One red paperclip

[Ghoulish Delight]

A coworker just pointed me to this interesting saga.

A guy went onto Craig's list with a simple goal...trade one red paperclip for a house.

Of course, he wasn't going to get there in one step. So he's been gradually trading up. So far, this is what he's traded for. He traded the paperclip for a fish pen. The fish pen got him a novelty cabinet door knob. For that he got a Coleman stove, then a gas powered generator, and on to an "instant party" (an empty keg, a neon Budweiser sign, and a voucher for a keg's worth of beer). That netted him a snow mobile from a radio host in Quebec. From there, he got an all expense paid trip to Yahk, British Columbia (stemming from a joke he made in an interview about going anywhere in the world to make at trade, except Yahk). The trip he traded for a delivery van, then a recording contract with Club Treehouse, which he then traded for 1 year of rent at a place in Phoenix. Next, an afternoon with Alice Cooper. Then the weirdest one so far...a snow globe. A motorized Kiss snowglobe to be exact. But, miracle of miracles, it turns out that Corbin Bernsen is a huge snow globe collector and really wanted that Kiss globe...so he traded a credited speaking role in a film for it!

And that's where it stands now. So if you've got something you're willing to trade for a role in Donna on Demand, head to http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.com/ and make an offer!

[Ponine]

This was on MSNBC a while back... I'm trying to find the story for you.

Its the same story, but with a few more interesting details.

Edited:

Trade a paperclip for a house? (http://www.msnbc.msn.com/id/12346469/)

Kyle MacDonald had a red paper clip and a dream: Could he use the community power of the Internet to barter that paper clip for something better, and trade that thing for something else — and so on and so on until he had a house?

After a cross-continental trading trek involving a fish-shaped pen, a town named Yahk and the Web’s astonishing ability to bestow celebrity, MacDonald is getting close. He’s up to one year’s free rent on a house in Phoenix.

Not a bad return on an investment of one red paper clip. Yet MacDonald, 26, vows to keep going until he crosses the threshold of his very own home, wherever that might be.

“It’s totally overwhelming, I’m not going to lie,” he said by phone from Montreal, where he and his girlfriend, Dominique Dupuis, live with two roommates. “But I’m still trading for that house. It’s this obsessive thing.”

The story begins last July.

MacDonald had spent years backpacking, delivering pizzas and working other part-time jobs, suiting his jack-of-all-trades, restless nature. He paid his $300 share of the rent by occasionally promoting products at trade shows.

But he yearned for one piece of settled-down adulthood: a house, which he knew he could not afford.

Knack for promotion
It’s clear, however, that MacDonald has a knack for promotion. Asked what he had talked up at all those trade shows, MacDonald slipped right into his spiel for the employer, TableShox.com. “You ever sat at a wobbly table at a restaurant?” he said.

Beyond a gift for advertising table stabilizers, he’s a geography buff, keeps a blog and writes short stories. Random interactions with strangers and the rich kitsch of North Americana provide his favorite material.

Put it all together, and you have the outline of MacDonald’s quest.

He advertised it in the barter section of Craigslist.org, the Web site teeming with city-specific listings for everything from job openings to apartment rentals. At first, MacDonald said merely that he wanted something bigger or better for his red paper clip. No mention of a house — he feared seeming flaky.

While he was visiting his hometown of Vancouver, British Columbia, two women gave him a fish-shaped pen for the paper clip.

Later that day, MacDonald headed to Seattle to catch a ballgame and a flight home. Before the airport, though, he stopped to see Annie Robbins, an artist who had just stumbled upon the Craigslist barter section. She admired its anticonsumerist vibe, she said, so she answered MacDonald’s posting “on a lark.”

MacDonald left her home the proud owner of a small ceramic doorknob with a smiley face, made by the son of an artist Robbins knows.

Next up was Shawn Sparks, who was packing up to move from Amherst, Mass., to Alexandria, Va. Sparks, 35, is a huge fan of Craigslist barters, having acquired his 1993 Chevy Blazer in a trade for a used laptop.

Camping stove for a generator
Sparks offered MacDonald a Coleman camping stove. Sparks had two, and didn’t want to lug both on his move. And he needed a new knob for his espresso machine.

Done. The men celebrated with a barbecue at Sparks’ house.

