With all the talk of “going green” it seems that the global community as a whole, with a few exceptions, are looking to conservation as a sort of gold standard and striving to make it the norm. So I thought I’d bring you a few options for going green that won’t put a huge dent in your wallet, will potentially help the planet, and will still leave you with your geek cred. Now, without further ado, I give you some of the more geeky options for going green.

Media

Video Games - We all know where to buy games, and I’m betting most of you know that you can sell old games back to GameStop, EB, and other various stores as well. Either for cash or store credit, most stores tend to offer both with a slight price difference. So why not sell the games you don’t want and use the price towards buying a new game you do want?

Music - There are a veritable multitude of sites all over the Internet that will pay you for your used CDs, but did you know that most local music stores will do the same? Sam Goody and other larger media franchises will pay you for your used CDs, usually small privately owned music stores will do the same. Sam Goody, for instance, will also buy your used DVDs.

Movies - Peerflix is a handy little site that allows you to buy and sell your old DVDs, HD DVDs, and Blu-Ray discs. Postage is handled by pre-paid envelopes that you fold yourself after printing them out with the sender and destination information already taken care of, just fold and mail. It’s a great way to recycle that old copy of Hackers you don’t watch anymore while finding the movies you do want or discovering flicks you may not have previously known existed.

It’s going cost you to buy movies, but the average is around $5 or $6 and you get paid for the movies you sell. So if you play it right you can either break even like you never spent the money or you can actually make money with this site. It’s all up to you and best of all it will keep those discs from ending up in a landfill once you’re done with them.

Books - That’s right, there are even services to buy and sell used books on the Internet. Sites like SwapBooks.com let you look up books buy ISBN number to make sure you get the exact one you want or need. It’s also a good source for textbooks for you college students out there. Reduce clutter, find that book you’ve been hunting for all semester, or curl up with a newly discovered treasure. Best of all, you can save some serious cash with things like this.

Community Chest

Freecycle - This is a great idea! Instead of throwing your old junk away, why not check to see if anyone in your community wants or needs it? It keeps garbage down to a minimum, helps out people in your community, and gives your things you have no use for anymore a second chance at life. The Freecycle Network is a collection of Yahoo Groups, based on your location, where people post what they want, need, or have to offer for free (the rules state that you cannot charge for your stuff) to see if anyone else wants or needs it. I’ve seen everything from moving boxes and bags of old clothes to video games and even TVs go in these communities.

While you cannot charge for your stuff, it’s not so bad. If you were getting rid of it anyway, you weren’t going to sell it to your garbage collector and if someone else needs it then you’re helping them out. Consider it good for the environment and possibly good luck.

Reduction

Hollywood gets involved - Even Hollywood, who until recently had been pretty notorious for turning everything into a disposable commodity, seems to be paying more attention to the world around us. Comedy Central’s Address the Mess and G4’s GCycle are prime examples of the TV industry trying to take part in raising awareness in recycling and consumption reduction.

Green Penguins?

Go green with Linux - According to an article on CNN switching to Linux could slash computer generated “e-waste” by as much as 50%. Linux has also put in place tools to turn it into a green OS by saving energy on better power management and the like. So in addition to saving you some money, you could be saving a little green in more ways than one.

Green Hosting

Hosting that helps - Several hosting companies out there offering green hosting and our host, Dreamhost, happens to be one of them. Dreamhost purchases Renewable Energy Certificates, and have made themselves carbon neutral through these certificates and additional conservation measures. We support Dreamhost here, because of price and their eco-friendly hosting. However, there are many companies out there to choose from that have gone green. So do your homework before signing up with a service.

Baby Steps

We don’t think you need to go putting geothermal heating in your home, installing solar panels, or bicycling 30 miles every day, those are huge costly steps. We just wanted to bring to your attention some smaller changes you could make in your daily lives that wouldn’t cost much but could still have a potentially big impact on the world around you.

Things like swapping your old possessions with others, taking a look at different web hosting, switching to an alternative OS, or just reducing what you already use by a little bit may not seem like much, but the little stuff adds up after a while. I hope this article has helped you realize that you can make a difference, and still save some money in the process. I like saving money, and helping the only world we’ve got is always a nice bonus to padding my wallet out.

If you liked that, try...

1. Need Hosting?
2. Peerflix “Closing Down”
3. Comic Rundown: Green Mists, Green Lanterns and Green Skrulls
4. Comic Rundown: Hellboy and What the Hell is up with Green Arrow?
5. Microsoft Announces XBox 360 Price Cut In U.S.

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