of 3D images… who knows… right now though the streets are filling up with vacuum tubed behemoths that have met their use by date and been found wanting.
The Eclectic Interweb 