Wow, look at all the things the homeless get!

[Bizkitkid2001]

I was listening to the radio the other day, and ont he show they were talking about all the things the homeless people are getting are really out of whack for the homless, examples are.

Free Apple Ipods!

Free Voice Mail that only cost 50 cents to check everytime!

Free DVD Movies!

Free Nokia cell phones!

Those were just some of the many idiotic homeless giveaways. I mean comeone, how is a homeless person going to afford a computer to download music to an apple ipod, how are they going to afford the music!? Free voice mail, woo hoo, voice mail without even having a phone! Free DVD movies, they are great for coasters if you don't OWN a dvd player or a TV! And all homeless people need a paper weight nokia cell phone, they won't be making any calls cause they can't afford the $50 a month plan!!


Man, some of the charities are plain stupid

[Siliconjunkie]

Free Nokia cell phones!

Ever tried to find a job without a phone? I would assume it would come with service of some sort.

[Bob The Great]

hey man Bizkitkid2001 I think it sounds idiotic. We're helping homeless people be homeless. I think a much better way to get them going is give them minimum wage jobs doing labor around there county and renting them out cheap apartments that have phones and such. That way we would be losing a minimum of money but if they wanted to get back on top they could.

[osprey4]

Excuse my skepticism, but exactly who is giving all this stuff away to the homeless?

[Theophylact]

Actually, a number of charities do give free cell phones to the homeless. They're older ones that people have turned in when the upgrade their service. I have three or four lying around the house right now that I'm going to donate.

Even if you don't have a telco provider, any charged cell phone can dial 911; for the homeless, that's important. And people who are trying to get jobs so they won't be homeless need phone numbers where they can be reached; call-in-only service can be provided very cheaply.

[Lemon[H]ead]

to be honest, a lot of the homeless that beg get a LOT of money. One guy was booted out of leeds city centre because he was a persistant beggar. Which everyone was all "aww leave him alone!" about till they realised that he used the £400 a week!! (about $600US) to fuel his drug habit...

[MTAtech]

I share osprey4's skepticism. So, it isn't that the homeless get free cellphones (implies the phone has minutes) but the phone is just someone's old phone that they don't want and only used for free 911 calls. Doesn't sound 'idiotic' or even unreasonable to me, except that a homeless person may not have a socket to recharge the battery.

Who, exactly, is giving away ipods, DVDs, etc.?

[Bizkitkid2001]

I don't know who was giving it away. They were just listing off some stuff that homeless were getting.

The only one I heard them say was that the city of seatle was giving the homless free voice mail.

[Mike]

Well wouldn't you much rather pay for your own iPod but live in a house?

[vass0922]

voice mail again could help get a job which still makes sense

The iPod/DVD etc I find very hard to believe w/o some sort of proof.