Because at $7 to $8 per pick, that just wouldn't be wise. Unless your fan is a family member. Then you could probably just ask for it back. [Etsy via Technabob]

The USS New York is a San Antonio-class amphibious assault vessel, which can carry 800 marines with their helicopters. The steel from the World Trade Center was used for its bow. If you are in New York, you can see it today near Zone Zero, on the south tip of Manhattan. [USS New York via Times Online]

Lame jokes aside, TerraCycle actually has a decent little business plan going on. Put simply, they recycle the world's garbage into electronics, bags and other knick knacks, and sell them on the cheap.

These Frito-Lay Cheeto speakers, for example, sell at Radio Shack for $20. They won't melt your face, but I can see them finding a comfortable home on the desk of some college undergrad. [TerraCycle via CNET]

Supposedly, the ecoATM went live on Friday, in an Omaha furniture store, of all places. Update: It's not a store, it's a mart! Nebraska Furniture Mart. And it's huge!

The process is pretty simple. The cellphone is placed in the ecoATM, scanners judge how terrible you were to your phone over the years, and then you are presented with a quote that can be used as store credit or cash. Cellphone beat up beyond repair? That's OK too: ecoATM cheerfully informs you that the phone will be recycled and that a tree will be planted in your name.

More ecoATMs are slated to appear in other stores over the next few months. Might we suggest a Best Buy or any store that happens to specialize in electronics? Update: Nebraska Furniture Mart, which is apparently huge, specializes in furniture and electronics. The world makes sense again. [CrunchGear]

It's not a novel idea to crush cans to 40% of their volume in order to recycle them, nor is it news that there's a gadget for it. What is of interest about this can crushing gadget is that it's automated and oriented toward households. Check out the video for a peek at the (rather durable looking) inner workings and you won't be surprised that it's great on battery life, too. Unlike my iPhone since a certain update. [Yanko Design]

Due to certain materials used in consumer electronics (especially in batteries and displays), gadgets are some of the most toxic consumer items out there, capable of leaking dangerous chemicals into the ground if they're not properly disposed of. New York, and 13 other states, have thus passed laws to create specific, stronger rules for these products. Unfortunately, in NYC, that means the members of CEA would have to go door to door to pick up products like televisions and monitors, at their own expense.

CEA is claiming that this pick-up service would clog the city's streets with smoke-belching trucks, which is bad for traffic and bad for the environment, and that the laws are unfair to electronics manufacturers. A spokesman claimed that it's "an unreasonable and unsustainable burden on manufacturers."

The CEA's argument isn't totally unfounded—it certainly would be a financial concern, even if we're not sure their environmental point about trucking is all that accurate. But the fact remains that somebody's got to take care of this stuff: It's either the state of New York, that needs to spend far more money extracting these gadgets from the trash, or the manufacturers that create the harmful products in the first place. And the fact remains that many other states and countries (Japan, South Korea) have enacted similar laws. So we're siding with New York on this one: We think it's worth a little trouble to get these products conscientiously recycled. [Wall Street Journal]

The pitch: these boxes, fashioned like regular ol' vending machines, will eat, clean and smush your recyclable empties, rewarding you for your good deed with coupons, cash credit or vouchers for nearby stores. Your good deed, of course, was that you a) recycled a plastic bottle and b) watched a targeted advertisement on the machine's LCD screen. As of last week, they've been deployed in a few locations in Envirobank's native Australia, but only on a trial basis.

Evirobank claims the machines not only encourage recycling, but reduce carbon emissions by preparing the empties for direct shipment to a recycling depot, bypassing waste processing facilities altogether. I'm not sure that building a massive machine, replete with screens, processors, motors and pumps, results in a net decrease in emissions compared to driving some bottles around, but their hearts are in the right place, and 'details' like that tend to be ignored anyway. [RedFerret]

The "Beggar Bot" does have a few distinct advantages over its human counterparts. First off, it can often conduct business in areas where begging is not allowed—big money hotspots like shopping malls for example. Plus, it draws a crowd and eliminates the stigma associated with giving money directly to the homeless. In this case, it's almost like putting money in a vending machine.

Although the project has been in development for a number of years, details are scarce. However, it does appear that the robot is made from recycled parts and made available for use by the homeless on a rental basis. Sounds like a decent business venture to me. It would be great for other charity organizations like the Salvation Army, or even for people working menial jobs. Why bust your ass when you can spend a few bucks and have a robot earn a bigger profit for you? [Saso Sedlacek via Botjunkie via Botropolis]

Energy could be harnessed from eternal sources, like the sun, the wind, or the seas. But there is only a limited amount of elements in planet Earth and—what's worst—bringing them from other planets will prove impractical with our current technology (and the technology that will be available in the next century).

