The Freecycle Network (often abbreviated TFN) is a corporation registered as a non-profit in Arizona that organizes a worldwide network of regiving groups, aiming to divert usable goods from landfill. It provides an online registry of worldwide groups, and co-ordinates the creation of forums for individuals and non-profits to offer and receive free items for reuse or recycling. By 2006, The Freecycle Network extended to over 3000 groups with almost 2 million members. Official language(s) None Capital Phoenix Largest city Phoenix Area  Ranked 6th  - Total 113,998 sq. ... The practice of giving away ones goods to others. ... Landfill is a waste disposal site for the deposit of the waste onto or into land (i. ...

Background

The organization was a project of RISE Inc., a nonprofit corporation, to promote waste reduction in Tucson, Arizona, and reduce the need for landfill sites in Arizona's fragile desert landscape. RISE handed it over to the project leader, Deron Beal, who describes himself as "just another MBA who had decided to work for the public good after years in international marketing". It has since grown, reaching into 50 countries and involving over a million members in over 3,000 groups worldwide. On April 2004, it incorporated under Arizona law, although it has not yet achieved 501(c)(3) status. The board of directors is limited to 15 members, although it currently has three: founder Deron Beal (chairperson and treasurer), his wife Jennifer Columbus (vice chairperson) and friend Jolie Sibert (secretary). A city street near downtown Tucson, Arizona. ... Official language(s) None Capital Phoenix Largest city Phoenix Area  Ranked 6th  - Total 113,998 sq. ... This page is a candidate for speedy deletion. ... 2004 : January - February - March - April - May - June - July - August - September - October - November - December Deaths in April • 18 Ratu Sir Kamisese Mara • 19 Norris McWhirter • 22 Pat Tillman • 24 Estée Lauder Other recent deaths Ongoing events EU Enlargement Exploration of Mars: Rovers Haiti Rebellion Reconstruction of Iraq – Occupation & Resistance Israeli... 501(c)(3) is a provision of the US tax code that provides exempt status, for Federal income tax purposes, for some non-profit organizations in the United States (see 26 U.S.C. Â§ 501(c)(3)). The term refers to: Section 501. ...

Each local group exists as a Yahoo! Groups list run by volunteer moderators with local owners. TFN encourages the formation of new groups, subject to approval by regional New Group Approvers (NGAs). Groups approved by TFN are listed at the official website, can use the name and logo, and are subject to rules enforced by a structure of global and regional Group Outreach Assistants and NGAs. TFN plan to move in early 2006 from Yahoo! Groups to a centralised site, listing "offers" and "wanteds" across the world. Yahoo! Groups is an electronic mailing list service provided by Yahoo!. Yahoo! has over the years bought many other mailing list providers, including the popular eGroups, and combined them into one system. ... 2006 (MMVI) is a common year starting on Sunday of the Gregorian calendar. ...

Controversies

There are a number of controversial issues concerning The Freecycle Network:

• Corporate Sponsorship - In February 2005, Deron Beal accepted TFN's first corporate support of $130,000 from Waste Management, Inc. [1]. This polarized opinion amongst group moderators, for some being a sensible way of raising funds from a company Beal describes as America's "largest recycler", and for others selling out to corporate interests. Further criticism was provoked by a decision to take paid Google ads on the Freecycle web site, contrary to the initial stated principles, and by Beal's green amabassador role for WMI [2].

• Use of Funds. Some members have challenged how sponsorship funds have been allocated. The initial goals were to use this for a new website, Beal's salary and lawyers' fees. After the first year, the new web site had not appeared, although $45K had received by Beal in salary, and an unstated sum spent on legal expenses. However, the web site is claimed to be on schedule for Q1 2006. Further criticism has been attracted by the friends-and-family board structure, which prevents The Freecycle Network from full registration as a non-profit and efficient use of donations. Beal defends this as a necessary interim measure whilst the organization grows rapidly.

