Recycling is the science of turning used materials into useful materials. To recycle simply means to adapt a thing which has already been used to a new use. The typical human tendency is to discard things that have been used. The assumption is that the material having been used for the principal purpose is now waste and not needed anymore, so flung into the bin they get! However, not all materials become useless after their principal use case. A host of materials can serve other purposes besides their original purpose. Trousers can turn nickers when they are outgrown. Long sleeve formal shirts can become sleeveless casual wears. Packaging corks can become glues/epoxy. Bottles of potable water can be transformed into beautiful flower vases (See @Eliany for an example) ..and so on. It's all in our imagination and within the bounds of our creativity.

Yes, digital wastes exist too. I know you may never have given thought to it but trust me, we all have a ton of clutter here and there in our digital environments. Often, the garbage heap becomes a real problem only when we notice we've run out on storage space. Then we struggle to find what we no longer have use for to delete in order to have the space to stash more. Think about those images you captured when you went on that trip the other time. Oh, you barely even remember the trip I'm referring to. But that's okay, it happens. We live a fast paced live. So from one trip to another vacation to another ceremony to another site seeing to another event to another selfie galore to another facetime to another 'snap and share' to another 'record and replay' to another nice loneliness-inspired writ....to memory full! We rack up clutters of beautiful moments turned history and waste, all of them digital.

You have heard of NFT (Non-fungible tokens). Truth is, every digital creation is non-fungible, as in. What's left is tokenisation of the item be it image/picture, videos, audio or text digital element. Now you know what I'm thinking don't you? You can encrypt your digital items, set royalties, put them up for trade as tokens on the Blockchain. The royalties will forever keep coming in as your once-upon-a-time digital waste now turned NFT changes hands on the cryptomarket!

So instead of letting your selfies and pictures and video clips just lie there, using up space, you can give it a new purpose thru recycling. That way you could easily turn your digital waste to wealth!

DIY: Recycle Waste Digital Items to NFTs

Step 1: Search your device for items you may no longer need: pictures, videos, etc
Step 2: Install and setup a crypto wallet if you don't already have one. Wallets with browsers like Metamask and Trust are recommended.
Step 3: Open dapps (wallet browser) and load opensea.io (Opensea is one of the largest NFT marketplace)
Step 4: Setup you Opensea account and create a collection for your NFTs
Step 5: Oops! Nice try but I'm no NFT guru so don't mind me,
Follow the steps here to mint your first NFT

Some Useful Tips

You can cartoonise your images before puting them up as NFTs to give them some more artsy look
You should avoid using other people's images for NFTs unless you have consent
Give your NFTs a boost by using social media to advertise them and generate sales leads
Don't forget to set royalties for your digital arts

Success Stories to Inspire You

Many people have made huge financial gains from selling their personal pictures as NFTs. Two examples can be found here:
✓ Student Becomes a Millionaire After Turning Selfies Into NFTs as a Joke

✓ Beeple’s opus

Final Word