In the meantime, copper—which is everywhere around you—will be gone in about 61 years; antimony—widely used in medicines—will be depleted in 20 years; while indium, rhodium, platinum, or silver—which are present in many essential consumer electronics—won't last much longer. And those estimations are only valid if we manage to consume half of what we are consuming now.

So, unless we really push technology forward, dramatically increase our recycling rhythm, or something extraordinary happens first—like Apophis obliterating us or the Large Hadron Collider blows us to another dimension, or Nazi zombies getting out of their crypts to make bacon of all of us—we and our children are going to have a really hard time pushing the world forward.

I guess we will have to keep taking life one weekend at a time. [New Scientist via Dark Roasted Blend]

Check out the videos—they're practically immobile, but remain menacing.

If you want to build a Mantis of your own (like you ever could!), you can read how Nemo did it on Instructables. [Nemomatic via BoingBoing]

The gadgets are separated into categories, and then ripped apart for the valuable or recyclable parts, like glass, steel, aluminum, and more valuable metals like copper and gold. They use a special machine with teeth to separate copper from steel and aluminum, and then magnets to separate the latter two. As expected, the batteries are placed in hazardous waste containers, since they're by far the most environmentally harmful piece of any given gadget, and are shipped to specialized outposts who deal with them.

Factories like this are a big step up from our previous recycling protocol, which was to mail our junk overseas where the restrictions are much more lenient (and harmful). Check out this link for instructions on how to responsibly recycle your dead toys. [Wired]

Currently 12,000 to 16,000 2-liter soda bottles are being collected to fill in the twin hulls of their Plastiki vessel. Each bottle with be pressurized using dry ice powder that will sublimate into carbon dioxide gas. If all goes as planned, the vessel will carry four crewmembers on a 11,000 mile journey starting this April from San Francisco to Sydney only to be broken down and recycled at the end of the trip. Apparently, only the masts of the ship are metal, leaving the remaining 90% as recycled material.

Sure it's dangerous, but the design is obviously more professional (and less risky) than the paper bottle boat that his 22-year old predecessor cobbled together with his father. My guess is that it the outcome will be much better this time around. [CNN and Architecture for Humanity]

The project both helps divert materials from landfills and gives the homeless a place to sleep (though I wonder how they breathe under all that plastic). Max won $10,000, a Dell laptop and a trip to Boston. [Design Blog]

While the Blue Earth features a gorgeously rendered touch screen front, the entire back is covered with a solar panel. Samsung claims this panel produces enough electricity to place a call any time you want—which is a little tough to believe, given the battery draw of a touchscreen. (To counter these energy shortages, the phone includes an Eco Mode, which attenuates screen brightness while deactivating Bluetooth.)

Even if solar power isn't your thing (you Hummer driving, baby suffocating, evil doer), most of the phone is constructed from PCM, a plastic extracted from recycled water bottles. And there's a built-in pedometer that tells you how many trees you are saving by walking instead of driving (that part may sound made up but it is not).

We have no more specifics at this time, but the Blue Earth should be available in the UK during the second half of '09. [Pocket-lint]

The All-In-One recycling center has an 8-gallon bin for cans and bottles and a 5-gallon bin for newspaper and junkmail. There's a foot-activated can crusher that automatically drops the compressed rubbish into the bin, and a carbon filter in the lid to contain odors. In addition, the front of the unit has an LCD screen which reminds you what day the recycling comes.

But the price? An overblown $250 dollars. My inefficient and inadequate recycling habits will have to do for now. [Brookstone and Williams-Sonoma via Red Ferret via BB Gadgets]

Most hardware doesn't age well. PCs can quickly become too old to salvage, entire cellphone generations pass in about three years and the country is moving on from outdated CRT display tech en masse. Newly idle gadgetry is the dark side of every upgrade, but there are responsible, beneficial ways to get rid of it.

Sell It
You know, one man's garbage, et cetera. There are a few ways to sell you stuff, and although most old hardware won't net you big bucks, finding a decommissioned gadget a new home is particularly satisfying.

If you think you've got something with niche appeal, eBay is your savior. Your Razr V3? On the right carrier, or unlocked, it could be worth an easy $75, while fetishized first-gen iMacs can rake in well over $100. Shipping as selling on the site can be a hassle and it's one of the most obvious options, but don't ignore the possibility—you never be sure what junk people are willing to pay for, and eBay is the easiest way to find out.

You're not bound to make as much money on Craigslist as on eBay, but it's easier and at least you'll know that whoever adopts your stuff will appreciate it. It's local, so you can usually convince your chumps to come pick you stuff up. Lifehacker as a great guide for getting the most out of Craigslist, but as long as you don't list your Zen Xtra in the Casual Encounters section it should be able to sell itself, or at least give itself away.

