You have my trust to decide what to do with expiring codes as per your own discretion. :)

I like this, but with alteration:
1. The waiving of requirements needs to done a longer period of time before expiry, like a week or more especially for those GA codes which were given freely from the frontpage or were free to self-gift via the store. Because these titles are so common in libraries by the time they are donated, the numbers of donations will be larger but the requesters will be smaller.
2. The final "ninja" drop should be with pre-authorisation of the donor. If we donate an expiring key, we should indicate whether the key will be restricted/"no ninja" or unrestricted/"ninja OK". If the donor fails to specify, then the default should be assumed restricted.

Why #2? We donate our keys with the intention that the host will hopefully find a forumite who will give them a home. Any of us donating could have dropped these extra codes immediately on the ninja thread if we didn't give a toss. I may appear selfish in saying this, but I'd rather a GA code of mine expire than go to someone who couldn't even bother to ask for it but took it anyway. I like encouraging people to engage with this community, rather than remain silent unknowns.

Daggered keys aside (since there were given for free at some point on the site and anyone could have gotten them, if wanted to), if we talk specifically about the non-daggered keys that are about to expire, then of course there are those cases that someone has gotten a non-daggered key early in a month, but then another non-daggered key (which currently no one asks for) appears to be about to expire in that month or the next.
So, it's not a matter that no one ask for it (The Beast Inside, for example), but that these people don't have another request available for that month. And the matter would be worse, if the game is about to expire in that same month.
Speaking about myself, I wait for the month to pass, to ask for The Beast Inside! (if I'm not beaten by others to it!)

You are absolutely right. Which is why I'm personally asking the donors via PM for permission to drop them on the ninja thread. Most have agreed for me to do it but for those that have not responded yet, I will not code drop them for the same reasons you specified.

I'd go the other way with that default, my assumption being that once you donate something, you, well, donate it, let go of it in order for someone else to use it, and to avoid having it go to waste. So if you would rather have it go to waste than be used by someone not fitting certain criteria, then that should be specified, not the other way around.

I agree, +1. While I was giving the (very) few games' codes I donated to Lone_Scout's Giveaway, I had the mentality that "This game isn't mine anymore. It's his to do what he want with it."

Not to mention it seems less than convenient to ask everyone individually for permission.

Your own rule #1 is, "If you donate a key to this giveaway, you're leaving who gets it fully up to my discretion". You can give people the choice to opt out when donating, the same way donors can request to remain anonymous.

Edit: Well, that's a shame.

That's right! +1 too.

Huh.....

Well anyway, the codes for Lorelai expired sooner than expected so they're all gone now. But we got others that will expire soon so I'll put them up on ninja the 24 hours before they expire.

I presume, that if I will be sending daggered keys, I will also write in PM message about consent to their possible transfer to Ninja Giveaway. I hope this will make BenKii's work easier.

I think it kind of depends on what one defines as "go to waste". There might be some people who see a code going to the ninja thread as no less --- and perhaps even more --- of a waste than allowing it to simply expire.

My suggestion is not to post expiring codes in the ninja thread, but rather, about 24 hours prior to expiry, to post there a note that directs people to the giveaway thread to claim the expiring codes in the normal manner, but without any prerequisites.

Keys must be distributed among people. They must not be allowed to expire. Perhaps they will make someone happier.
To let the keys expire is to turn them into waste.
I vote to post expiring activation keys in the ninja thread 2 days before the deadline.

Uh, how come? Waste is waste, something discarded and not used by anyone else. Something used by someone else is quite clearly not wasted. May be misappropriated, but not wasted.
Technically such a post would be outside the scope of the ninja thread. And if just advertising that expiring keys exist would be the point, then there are other threads where that'd be more suitable, like specifically the expiring keys thread (which could actually be an earlier stop in the attempt to find homes for them), the gifting thread and so on. But it's still less likely for someone to grab them than posting them there. It should be the last resort, but...

And yeah, good point by Ice_Mage, that rule #1.

Best of two worlds. Good suggestion.
This.