BLEARY-eyed, I stare at the prize before me: a pine toilet seat. No toilet, just the seat. It's 7am. I'm standing in the home of a total stranger. I "met" him over the internet 12 hours ago. As he peers at me through knackered bifocals, I'm mildly captivated by his dishevelled hair, battered baffies and stain-laden dressing gown. His enthusiasm for urinal appliances knows no bounds.
"It has brass attachments you know," he says, thrusting the unwanted (and, thankfully, unused) toilet furnishing at me. Silence descends. I was taught never to look a gift horse in the mouth and I ask myself if such etiquette applies to lavatory acco
utrements. Politeness prevails. "It has a lovely sheen. Very shiny," I announce, boldly, before shuffling my feet and confessing meekly: "But my name is Millar and I came for the rowing machine."
It's my first attempt to get to grips with the internet's latest trend, and I have not so much freecycled as freewheeled into the black abyss of bargain basement shopping online. The two million users, currently freecycling around the world, could doubtless teach me a thing or two.
As the younger, more ethically-minded sibling of eBay, freecycling consists of advertising unwanted possessions on the web, in your local section of websites such as
www.freecycle.org Everything from CDs, clothes and TVs to random socks, containers, bird cages and kitchen appliances are available, all gratis. There are literally thousands of items on offer, and the skill lies in doggedly sifting through them for something of genuine worth, as opposed to trash that the owner is too lazy or too green to take to the local dump. To the untrained eye, it is rather like an unseen bring and buy sale. Only here, no cash changes hands.
Just three years after its conception - in America, of course - the freecycle tentacles reach further every day, affording it a key place and major trend status in a vibrant online marketplace. A grassroots non-profit movement, it now stretches to more than 50 countries. Every day, the movement is responsible for keeping more than 200 tonnes of waste out of landfill sites across the globe.
In the UK, it is estimated that 122,000 members will exchange some 45,000 items this month alone. Like eBay, users who log on to the site can post messages advertising unwanted belongings. If people find something they want, the onus is on them to pick it up; they do not have to give anything back in return.
Started in 2003 by 36-year-old Deron Beal, from Arizona, the organisation works on a local basis, with different sites for different regions. Across the UK there are already 300 groups.
Simplicity is paramount to the site's success. Budding freecyclers sign up to an e-mail list via the site and receive regular messages from people in their immediate area looking to rid themselves of unwanted belongings or to find particular items for free.
For many it proves a great success. Recent freecycle convert James Mackenzie has lost a roomful of junk and at the same time acquired items of genuine value - in the eye of the beholder, at least. Now, minus three chairs, an electric fire, an old computer, surplus tiles, academic notes and an ashtray, he has managed to find two kayaks, a Dyson vacuum cleaner, a fax, two lamps and an espresso machine - all costing him absolutely nothing. A friend even managed to get a piano through the service. Better still, he gets to feel good about himself in the process.
For those who find internet commerce just a bit too money-hungry, freecycle.org is seen as the ethical and environmentally-friendly alternative.
Mackenzie, who works as a PR adviser to charities, said: "I use eBay too, but this is ideal for other things. It's local so you are not transporting things a long distance. You can get rid of things which would be difficult on something like eBay. How would you send off an electric fire? Rather than throwing things away, you are allowing them to be reused, so it's green in that way."
Freecycle is a relative newcomer in the increasingly-pervasive digital movement that is Life Online - a world in which more and more consumers are using their computers to do everything from order up pizza to getting in touch with their inner self.
Without moving from his home, an internet surfer can order a takeaway, select and pay for an airline or train ticket, buy furniture or kitchen appliances, flirt, find a date or a life partner, and chat with friends. Millions of the bouquets received by mothers today will have been selected and paid for online - and not all of them, desperately, on the eve of Mothers' Day.
Earlier this month, it emerged that the internet had overtaken television as the nation's favourite leisure pastime. The average web user now spends 164 minutes online each day - equal to more than 41 days per year, compared with 148 minutes or 37 days for TV viewers.
