The fate of computers and appliances when they aged or not in fashion anymore.

[Lawsen]

[Armin_Balija]

Good on those companies IMO. They turn a profit AND let these poor folk get a chance to make some money as well! IMO I'd like some of that trash as well 

[JonnyBoats]

Oh all this political correctness...

Where would Australia be if England had not been able to use it as a dumping ground for its criminals?

[Mint.]

Good on those companies IMO. They turn a profit AND let these poor folk get a chance to make some money as well! IMO I'd like some of that trash as well 

Yep same here 

[gregariz]

Oh all this political correctness...

I wonder if sales of blowtorches and bandages has gone up since no-lead solder was introduced...

[Mechatrommer]

Where would Australia be if England...

is it really necessary to bring back history? a child cannot be blamed of what his father did.

[saturation]

I'm not sure how much is sent outside the USA but gold, copper and silver content in older PCB is far greater than we have today and is very valuable.  The cost of gold alone is over 100x what is was in 1990s.  I know a lot of local reclamation sites who are very rich working in the 'garbage' business; its very lucrative and very kept quiet.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Electronics_recycling

2 very troublesome electronic products due to toxic contents, lead for one, are actual CRTs in old monitors and TVs.  These have a tendency to get shipped out, but the Wiki article explains more.




 

[JonnyBoats]

Where would Australia be if England...

is it really necessary to bring back history? a child cannot be blamed of what his father did.

Please don't take my comment the wrong way. While my tongue was planted firmly in my cheek,  it is undoubtedly true that some of Australia's greatest people and talent came from someone elses castoffs.

While all this electronics being shipped to the third world causes environmental and health problems, I wonder if there is not a silver lining here as well? Surely some of this "junk" must be being re-purposed into useful items?

As a kid in the 1960s I used to disassemble old radios and TVs for parts and build ham radio stuff. I got parts I could not otherwise afford this way. 

[alm]

Apart from using the equipment as-is or reclaiming raw materials like gold, I'm not sure if there's a lot they can do with it. It's not like they are filled with discrete transistors, op-amps and 74 series logic. Technology has moved on to a few really complex single-purpose ICs with some supporting circuitry. What are you going to do with an Intel chipset for a Pentium 4, apart from building the P4 mainboard you already had? About the only reusable module with usable parts is the power supply.

[Lawsen]

Johnny Boats:
I did not expect a reply about immigration of people.  I would like a reply about the outdated PDA, cellular telephones, computer monitors, computers, and everyday appliances.  This is not a sociology topic or history of the nations at the U.  I am not very happy with the replies. 

I still use a tube monitor in my bedroom.  I did not upgrade to an LCD, yet, because I did not worked enough hours during the slump. 

[JonnyBoats]

Lawsen,

My apologies if if I caused offense, it was not intended that way.

My point was that "One man's meat is another man's poison". I rather suspect that there are many things being "scrapped" in the first world in an irresponsible manner that if things were better managed could be re-purposed to great advantage in the third world.

I would love to know how much of that electronic gear (primarily old computers I assume) is really broken as opposed to simply obsolete? My assumption is that the majority is simply slow and old as opposed to truly broken and unrepairable. If an old but working first generation Pentium computer  with Windows XP is sent to the third world is it really better for them to tear it apart for scrap metal and parts rather than sending it to a poor, rural school that has no computer?

A couple of years ago in the USA we had a "cash for clunkers" program where the government paid people for their old fuel inefficient cars on the condition  that the motors be destroyed. Motors happen to be heavy, and probably prohibitively expensive to ship, but I have to believe that there are villages where an old motor re-purposed to pump water might literally save lives and be of significant benefit.

[david77]

Don't say old cars are too heavy to be shipped. This has been going on here for years, there are people who buy up a lot of old cars put them on ships and ship the lot to Africa where the old bangers are sold on and stay on the roads for a couple more years. I couldn't tell how many offers I've had stuck to the windscreen of my old banger in the last years.

Personally I have no problem with shipping our scrap to somewhere where some enterprising souls want to reuse/recycle stuff and turn a profit in the process. There are of course issues (environmental, health of workers,...) with this but I truely believe these problems will be solved somehow. Pretty much the same issues had to be conquered in the now industrialised world a few decades ago. The 3rd world countries that are now in the process of becoming industrialised at least can learn from our mistakes, they don't have to find out the hard way what to do and what not.

It may well be that my thinking's a bit naive here, but I still hope the people in these countries sort it all out.

[slateraptor]

How naive of higher society for thinking that their lavish consumer lifestyle wasn't going to impact some 3rd-world country.