The A to Z of green IT

Freecycle

Freecycle - or 'FreeBay' as some people have labelled it - is a non-profit movement of people who give and get stuff for free, just like a giant online multi-colour swapshop.

Green IT from A to Z

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A is for Abroad
B is for Blades
C is for Carbon footprint
D is for Data centres
E is for Energy sources
F is for Freecycle
G is for Government
H is for Homeworking
I is for Ice caps
J is for Jobs (Steve)
K is for Kilowatts
L is for Landfill
M is for Mercury
N is for Nanogeneration
O is for Offsetting
P is for Paperless office
Q is for Queen
R is for Recycling
S is for SmartPlanet.com
T is for Travel
U is for Upgrade
V is for Virtualisation
W is for WEEE
X is for Xmas
Y is for You
Z is for Zero emissions

The benefit of this site, if you're disinclined to go to the effort of taking stuff to a charity shop, is that it puts you in touch with people who are willing to come and pick up your item providing you're willing to let it go for free.

The prime objective of the group behind the service is to keep items of furniture out of landfill. So if you have an old sofa, for example, which you're looking to get rid of, all you have to do is find your local FreeBay community via the site (though in some instances you may have to set up a local community - which is pretty easy as the service is growing rapidly in the UK).

Here you'll find people listing items they are looking for and people listing items they are looking to get rid of - cue many matches made in second-hand-furniture heaven.

Some communities such as Warwickshire and Coventry have eschewed the Yahoo! Groups format of the Freecycle service and are running their own community FreeBay sites, with the backing of the Environment Agency.

The community currently has 4,169 groups with 4,085,000 members across the globe. silicon.com even got involved in the Freecycle movement when reporter Natasha Lomas put the web giveaway service to the test - and shared her experiences in the Freecycle Diaries.