Local recycling group changes its name
The Hammersmith and Fulham branch of the recycling group Freecycle has changed its name to Freegle, in a bid to breakaway from its parent organisation in the United States.
The move towards independence, which has affected Freecycle groups across the country, comes after a dispute between the UK branches and the American network.
Explaining the change, Hammersmith and Fulham moderators told their members: “The main reason for our move is simple. While Freecycle is a great idea, all our UK groups were basically forced to work under a system devised in and for the United States. Leaders of Freecycle in the UK spent more than two years talking with the main Freecycle Network trying to get the freedom to run things in a way more suited to our own country and our own laws. Nothing changed.”
Local moderators, who work as volunteers, screening all the posts and checking members are adhering to the rules, say the relationship between the US and UK groups deteriorated, eventually turning into “an immense power struggle”.
The Hammersmith and Fulham group, which has been running since 2006, has 10592 members, who offer unwanted household items to each other for free. The aim is to prevent as much as possible from going into landfill.
Moderators say the name change will not alter how the organisation works: “From the members point of view nothing has changed and in general nothing will. We will remain a group dedicated to keeping tangible items out of landfill by gifting, and we will remain a community for local people,” moderators wrote in a message to their members.
Explaining the new name, they continued: “This all happened in an exceedingly short period of time. In order to stand on our own in a united way we needed a name. All UK moderators and group owners were invited to make suggestions. Many were very good but could not be used as they infringed on other organisations or were not available as a top level domain name. We had two separate votes in a period of 24 hours. The name needed to be simple and could be used as a verb. It has been agreed that we would review the name in the near future and, if necessary, change it to a much better name.”
Nan Bixby, hub coordinator for the Freecycle Network in the US, told the Guardian he was not aware of any plans for UK groups to break away. "Sadly, there are times when groups feel they can better serve their local community in other ways. When this happens we wish them well and continue in our efforts to save local landfills,” he said.
15 September 2009