New Toy & Recycling the Old

As a Librarian I feel I need to keep up to date with some of modern technology. So this year  I have updated a number of  objects. I'm now the proud user of an Android based Smartphone and am having fun learning how to use it.
My old mobile phone will get passed down to another member of the family, so it won't need recycling as yet. The "old" Motorola is >4 years old now - a whole generation of phones has been and gone while I've had it. But the dilemma of discontinuing a perfectly good piece of technology for something new has always been a problem with me.
"Waste not, want not" was my Grandma's watchword. My mother lives without mobile phone or computer. But as I am exposed to the effects of the digital age, I feel I have to keep up with the new. Each time I've thrown out an old piece of technology, I look for some recycling service.
At least now there is a Mobile Phone recycling box in all the libraries I work in. And occasionally, someone actually deposits an old phone there. I hope the materials do get reused as the amount of eWaste is now enormous.
I have had at least 4 computers at home since starting to use them more than 20 years ago. Each time I've managed to hold onto the old technology for a bit longer than I would have at work, by adding extra RAM and other devices. My current PC is 5 years old - it has taken me that long to fill it up with 5 years of Digital Photos, applications and games from the kids. The last time I bought a new PC, I couldn't find anyone close by willing to take the old one. So I dismembered the CPU and put it out in the hard rubbish, where even the scavengers thought it too old to take. I gave the old bits leftover (RAM, CD, PI cards) to a young teen just starting to experiment with computers. He now has his bedroom filled with my stuff as well as ebay second hand stuff. Good luck to him and I hope he passes his stuff to someone else again!