The utilitarian shopping cart has an interesting history. February is "Return Shopping Carts To The Supermarket Month" in America (yes, it really is). Apparently shopping cart loss is such a problem that there is an industry of shopping cart bounty hunters. Some cities seek to make it a crime for homeless people to possess shopping carts. Some people would rather make art and sculpture out of them. Previously on Metafilter: Shopping Cart Abuse and The Stray Shopping Cart Project.
posted by amyms on Feb 5, 2007 - 41 comments

Trolley-spotting : Dedicated to developing a system of classification that allows stray shopping carts to be identified based on the situations in which they are found.
posted by boo_radley on Mar 5, 2006 - 12 comments

Amazon can't patent 1-Click after all Finally somebody realizes the obvious; now if they can get BT to give up on patenting hyperlinks we can all go back to enjoying the Internet.
posted by briank on Feb 15, 2001 - 7 comments

Shoppping cart abuse, whether physical or psychological, is all too common in our modern era. And at long last there is a web site that offers documentation of this problem, photographs of abused carts, and 12 step guidance for offenders who desire help. Most importantly, The Confessional offers a chance for visiting abusers to repent by sharing their stories. It's the most consistently humorous crop of visitor comments that I've ever come across on a silly site like this.
posted by sixfoot6 on Apr 15, 2000 - 0 comments