The great junk transfer is coming

Re:The great junk transfer is coming by SoftTalker on Wednesday May 25, 2022 @01:20PM (#31507544)

I've found books surprisingly hard to get rid of. Local recycling center doesn't take them, and they are pretty heavy so you can't set out a big bin full of them for trash collection. Used bookstores are extremely picky about titles, authors, and condition. Listing and selling on eBay is not worth the time for the tiny amount of money you may make, and most of them don't even sell.

I mostly just end up throwing them away a few at a time.

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Re:The great junk transfer is coming by syntheweave on Thursday May 26, 2022 @02:21AM (#31515279)

The unfortunate fact is that although we romanticize reading, most books don't have much trade value. And if it's already in the Library of Congress, it's as good as archived.

Still, my household(multigenerational) has too many books, and this is mostly an artifact of a childhood that gave me plenty to read. We even still have the incomplete Funk & Wagnalls encyclopedia picked up from when the school library dumped them.

It'll be the "great book downsizing", for us. Someday. Occasionally I look into scanning the ones I have sentimental value towards, and there are services to do so...but really, that would just displace the problem into "digital junk hoarding". It's hard to let go of things, especially in the gradual way that fits with our waste stream system.

The best tactic I've had to deal with it is to first make an explicit division of space (no piles allowed, at least have a tray or tie the bundle) and then use the divisions to create a ranking mechanism. You don't have to let go of things immediately, but whenever you have a day where you value space over stuff, the low rank stuff can be taken out with minimal ceremony: "thank you very much".

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Re:The great junk transfer is coming by ghaff on Thursday May 26, 2022 @11:55AM (#31519899)

I have a big cinderblock set of bookshelves in the back of my garage. It's where the not quite ready to go out yet books go. I did some book downsizing during the pandemic. This summer I'm going to try to get some more books and a fair bit of clothing out of the house.

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Re:The great junk transfer is coming by ghaff on Wednesday May 25, 2022 @01:31PM (#31507699)

That surprises me. I've always been able to donate to my local library for their annual book sale. I've also seen donation containers in various parking lots around my area. Books are one of the easier things for me to get rid of.

>Listing and selling on eBay

Yeah, unless something is a big ticket item, eBay isn't worth the effort. You used to be able to outsource it to someone for a cut but nothing like that seems to exist any longer.

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Re:The great junk transfer is coming by netsharc on Wednesday May 25, 2022 @08:50PM (#31512892)

This is probably why a lot of book exchanges[1] have odd books. I remember sitting in a bar which decor were bookshelves with old books, I found a book about DOS 5.0 which actually amused me.

[1] https://londonist.com/london/books-and-poetry/bookswap_eastc...

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Re:The great junk transfer is coming by Arete314159 on Thursday May 26, 2022 @10:23AM (#31518670)

Try your local Buy Nothing group. I got rid of some books I didn't think anyone would want, but they were excited about them.

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