OT Definition of "free"

[alan_m]

Having trouble sleeping I got up and watched a Channel4 TV programme at around 4am.

It was another of those programs that suggested that a house featured on the program had been been furnished for free, by carefully ignoring any of the real costs.

Turn up with two men and a lorry to pick up something given away for free and weighing a couple of hundred weight which then is put into the hands of a professional interior designer and his mates to transform the rubbish into crap.

Get something for free in Essex and transport it to Glasgow! [1] Again passing through the hands of designers who seem to have been down to the local shed to obtain £30 worth of wood/ply.

It would probably been cheaper for the program makers to have visited a local furnishing store and purchased everything new.

[1] This reminds me of phone calls that friends had when downsizing and putting good quality items on some social media sites. The items were being given away, for free. "Can you deliver it for free - I'm only 50 miles away?" - "Can you bring it around for us to have a look?"

[soup]

Something similar happens with a programme called "wheeler dealers" where they buy a car for X and sell it for y (after repairing it/'doing it up'). Profit is y-x.

What they tend not to allow for is that they have master mechanics (who know what they are doing, an entire research team finding where to get the parts that the mechanic just happens to know are needed) on hand and a fully equipped work shop. Say £450 an hour for a week or so, soon eats any profit they have 'made'.

[Andy Burns]

You expected to see something other than a twisted version of the truth?

[The Natural Philosopher]

Dont even think about 'free' renewable energy...

[Brian Gaff]

Surely not?

I mean, if its free then I'd be arranging my own transport even if I paid the bloke in some kind of non currency. Brian

[Harry Bloomfield, Esq.]

The Natural Philosopher pretended :

But it is free, until you start adding up the cost of getting it for free lol

[Harry Bloomfield, Esq.]

alan_m presented the following explanation :

Then they happen to find a blind person, to buy for a silly amount, what they have made.

I give odd items away and despite including in the ads, 'you must have your own transport' I still get asked to deliver.

Smaller, easily carried items I now leave by my gate, with a note on it

- 'Free- Help yourself'.

[The Natural Philosopher]

So is uranium free too, until you start adding up the cost of getting it for free ...

[alan_m]

No, but the BBC was covering a twisted version Brexit at the time.

[Swer]

Yep, with the best of them like Air Crash Investigation and 24 Hours in Emergency, and I do.

[news19k]

Even fossil fuels have to be extracted, refined, and transported to where they are needed; and to do that requires/d significant infrastructure to be built. Renewables are no less "free" than fossils; what counts is the overall efficiency, cost, reliablity, &etc of the delivery to where the energy is needed.

#Paul

[whisky-dave]

you kinky devil ;-)

[Commander Kinsey]

£450 an hour?! Bloody hell the mechanic could retire at 30.

[Commander Kinsey]

What amuses me is the plastic (so oil) required to make the solar panels and wind turbines....

[Harry Bloomfield, Esq.]

[e-mail] has brought this to us :

Plus the backup needed when renewables don't produce any output.

[Steve Walker]

To be fair to WD, they did explain that the older programmes (and even large parts of some of the later ones) were based on the idea that a competent home mechanic could do most of what Edd does at home (in some cases with workarounds where specialist equipment wasn't available) and so they didn't count Edd's time in the costs.

SteveW

[Harry Bloomfield, Esq.]

Steve Walker was thinking very hard :

The buy the vehicle, repair it up, then resell it - all rather pointless if they do the work for free. No one even doing it for a hobby would give there time and labour for nothing so utterly pointless.

[Dave Liquorice]

mechanics

450/hr less rent on workshop, less business rates, less heat & light, les depreciation of all the euipment in workshop...

[Commander Kinsey]

So how come my local garage charges me £40 per hour including VAT? Do you like being ripped off?

[whisky-dave]

I can;t think of many homes that have a winch and car ramp or can hire some of the things they have in their garage anytime they need it day or not and have the space to do it. he also always has someone around to help hol;d or carry something, maybe that;s why people have kids, as I was had to hold the ends of blanks of wood while my dad sawed the other end off.

But in one case they needed a plastic bit for a ford capri sunroof which they couldn't get anywhere so they had it designed by someone who did a 3D printer replacement for around £100, but I don't think that included the desiners time in doing it, or teh time it took to find him, take the old part and then return to collect the replacement of cours eit could have been posted.