Woman throws out Apple computer that turns out to be worth $200,000

[pwaldo]

https://www.yahoo.com/tech/s/woman-t...020430601.html

A recycling center in the Silicon Valley is looking for a woman who dropped off an old Apple computer that turned out to be a collectible item worth $200,000.

The computer was inside boxes of electronics that she had cleaned out from her garage after her husband died, said Victor Gichun, the vice president of Clean Bay Area.

She didn't want a tax receipt or leave her contact information, and it wasn't until a few weeks later that workers opened the boxes to discover an Apple I computer inside.

The San Jose Mercury News reports it was one of only about 200 first-generation desktop computers assembled by Steve Jobs, Steve Wozniak and Ron Wayne in 1976.

"We really couldn't believe our eyes. We thought it was fake," Gichun told KNTV-TV.

The recycling firm sold the Apple I for $200,000 to a private collection, and because the company gives 50 percent of items sold back to the original owner, Gichun said he wants to split the proceeds with the mystery donor.

[Star_Cards]

crazy. I know that I'm in a different frame of mind than most as a picker and ebayer, but I'll never understand why people can't see the value of things. I guess that's a good thing for those of us who buy and sell items that people just want out of their space.

[Wickabee]

That's insane, but I totally understand thinking an old Apple I is worthless. In picking, my talent is finding stuff even other pickers don't see, and I wouldn't have noticed that beyond an old computer. When people look at technology, they tend to think it's either new and useful or worthless. The fact that old computers and technology is now highly collectible just hasn't hit the mainstream yet, because of the nature of technology.