Imply value

The owner of a small company needed to get rid of an old boiler that his company had replaced with a shiny new one. Not wanting to pay disposal fees, and thinking that someone else could use it, he dragged it out onto the street and put a “Free” sign on it. To his dismay, a week later it was still there. He was about to call a disposal company when his foreman said “I can get rid of it in one day”.

The foreman replaced the “Free” sign with one that said “For Sale, $1,500”. That night, the boiler was stolen.

Found in presentation "How to do good research, get it published in SIGKDD and get it cited" by Eamonn Kough