http://www.cnn.com/2002/TECH/internet/10/17/aol.discs/index.html Campaign: Send AOL CDs back From Rusty Dornin CNN Friday, October 18, 2002 Posted: 9:47 AM EDT (1347 GMT) EL CERRITO, California (CNN) -- Don't know what to do with all those unwanted America Online compact discs that scream "Sign on today"? Jim McKenna and John Lieberman say they have the answer: Send them back. In an effort to get AOL, CNN's parent company, to stop sending the CDs, the two men started a Web site asking people to send the discs to them. Once the two have collected a million discs, they say they'll drive them to AOL's headquarters in Virginia and dump them at the Internet giant's door. "We're going to AOL and say, 'You've got mail. Please stop this,'" McKenna said. AOL is not the only company that sends out the free CDs, which entice customers with offers of over 1,000 hours of free Internet access. The marketing strategy also is used by AT&T, Earthlink and others. But AOL -- with 35 million subscribers worldwide -- uses the tactic most frequently. The AOL discs appear in magazines, at the movies, in the mail and at parties, but an AOL spokesman wouldn't say how many discs are sent out every year. The spokesman did say that customers who aren't happy about getting the CDs can send them back so the company can recycle them. McKenna and Lieberman are getting a little help for their cause from a waste management company, which publicized their campaign in a recent newsletter. "You're wasting a lot of natural resources," said landfill manager Janet Schnyder. "You're causing pollution and you're basically sending something that people don't want." They launched their campaign after going to the video store one night and getting an AOL disc with their rental. Then when they got to Lierberman's house there was another disc waiting in the mailbox, complete with plastic wrap and additional packaging. All of it added up to a lot of garbage. "We thought, 'You know. Somebody's got to do something about it,'" McKenna said. Having fun Their Web site has brought in about 70,000 CD's from as far away as Brazil and Africa. In the process, the two are having a lot of fun. Their homepage shows pictures reportedly sent in by frustrated disc recipients. There's a snapshot of a room wallpapered with the CDs and another of a dog with a disc clenched in its jaw. This "pooch can't stand it when the unsuspecting postal worker drops off another unwanted AOL CD," the site says. McKenna and Lieberman scratch the CDs so they can't be sent out again and then they loop them on string -- giving the unwanted discs the appearance of giant strands of silicon. The two stress they are not anti-AOL. "We're not defaming AOL or the corporation or anybody that does business with them," McKenna said. "We are asking them politely to stop. And we're just doing it in a creative way." link to their site http://www.nomoreaolcds.com/
I've been marking them "Return to Sender" for a year or so. Why would these folks, if they object to AOL's "wasting a lot of natural resources", scratch the CD's so they can't be re-used (forcing AOL to print more)? Seems counter-productive to me.
I also do this with all those credit card junk mailings. Return their crap in their postage paid envelope.
Well, in the article it says that AOL claims to recycle CDs that are sent back. I don't know if that means that they melt them down and recreate the CD or if they just send the same CD out again with new packaging. If it is the former, then the company absorbs the cost for that. If it is the former, then you are right and scratching the CDs before sending them back is not a very effective way of solving anything.
Well, it's not these two that mentioned wasting of resources, but that landfill manager chick. I like the idea of scratching the CDs. If they're scratched, then AOL will either have to melt them down (like Raven Said) or take the heat from the EPA for having to throw them away. Hey, I'd guess that 90% of those CDs would get thrown away anyways, so why not make AOL do it? BTW, anybody have any idea on how much room 1,000,000 CDs would take up? That has to be at least an 18-wheeler full...
I started using them as coasters in college, and still do. I fashioned a AOL coaster holder with a floppy diskette and big nail.
If you don't scratch them, you're just doing AOL a favor by collecting their rejected CDs so they can send them to yet more people -- which is the exact opposite effect these folks are looking for.
I have a friend who says he's saving his to fling them from the roof of a tall building to see if they'll slice into a tree.
When I was a junior, we used all of the AOL CDs for decorations in our "disco room" at prom. We hung a ton of them from the ceiling off of fishing line and the effect was pretty good, actually.
AOhell snuck in 2 extra months of charges after my free year with Dell expired. Now my car insurance just doubled because AO... sent it off to the land of bill collecters. I still can't get all of their nonsense of my computer-spyware from hell. Anything that slows them down and their utterly wasteful practices is a good idea in my book.
The coolest use of the CDs I've seen is in the office of the Marketing VP of AOL, Jan Brandt ... she has created a coffee table with the various CDs and it actually looks pretty cool.