• Trademark. Beal has been criticized for vigorously defending Freecycle as a trademark, at the expense of closing down functioning community groups and imposing precise rules on logos and language for groups. Beal inists this is solely to prevent commercial interests taking the name and establishing an inappropriate freecycle.com. (Ironically, Whois shows the registration for freecycle.com was filed May 29, 2000, long before the current controversy.) Critics point out that it could equally be protected from corporate abuse by establishment as a generic term. Ironically, Beal himself initially used freecycle as a generic term, and early documents make frequent references to 'freecyclers' and 'freecycling', terms which now trigger letters from the Freecycle trademark protection team. A formal trademark opposition [3] was filed in January 2006. FreecycleSunnyvale filed a lawsuit in federal court against The Freecycle Network [4] in January 2006.

• Centralization. Opinion divides amongst Yahoo! list moderators on the merits of a single centralized forum versus the federation of individual Yahoo! Groups, and since there is no widespread consultation or firm schedule, many groups remain unaware of the centralization plan. The concentration of infrastructure has its parallels in TFN governance, with decisions and discussion on organization removed from the general modsquad group open to all local moderators, shifted to a smaller OIDG group, and finally to a handful of people known as the 'HUB' group [5]. Former colleagues of Beal cite his behavior as an example of so-called founderitis. [6]

• Removed groups. Freecycle began removing many groups not registered, or subsequently deregistered on TFN's web directory of freecycle groups. Group moderators receive cease-and-desist emails and a request made to Yahoo! to close the group account. This has happened to groups with as many as 4,500 active members, for example Baton Rouge, Louisiana [7][8] and Ann Arbor,Michigan[9]. At times, mass deletions of up to 500 groups at one time have been alleged. Starting in North America , these purges extended later in 2005 to Europe where a group TFN alleged to be "rogue" was closed down in Leicestershire. The criteria for action, to quote from a TFN warning e-mail, "trademark-protected Freecycle name and logo, as well as any and all copyrighted texts, graphics, rules, and guidelines, in any part of the group including the title, or its URL".

As of February 2006, threatening emails from TFN have been issued to non-Freecycle groups, such as those associated with Freesharing.[10] Waste Management, Inc. ... Capitol Building Baton Rouge is the capital of Louisiana, a state of the United States of America. ... Official language(s) English and French Capital Baton Rouge Largest city New Orleans at last census; probably Baton Rouge since Hurricane Katrina Area  Ranked 31st  - Total 51,885 sq. ... Ann Arbor is a city in the U.S. state of Michigan. ... Official language(s) None (English, de-facto) Capital Lansing Largest city Detroit Area  Ranked 11th  - Total 102,384 sq. ... World map showing North America A satellite composite image of North America. ... 2005 (MMV) was a common year starting on Saturday of the Gregorian calendar. ... World map showing Europe Europe is one of the seven continents of Earth which, in this case, is more a cultural and political distinction than a physiographic one, leading to various perspectives about Europes borders. ... Leicestershire (abbreviated Leics) is a landlocked county in central England. ... The FreeSharing Network is an international Regiving network designed to redistrbute unwanted usable items by making them available for free via a network of locally managed internet mailing lists. ...

• Dismissing dissenters. The Freecycle Network have dismissed members who disagreed with or queried its practices and direction, deleting their messages from Freecycle administration forums, and have extended this to closing entire community groups moderated by dissenters.

External links

• The Freecycle Network
• BetterNeighbours: An Alternative.
• Freecycle Celebrates its 3rd Birthday
• De-Junk Your Life
• A Bridge Between Neighbors
• BusinessWeek blog on Freeycle issues
• Grist article on Freecycle, May 04
• Grist article on Freecycle, May 05

The Freecycle Network structure

• Board of Directors
• Staff - HUB group
• Group Outreach & Assistance Team (regional supervisors)
• OIDG - Confidential group for moderators to discuss organizational direction (334 members - Nov 2005)
• freecyclemodsquad - Mutual assistance group open to moderators of any local TFN group (2286 members - Nov 2005)

References

• The Freecycle Network Board of Directors
• Freecycle Trademark Application (US)
• Freecycle Trademark Application (EU)
• Trademark Application (UK)
• Freecycle Statement of Centralization Plans
• TFN Filings with State of Arizona