Selling gear to a faceless conglomerate might not yield the returns of an eBay success or have the dignity of a loving local transaction, but it'll get your gadgets off your hands and put a bit of money in your pocket. Last year, we investigated Costco's cash-for-gadget program, and it worked, though not always to our liking. Lifehacker wrote up Gazelle, who appraises and buys electronics, even covering the shipping. HP has a similar buyback program. Your gadget might end up as scrap and you won't be getting the best price, but these guys will take an awfully wide range of stuff and the process is pretty convenient.

Recycle It
Despite suffering from a recent bad rep on account of widespread, cost-cutting dumping in China, the recycling option is still a good one, as long as you do it through the right channels. Why not take care of your e-waste and middle-class enviroguilt all at once? The small cost is offset by the fact that your doing a good thing by not dumping some of the more toxic electronic component in landfills or, you know, poor countries, assuming your chosen company is legit.

Apple will waive the fee at recycling firm Metech for anyone who buys a new Mac. If you don't feel like spending $1999 to save $30, you can still use the company.

Your best option is to track down a local recycling company. Many towns have good e-waste facilities—some free, though most are not—and private companies often picks up the slack when the local government can't make it happen. E-Cycling Central has a fantastic utility for finding your local e-waste facilities, municipal and private, but the onus will be on you in either case to ensure that they're not just throwing your stuff into a landfill. Just be sure to ask where the stuff goes and if it gets recycled. If they won't or can't answer, move on.

For residents of D.C., Chicago, Los Angeles and San Diego areas, as well as a few others, the USPS will help you recycle small gadgetry for free. They basically serve as a middleman between individual citizens and a corporate bulk recycling/repurposing outfit, and offer free shipping for inkjet cartridges, cellphones, PDAs, digital cameras, and MP3 players to be recycled, torn down or sold. Call you local P/O to see if you've got this option. If you do, prepaid packages are available at your branch for easy sending. The best part about this service is that it isn't vetted, so even the dumpiest old Motorola gets a free ride.

Donate It
There are plenty of charitable organizations trade hardware for karma by placing your old hardware in needy hands, but they can be somewhat picky about what they take. The National Cristina Foundation will put your computers in the hands of those who need them, but they won't take garbage. If you have a Pentium 3 equivalent computer with a software license, you're good to go. They'll also take peripherals, which would be a great way to pass on old printers, monitors, mice, keyboards, speakers and so on. The charity has been around for years, and is very good at what it does.

CollectiveGood normally deals with corporate bulk donations, but also runs a buyback program not unlike Gazelle's. The difference is that CollectiveGood will donate your payment directly to the charity of your choice. Face it—it's far more satisfying to feel like you've done something good than to just walk away with a disappointing $31.43 for your once-beloved Optiplex.

Recycling for Charities is a lot like the National Cristina Foundation, but with a focus on reselling cellphones for charity. As with CollectiveGood, you can choose your cause.

Due to shipping constraints, many donation opportunities won't be national—no worries though, as local options abound. Our brilliant intern Erica found plenty of options for New Yorkers in just a few minutes, so a little localized Google-fu will likely turn up something in your area too.

Hat tip to Lifehacker, and thanks to Erico Ho for additional research.

Dealzmodo Hacks are intended to help you sustain your crippling gadget addiction through tighter times. If you come across any on your own that are particularly useful, send it to our tips line (Subject: Dealzmodo Hack). Check back every other Thursday for free DIY tricks to breathe new life into hardware that you already own.

The gold to mud ratio is quite impressive by mining standards: 4.2 pounds of gold for each ton of molten ash, which is generated after the plant—located in the town of Suwa —incinerates the sludge. However, this ratio may be exceptional in that area because the high concentration of industries that use the prized element for their operations.

The operation started from research done in 2007, when the Nagano Prefecture and the Japan Sewage Works Agency found that the concentration of gold in the ash was comparable to high-grade ore. At the time, the idea of mining this gold was discarded because the method to extract the precious metal was too expensive compared to the potential benefit.

That changed when the crisis hit the financial markets and the price of gold skyrocketed. Then, Suwa sold 1.4 tons of ash to a smelting company, which is going to pay the sewage plant 5 million yen ($56,000) for the gold they obtained. It doesn't seem like a lot, but the company expects to get $167,000 more in the next two months. The money will be used to pay for the operating costs at the plant, which treats 100,000 tons of wastewater each day, generating three tons of ash daily. Or in gold: 12.6 pounds.

We can only expect similar ingenious processes to keep popping across the world as we get deeper and deeper into the economic sludge, pun intended. [Yomiuri and Nagano Nippo via Pink Tentacle]