My town has a “bulk pickup” day where they pick up large trash. Practically, that means that four days every year, there are literally thousands of free items available to take, so long as you beat the garbage collectors. One time I salvaged a whole-ass fridge from the trash. I’ve gotten so many valuable items from other people’s “garbage”.

The city the image is from likely has a similar concept. It’s not at all surprising that someone threw out a perfectly good printer. If not, then they probably tacked a “free” sign on it and left it out for people to take with a tacit understanding that someone might still benefit from it.

Now personally, I’m more of a “repair it until it explodes” kind of guy, but especially with printers and their intentional annoyingness I could understand others’ desire to just be done with the thing.