MacDonald gave the camping stove to a Marine sergeant at Camp Pendleton, Calif., getting a generator in return.

East again. MacDonald swapped the generator for an “instant party package” — an empty beer keg, a neon Budweiser sign and a promise to fill the keg — proferred by a young man in Queens, New York City.

Before the trade, MacDonald left the generator in storage in his hotel. When he went to claim it, he was told it had been confiscated by the fire department because it was leaking gas.

“If there was ever a movie based on all that, that would be the closest to losing it all,” he said, recalling his anguish.

But more on movies later.

MacDonald reclaimed the generator by tracking it to a firehouse in lower Manhattan, where he got a Tootsie Pop from the crew and petted their Dalmatian.

The beer package went to a Montreal disc jockey, in exchange for a snowmobile.

Here’s where the project’s grassroots purity may have gotten compromised. MacDonald’s blog, http://oneredpaperclip.blogspot.com, was attracting attention, and MacDonald was invited onto Canadian television. Our wandering man was asked if there was anywhere he wouldn’t go to trade the snowmobile.

An obscure place came to mind, so he spit it out: Yahk, a hamlet in the Canadian Rockies.

Some publicity-seeking ensued. A snowmobiling magazine offered an expense-paid trip to Yahk in exchange for the snowmobile. The trip went to Bruno Taillefer, Quebec manager for the supply company Cintas Corp. He got headquarters to let him give MacDonald a 1995 Cintas van that he had been planning to sell.

MacDonald gave the van — stripped of Cintas logos — to a musician seeking to haul gear. In turn, the musician, who works at a Toronto recording studio, arranged a recording contract, with studio time and a promise to pitch the finished product to music executives.

MacDonald handed the contract to Jody Gnant, a singer in Phoenix who owns a duplex.

Soon to be a movie?
And that is how Kyle MacDonald has turned a paper clip into a year of shelter in the desert.

Where it goes now, who knows. He says he has offers from Hollywood studios to turn his story into a film.

But he pledges not to accept gifts or overly lopsided trades that would undermine the peer-to-peer joy that he says has animated his journey. Asked what he has learned from all this, he responded:

“If you say you’re going to do something and you start to do it, and people enjoy it or respect it or are entertained by it, people will step up and help you.”

[Alex]

Last time I saw it, it was just up to the Phoenix apartment. Seems to have backtracked significantly in value though (I don't know what a bit speaking role in a Corben Bernsen movie generally pays).

[Alex]

The guy got his house.

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Yeah, but it's in Canada. ;)

[Alex]

Since the guy lives in Canada I'm assuming that was the desire. He probably wasn't counting on ending up in Saskatchewan, but them's the breaks.

[Moonliner]

Well yeah, he got his house but he had to give up a Kiss snow-globe for it. Moron.

[Ghoulish Delight]

And a fine house it must be if it's worth a role in a Corbin Bernsen project.

[Moonliner]

And a fine house it must be if it's worth a role in a Corbin Bernsen project.

You did notice that the house is located in Canada right? :D

[RStar]

Still a house from a paper clip? Wow.

I'm sure it's a fine Canadian house, as long as it's not that one on the boarder where the front half is in America, and the back part is in Canada.......

I wonder, if you trade for it, do you have to pay sales taxes? No money changed hands. I don't know nothink about Canadian taxes.

[Alex]

Don't know how it would work in Canada but in the United States I'm pretty sure you would have to pay some sort of taxes otherwise. Otherwise when giving gifts that invoked a tax liability you'd just instead offer it in barter for a red paperclip.

But I could be wrong.

[Cadaverous Pallor]

This project would have been infinitely cooler and more interesting if he stuck to real-world items of actual worth.

What a lost opportunity.

[Ghoulish Delight]

Don't know how it would work in Canada but in the United States I'm pretty sure you would have to pay some sort of taxes otherwise. Otherwise when giving gifts that invoked a tax liability you'd just instead offer it in barter for a red paperclip.

But I could be wrong.Well, when my grandmother who lived in Vegas could no longer drive, I got her car transferred to me in California. I ended up "buying" it for $1, and that allowed us to avoid certain fees and taxes to bring it in from out of state.

[Gemini Cricket]

Anyone wanna trade me something for a paperclip?

