We provide a place for people to share technology, and to work together building healthier, more empowered communities. We want to see transparency, accountability, and sustainability become the norm in our industry and in our neighbourhoods. International organisations like the Basel Action Network help us determine how best we may lead by example.

OUR MISSION STATEMENT: Free Geek is a nonprofit community organisation that reduces the environmental impact of waste electronics by reusing and recycling donated technology. Through community engagement we provide education, job skills training, Internet access and free or low cost computers to the public.

Free Geek Vancouver was the first operation of its kind in Canada, and is entirely locally owned and operated. There are eleven other autonomous Free Geeks in existence. In order to be affiliated with the Free Geek family, we follow the following principles:

I) We dispose of equipment in an ethical and environmentally responsible manner. We're a reuse and recycling center; a large part of our mission is environmental.

We prioritize the fate of equipment this way:

• REUSE: We think reuse is often the most conserving form of recycling. It usually involves less energy expenditure and potential pollutants that arise during manufacturing and transport. It also reduces consumption and the harvest of virgin materials.

• RECYCLING REGIONALLY and ETHICALLY: We recycle as locally as possible, so that we can hold those recyclers accountable, and so that fuel is not wasted in transport. We prefer to recycle in BC when we can, and we don't want to send materials outside Canada or the US. These countries' environmental restrictions and worker protections tend to hold recyclers more responsible than recyclers in poorer countries. We absolutely refuse to send materials to a non-OECD country, in accordance with the Basel Convention. As a last resort for materials that cannot be recycled locally, we might send equipment to OECD countries, only using recyclers that can document sustainable processes. This sort of thought process and accountability - evaluating options and choosing the one that's the least harmful (and the most helpful) for people and the environment - is important to us.

II) We use free and open source software wherever possible, and promote the free software philosophy in other ways, such as transparent collaboration with others. The free software philosophy, with its emphasis on mutual assistance and freedom, is important to what we are; all of our software, documentation, and policies are open to whoever wants to avoid reinventing the wheels we've made.

III) We provide low- and no-cost computer technology and training to our community. We believe that empowering people is an essential part of equipping them. Rather than just dropping free hardware on folks, we want to educate them, and facilitate their self-sufficiency. We also want to involve them in creating a community where they can circulate their knowledge and empower others.

IV) Our mission statement must be in concordance with the original Free Geek Mission Statement.

Additionally, in order to use the Free Geek name and join the Intergalactic Federation of Free Geeks, we've agreed to the 'Principles for Official Free Geeks':

• Free Geeks are democratically run in a non-hierarchical way that is open and transparent to all participants in its programs. Our volunteers help shape Free Geek and determine our priorities and practices. We operate using a form of consensus, and we are currently developing our governance structure. Our meetings and mailing list archives are open to the public. Our staff is a collective -- there's no boss.

• We are a non-profit business (as legally defined in BC), following honest business practices and having the stated goal of advancing the common good. We registered as a non-profit society on Dec. 6, 2006.

'Secrecy is the badge of fraud' -- Sir John Chadwick (b. 1941), British judge