Re: More eBay madness

[mister_boffo@hotmail.com (Mister Boffo)]

On 3 Oct 2001 08:47:24 GMT, gkomatsu@Hawaii.Edu (Galen Tatsuo Komatsu)
wrote:

>In article <SKhu7.123976$sM1.33445846@news3.rdc1.on.home.com>,
>Tim Haynes <trhaynes@yahoo.SPAMBGONE.com> wrote:
>>Amen to that!  Finding anything Apple II around here (Toronto, Canada)
>>is like pulling teeth.  And Thrift Stores??? No way!!!  I personally
>>feel obliged to buy any Apple II stuff that I come across, nevermind
>>things like Ramworks boards!
>
>	Depends which stores you go to.  The regular GoodWill stores
>here probably won't bother with older computers, much less random parts,
>they'd rather peddle PentiumII systems for $300.

Locally, the Goodwill store will not even bother with Apple II stuff.
Straight to the dumpster or onward to wherever Goodwill sends stuff.

Normally, Goodwill does not accept returns. However, the majority of
the people shopping at Goodwill are utterly clueless about computers,
and so in fact is the Goodwill staff. So the store ended up having
people buy old machines, and then return them demanding their money
back when they discovered the machine is "useless".

I frequently heard people ask things like:
 - How big of a hard drive does it have?
    (While pointing at an Apple IIe with Duodisk & Green-Screen.)
 - Where's the mouse on this "Apple IIc" computer?
    (Doesn't have one, or OS support is so minimal it's useless.)
 - Can I get on the Internet/web with it?
    (Internet-very very hard with a unix shell. "What's that?")
    (Web-forget it.)
 - What software does it come with?
    (Nobody has a clue that you must use floppies for everything.)

The minimal standards for what people think a computer should do are
now so high that Apple stuff is just a ridiculous pain in the neck for
Goodwill to deal with. And who even wants them but a bunch of crazy
old nostalgic nerds who can't do anything really useful or modern with
them, anyway? ;)