[DreadPirateRoberts]

Anyone wanna trade me something for a paperclip?

see if you can convince scaeagles that a paperclip is a small appliance

[Moonliner]

Tis true, all that from a paperclip, wow.

It makes one wonder what could be accomplished if someone started out with something more interesting, like say a piece of deeded property (http://www.loungeoftomorrow.com/LoT/showpost.php?p=59413&postcount=1).

[Cadaverous Pallor]

Tis true, all that from a paperclip, wow.

It makes one wonder what could be accomplished if someone started out with something more interesting, like say a piece of deeded property (http://www.loungeoftomorrow.com/LoT/showpost.php?p=59413&postcount=1).Funny you bring that up - I just left that job, and I left Boardwalk and Park Place in the back of the drawer where I found them.

I like to imagine that the next person they hire will need the pieces for their own home set...but more likely, they'll just throw them out.

[Moonliner]

Funny you bring that up - I just left that job, and I left Boardwalk and Park Place in the back of the drawer where I found them.

I like to imagine that the next person they hire will need the pieces for their own home set...but more likely, they'll just throw them out.

Ahh too bad you already left. I would have suggested you used them to start your own little "Improve everywhere". Leave them in the drawer but place them in an envelope marked something like "Hold for Villaraigosa" or perhaps "Hold for S. Spielberg". :D

[scaeagles]

see if you can convince scaeagles that a paperclip is a small appliance

GC IS a small appliance.:D

[Gemini Cricket]

GC IS a small appliance.:D
You've obviously have never seen my DeLonghi. :D

It would never work out between scaeagles and me. It would be too Matalin/Carville-esque. And I don't need to lose any more hair...
:D

[scaeagles]

You've obviously have never seen my DeLonghi. :D


Well, I have an 8 foot tape measure in my desk, certainly long enough, but it isn't going to be satisfying much of anyone. Where's Mr. Girthy? :D

[Morrigoon]

sca: I hear GC would like to trade you a paperclip for that tape measure...

[tracilicious]

This town is pretty eager to give him a house. From the blog:

Kyle, the Town of Kipling, Saskatchewan wants you to complete your quest for a house. The Mayor and Town Council with the support of the employees and residents of the Town of Kipling have a revised offer for you. We know you will say Yes!

1. As a new resident to our community you will receive a Community Welcome Package containing local information and promotions from local businesses.
2. The Kipling Chamber of Commerce will give you $200 in Kipling Cash. This Cash can be spent at any local Chamber of Commerce business.
3. You will be given a Key to the Town of Kipling
4. You will become Honorary Mayor of Kipling for One Day.
5. You will be named an Honorary Lifelong Citizen of the Town of Kipling
6. The day we make the trade will be decreed One Red Paperclip Day by our Town Council and everyone will be encouraged to wear a red paperclip in honor of your achievements.
7. Will build the world’s largest red paperclip in dedication to you and your “one red paperclip project”
8. Most importantly to allow you to complete your quest…We will trade to you a house. The house was built in the 1920’s and has been recently renovated. It is locate at 503 Main Street Kipling, SK Canada. It is approximately 1100 square feet on two floors. There are three bedrooms, one and a half bathrooms, kitchen, living room and dinning room. It has white vinyl siding, a new roof and eaves troughs that have been put on in the last few years. We will be sending you pictures of the house as soon as we have had time to touch up the paint.

Kyle MacDonald, do you accept our offer of one house in Kipling for one role in Corbin Bernsen’s movie “Donna on Demand”?



They're doing Canadian American Idol!

And here's what the MORE is:

Kipling is going to set up "American Idol style" auditions for the role in Donna on Demand over the Labour Day weekend (Sept 1-4). These auditions are open to ANYBODY from ANYWHERE. Yes, that means you! Corbin Bernsen will be there for the auditions and rumor has it that he might cast a few more roles then as well. *Rumor has it.* Rumor does not have it, yet, that Alice Cooper will be there. That's a rumor I definitely want to start, and deliver on.

**********

Great quote from Kipling for that part of the offer:

"We would also invite Corbin Bernsen and the Producers of the movie to be on the panel. Anyone wanting to audition would have to make a donation of some kind, either money or an item of their choice. These items would then be split between the Kipling and District Parks and Recreation and the charity of your choice. We will not take live animals, children, souls or rain cheques since we have had lots of rain lately."


I love that they have a sense of humor. :D