100 Bottles of Beer

May 28, 2011 8:39 AM

Street interviews with Buffalo's freelance bottle collectors – the people who wander through the city to recycle our empties.

Meet a great-grandfather, a political commentator, a laid-off cook who attended college for a year and half, a Native American Vietnam veteran, and more. The project was originally supposed to encompass 100 interviews, but only ten videos are currently posted, from 2008 and 2009.

posted by skoosh (5 comments total)

I cracked up the first time I saw the city of LA refer to the bottle-scroungers as "neighborhood entrepreneurs," like "You can either take your CRV containers to a recycling center, or put them out for a neighborhood entrepreneur to collect."
posted by klangklangston at 10:39 AM on May 28, 2011

While I found the people who were interviewed to be moderately interesting, these aren't really interviews--it's just footage. And they were planning 100 of these? Why, dear god, why?

Editing would help a lot, as would getting the folks in action. Just plunking a camera in front of someone, asking banal questions and pressing record isn't the same as interviewing.
posted by Ideefixe at 12:28 PM on May 28, 2011

Yeah, it's a good idea -- I recognize a couple of these guys from my own neighborhood. When I saw the headline I thought, "I should have thought of this." But. Sigh. 100?
posted by Buffaload at 1:11 PM on May 28, 2011

I think that's probably why they stopped adding videos. Plus, can there seriously be that many bottle collectors in this town? At least some people are recycling their own bottles, I'm sure.
posted by skoosh at 12:33 PM on May 29, 2011

Oops, I got distracted by Before it Disappears.
posted by wallstreet1929 at 7:17 PM on May 29, 2011