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Thursday, Jan. 6, 2005 | 8:13 a.m.

Tony Manchuso calls his new Web community "the virtual curb."

Need a sofa but short on cash? Las Vegas Freecyclers probably have one, and you can have it for free.

That treadmill from Christmas two years ago still gathering dust in the corner of the guest room? Someone probably would be glad to take it off your hands.

"Everything is totally free," Manchuso said of items listed on www.lvfreecycle.org.

"I got a computer monitor for a friend of mine," he said. "It's amazing. This is definitely not junk."

Freecycle is an international grass-roots movement started in 2003 by a group in Tucson. Members wanted to reduce the accumulation of trash and protect the landscape from future landfills by setting up an environment in which unwanted items are recycled rather than trashed.

Manchuso and many of the estimated 400 members of the Las Vegas Freecyclers also are members of the larger international group. But the 42-year-old computer programmer started the local branch on a separate site about three months ago because he wanted to create what he considers a more efficient electronic communication process.

Basically, the bigger group places members on an e-mail list, from which they can receive several messages a day, Manchuso said. The Las Vegas Freecyclers is a Web community. People can log onto the site and browse items or list items at will, without their in-boxes receiving dozens of messages.

There is no membership fee, and everything must be given away free.

No catch.

"It sounded like such a neat idea," Mancuso said. "I'd been wanting to start a Web community for a while and thought that this would be broad enough. It's more than a message board and more than instant messaging. It's a community.

"There have been some real friendships in the real world that have come from here."

All transactions are confidential. Items are listed by category -- similar to eBay -- and each category has moderators. People are identified only by computer user names and arrange their own give-and-take through private e-mail.

"You can do a complete transaction without the two parties actually meeting," Manchuso said. "I've left stuff on my porch for people before. The other day, I met someone in a parking lot at Desert Inn and Paradise (roads)."

Manchuso has unloaded unwanted office supplies, a microwave oven and bird feeders. He has obtained a blender, a Crock-Pot and clothing.

And what else does he get out of it?

"I've got a closet again," he said.

Hundreds of items are listed under the site's "Forum" heading. They include a food processor, a snow cone machine, a baby's crib and two playpens, three cans of hummingbird food, a set of rims for a 2004 Toyota Tacoma and "the world's ugliest doghouse."

True, all of these items could be donated to good causes. But many such donations end up in dumps anyway. And with freecycling, no one has to fill out paperwork or "qualify" for services. It's not charity. It's recycling.

And it revolves around one of society's truisms:

"Everybody needs some stuff," Manchuso said.