One man's trash

I recently bought a replacement inkjet cartridge for my printer/scanner, and noticed that HP had thoughtfully included a postage-paid return envelope in which to mail back and recycle my spent containers. "This is pretty neat," I thought, "and it seems like HP's responsibility department was able to wrestle some money into a recycling program." I mused later that day that surely, this sortof thing isn't making them all that much money.

But early this morning I ran across this article, which notes that both Staples and Office Max now give $3 for used printer carts (which can be spent on ... coffee). The first thought this sparked was "competitive philanthropy," which made me chuckle a little bit—but it also occured to me that we may be on the threshold of a consumer economy built on waste.

The thing is that with rising mining, manufacturing, and transportation costs, it may actually be (for the first time in history) economically and socially reasonable to build a business on asking consumers for their trash. Copper is already valuable enough to spark widespread theft of wires with copper cores—and I have to wonder if the value content in say, certain appliances or novelty items (in this case, inkjet cartridges) is high enough to warrant someone building a business buying these things off of consumers.

I suppose this sortof thing happens already at recycling plants (where scrap metal is sold) and through older goods (secondhand clothing stores?) but this seems like a first for technology—and certainly a first for asking consumers directly for these goods. I've heard of donation programs for these things before (similar to the HP mail-away program) but a $3 bounty? This seems new.

So what is it? Has the price of cartridge manufacturing finally risen above $3 (sans ink), or is it just that it's OK to ask people for their trash now?