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Why would I want to have more money? To watch a number on my bank account get bigger? Somehow I fail to see the appeal of that.

Well, there is always altruism, charitable giving to help people in need, villages that lack fresh water, people that suffer from disease, starvation, etc... What about donating to maintain academic freedom? Freedom of conscience? Or do you fail to see the appeal or purpose of any of that?

Food For the Poor
BUY A GOAT FOR A FAMILY IN AFRICA

But working sure isn't the way to do it, which is easy to deduce by simple observation.

Simply working isn't the only part of it, you generally have to show some discipline and wisdom in how you handle your money.

Humble Teacher Shocks Community By Leaving $8.4 Million To Charity
A janitor secretly amassed an $8 million fortune and left most of it to his library and hospital

Also, and I don't expect you to understand that, I don't give a shit about money.

That isn't so hard to understand*, I'm not particularly materialistic myself. But how about "the rich"? Aren't you one of the people around here that complains about them?

Slashdot is full of people that like to code, build things, hack hardware. It is what gets them going. One thing that a lot of people on Slashdot miss, or get wrong, is not realizing that there are people that feel like that about building companies, doing business deals, creating jobs and so on. In some ways it is a similar mindset in a very different setting. There are brilliant jerks like Linus here and there, but there are also good people too that are doing something useful.

*Not like "atheism" is "hard" to understand. I still can't believe you tried that line on me.

Since fruit trees can bear annually without any specific farming, they're an okay food source supplement in places war torn, or recovering from deforestation

I have a tweet I do on twitter daily: Go #green & help the #poor @foodforthepoor Plant fruit trees in #Haiti http://www.foodforthepoor.org/...

Since fruit trees can bear annually without any specific farming, they're an okay food source supplement in places war torn, or recovering from deforestation

I have a tweet I do on twitter daily: Go #green & help the #poor @foodforthepoor Plant fruit trees in #Haiti http://www.foodforthepoor.org/...

There are a couple like this that I've heard of. Their commitment is to get as much traction as possible out of every dollar by minimizing administrative costs, etc. This one claims upward of 96% going to feed the hungry around the world: http://www.foodforthepoor.org/

doesn't top this guy.

I guess I will donate $50 in 15 days if nothing comes from the OSS community before.

For crying out loud could you not think of a more worthier cause for your cash other than speeding up the release of a game controller driver? Might I suggest http://www.foodforthepoor.org/ or a similarly worthy organization?

I love getting pre-paid business return envelopes in my mail. That way I can just send all the stuff that they send me right back to them. They pay to send it to me, and they pay to get it all back from me.

I love to do that, too! I've noticed, though, that nowadays a lot of companies have individually printed business reply mail that contains a serial number that probably maps to my name and address (how did they know that my parents, Mr. & Mrs. Resident, named me Current?). If I send it back, they'll know exactly who did it. Technically, that should tell them to stop sending to me since they're just wasting their time, but it proves that I'm reading their ads (rather than just dumping the junk mail), and I would much rather they get the feedback that "the generic recipient" is pissed off at their mass mailing, rather than any one particular person.

(On a side note: yes, I did try once specifically respond to a charity organization to take me off their list. I said that I would no longer contribute (I had contributed once) and could they please save my sanity --as well as their costs-- by taking me off the list. I kept getting more and more physical junk mail, almost as if they were being encouraged by my entreaties to stop. I threatened to diss them for wasting their income from donations, and I am making good on that threat with this post.)

Not so sure about Goodwill. Last time I talked to a Goodwill employee, I was told that they really only want items that are in good working order - something that can be resold without repair. So as long as its still useful, they are an option. But if its actually broken, don't waste their time or yours - they will just throw it away. This is true for everything with them, not just tech. Might be true of Salvation Army, not sure. I've heard that both of them get a lot more donations (in terms of physical items, not money, putting that loose change in Santa's bucket is okay!) than they can actually make use of.

Personally, I'd give to Food for the Poor before either Goodwill or Salvation Army, though not for tech. They are a lot less picky about what they take and seem to do a good job of finding a home for your worn out consumer goods.