I've seen a few doozies on our local Freecycle. Some people have asked for Kitchen Aid stand mixers and VitaMix blenders. I don't think they ever got them, there were no RECEIVED messages, and those things are expensive, anyway.
Then there was this guy named Jeffrey who said that his wife was having a baby in two weeks, and they had NOTHING except for "a couple of outfits". he then gave a very long list of stuff they "needed". I don't see a problem per se with asking for baby stuff on Freecycle, as a lot of people do have it to give away, when their own kids outgrown it and they decide they are done having kids. But waiting until TWO WEEKS before the baby is due to start asking? Why didn't they start looking for stuff as soon as they found out about the pregnancy?
The most outrageous request, though, was for a very specific make and model of DSLR camera. Out of curiosity, I did a search on Amazon for it, and they went for over $700 new, and $300-$400 used.
I tried to give away an old Virgin Mobile BlackBerry cell phone that I was no longer using. In my post, I stressed that the phone would ONLY work with Virgin Mobile's pre-paid service, could NOT be unlocked to use with another carrier as there is no SIM card, and I also mentioned what the monthly service costs with VM. The mod cut most of this info out, to my annoyance.
The first response I got was from the aforementioned Jeffrey. He thought I was also giving away free phone service with the phone. Needless to say, I wasn't going to give it to him. The next response was from a woman named April. When she emailed me, I happened to be at a baseball game and was not checking my email. When I did check it, I saw that she emailed me three times within an hour and a half, each email ruder than the last, calling ME rude for not daring to have a life where I don't check my email every five minutes. Another person who was NOT getting the phone. I decided not to give it to anyone on Freecycle, and I also blocked April's email address, just because she was so rude and annoying. If I ever do decide to give anything else away there, she certainly won't be getting it.
After I posted the TAKEN and the mod let it go through, I got another email from Jeffrey, asking if I still had the phone. His email address got blocked, too.
I actually have TWO VM BlackBerry phones to give away, as my husband finally upgraded to an Android a few weeks ago. A few friends suggested that I donate the phones to a battered women's shelter, so I will probably do that. Better to a worthy cause, than to people who are greedy and grabby and ask for more than you are willing to give away.
Not sure if I will try Freecycle again. I did once give away one of those digital converter boxes (the ones that the government was giving coupons for, back when they were switching over from analog to digital TV). We decided to get cable, plus we got new digital TVs, so we didn't need the boxes we had any longer. A woman posted a WANTED for such a box, she wanted to give it to her elderly mother so she could watch over-the-air TV on an older set. I offered her one of mine, and even threw in a cable to hook it up with. She showed up right on time, thanked me profusely, and then posted a RECEIVED thanking me again, she said it worked great and was exactly what she was looking for. So there are some good, appreciative Freecyclers out there. It's just the Jeffreys and Aprils of the world who kind of ruin things for everybody else.
Topic: What weird/outrageous requests have you seen on Freecycle/Craigslist? (Read 416764 times)