Computer executives' dreams about digital convergence are now becoming a reality. Music fans store their CD collections on computers, and increasingly buy their music online as digital MP3 files, meaning the computer is replacing both the hi-fi and the CD. Radio stations transmit over the net or make their programmes available for listening to later, while the rise of fast internet connections and file-swapping programmes mean that users can download the latest episodes of their favourite shows, replacing both the TV and the video recorder.
Meanwhile, new internet phone services mean that the computer is even beginning to replace Alexander Graham Bell's greatest invention, while messaging programmes, a particular hit with teenage girls, are making inroads on text territory.
There seem to be no limits to how life can revolve around the digital age. Those anxious about the effect of sitting in front of a computer can even arrange customised physical workouts... which are delivered by computer. The spiritual can even download a message for the Bible or take part in church services online.
Technology writer Brian Baglow said: "It's getting close to being able to live your whole life online. It's no longer just about being able to get books and CDs. Most companies and services now realise that unless they have a presence online they are not going to get business."
In fact, last year Britain's internet sales rose by 50% on 2004, and 24 million shoppers spent £2.253bn online in the run up to Christmas - an average of £94 each.
In addition to epitomising the rise of the digital lifestyle, Freecycle.org is symbolic of another new phenomenon, the ethical consumer.
At the moment, hundreds of thousands of electrical items are still being dumped in landfills - at least until the Waste Electrical and Electronic Equipment directive attempts to make manufacturers recycle later this year.
The machines' innards often include the heavyweights of the periodic table, such as selenium, cadmium and mercury - all of which are environmentally hazardous. Whereas charity shops can't sell these electrical items - under law, they would have to be tested and certified by a qualified electrician - they can be freecycled.
Gillian Hogg, professor of marketing at Strathclyde University, said: "We live in a society where we all have far too much stuff and people do want to feel that they are doing the right thing by giving things away. This kind of site helps people meet their obligation by feeling that they are giving it to a good cause.
"They feel they no longer need something, and why not just give it away? They feel that they are recycling it too." There was also the "Trinny and Susannah thing" where people wanted to clear out possessions in order to freshen up their lives, she said.
When I roadtested www.freecycle.org I have to admit that - toilet seat aside - that the site's main appeal was its fun factor, and the seemingly endless opportunities on offer. In the US last year, a 32ft mobile home was given away for free on Freecycle. Via the network it has now changed hands for the third time after two of the owners used it for holidays and then passed it on. The joyful prospect of such possibilities is as much an incentive as the lure of golf clubs, roller blades, picture frames and bath suites - all of which I pitched for and all of which went within hours of being posted on the site.
To its credit, for all that I was denied, I gained a video/TV combo, a cushion and a book, all within 24 hours. As I jumped from the cab to collect my prizes in one house after another, it felt slightly like a living, breathing Generation Game for the 21st century: only here the game show hosts are far more interesting.
From the old man in Musselburgh to the young student in Edinburgh city centre, I found that freecycling is about humanising a marketplace that otherwise amounts to plugging in your credit card details.
After people have purchased online at freecycle, often they send e-mails to all those registered, telling them about what happens next and thanking people for their successful purchases.
In an age of reality TV, other people's lives continue to be fascinating. From the woman trying to punt her gold coloured bird cage - previously home to rats, she happily confesses online - through to the random appeal for polystyrene heads to put wigs on.
It feels very inclusive, too, because the system is self-policing. If members think you are being greedy they post messages to say so, starting a chain of debates and affording the site a chatroom feel that will doubtless be built on to discuss more ethical issues as the site's audience increases. Ebay, it ain't.
Be warned, though, once converted even the greatest sceptic will find it addictive. In 24 hours, I e-mailed requests for more than 100 items. Four came good, two dozen were met with apologies that the items had already been snapped up by other freecyclers. The rest fell away into the virtual ether.
Sitting surrounded by my purchases: the television that needs an aerial, the cushion that doesn't go with the colour scheme of my home, and a book which I already have an edition of, I am quietly delighted.
I remember what my bespeckled toilet seat friend said, as I left him: "I do this because it's like detoxing the soul. That you can pass on a bit of your life to help other people and actually see where it is going is quite special really."
Additional reporting by Murdo Macleod
The full article contains 1806 words and appears in Scotland On Sunday newspaper.
