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i'm thinking about buying a bunch of things for the express purpose of being able to say that i own them. possibly displaying them prominently to make others aware of said ownership? i don't really have an identity or personality of my own, so the idea of being able to buy one really appeals to me
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Oct 13, 2021 20:16
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I get you're being flippant and stuff, and I have the exact same thought when I read about somebody filling a garage with funkopops or something. One should simply put their money in the toilet and flush. But it's a valid question - on balance you lose more than you gain by collecting anything and it certainly doesn't give you an identity/personality/appeal. So why do people do it? Is it a symptom of a near century of unfettered materialism having destroyed our concepts of what's valuable about life? Are there loads of people out there thinking their little "curated" pile of poo poo will have some kind of cultural or historical significance, in the end? What is wrong with us? Are we all dead and in hell?
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Oct 13, 2021 21:23
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Deep Glove Bruno posted:I get you're being flippant and stuff, and I have the exact same thought when I read about somebody filling a garage with funkopops or something. One should simply put their money in the toilet and flush. all of those answers feel at least a little bit true to me. it's like the natural drive we have to gather and stockpile the things we need to survive being abused. people still have those drives after all their needs have been met, and taking advantage of that is profitable so it happens. i was being a poo poo before, but i really do think a lot of people use their collections as a personality replacement too, especially the media-centered ones. liking the right music/movies is a huge identifier these days and a big part of how people relate to each other. hell is a spare empty bedroom you might as well fill with funko pops
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Oct 13, 2021 22:24
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This is a valid and interesting topic to discuss. Many of the criticisms are completely valid, but even the most cynical has to admit their is some enjoyment in collecting. If you have never collected anything, I'd like to hear that perspective as well. Some thoughts: 1. For some people it is a poor form of investing or gambling. People buy packs of sports cards or funko pops because they think they will either pull something valuable out of a pack or their "investment" will be worth a lot in the future. This is undoubtedly a poor financial decision, but even knowing the odds, there is an undeniable enjoyment to this aspect. 2. People have plenty of wasteful and pointless hobbies, so geeking out about action figures is no better or worse than spending all your money on car parts, concert tickets, or funny guitar pedals. People have a money and time, so why not buy a crazy vintage lego set. 3. It can be cool to own something rare and historic. I'm sure others can speculate, but possessing an item that is 100+ years old and has a history all to itself is pretty cool. 4. Some things are just neat from an aesthetic perspective. I don't have a closet full of sea shells, but I have certainly purchased a couple cool ones that I display. 5. The hunt/search can be fun. It is nice to set a goal and complete it. Maybe less applicable now that Ebay exists, but tracking down something rare can be a thrill in and of itself, albeit fleeting.
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Oct 13, 2021 23:04
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pnac attack posted:all of those answers feel at least a little bit true to me. it's like the natural drive we have to gather and stockpile the things we need to survive being abused. people still have those drives after all their needs have been met, and taking advantage of that is profitable so it happens. i was being a poo poo before, but i really do think a lot of people use their collections as a personality replacement too, especially the media-centered ones. liking the right music/movies is a huge identifier these days and a big part of how people relate to each other. hell is a spare empty bedroom you might as well fill with funko pops you are right about the media thing... I mean there are exceptions, to draw from my field of knowledge I'd say most serious record collectors I've known are not using it as a social filter, because once you own a 5x5 ikea expedit full of music you probably had a few years to realize this is not a hobby you attract the people around you into. at that point it's become a hobby, which I think people accept more as a thing they can wall off from the rest of their social existence. you don't even need to do hobbies with friends. you could just paint figurines for your whole life without talking to another person about it and it wouldn't be the weirdest thing. but so many people I've talked to about their dating and relationships categorically need their partner to share in their love of a genre or other subset of mass media. that is definitely the substitute personality aspect. like, gently caress, if you can't have a conversation with someone who likes different products to you what the gently caress kind of conversation can you even have? with anybody!? some people even end up self selecting friend groups in this way. MayakovskyMarmite posted:This is a valid and interesting topic to discuss. Many of the criticisms are completely valid, but even the most cynical has to admit their is some enjoyment in collecting. If you have never collected anything, I'd like to hear that perspective as well. I get the appeal of all five, but I guess I'm wondering if, say, 1 and 2 and 5 aren't basically what PNAC said about the zombie accumulation drive once somebody's basic needs are met.
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Oct 13, 2021 23:28
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This is a cool topic and I like everyone's points. I think collecting things isn't really a substitute for a personality but rather a symptom. Their personality dictated their decision to acquire things, and multiples of similar things, or in some cased identical copies of things. I myself have smallish collections of games (traditional and electronic), phizical media (tapes, records, CD/DVDs), books, and stickers, and they're a part of my lived experience. Is there more productive, useful things I could have put my time and money towards? Definitely. I can't change my past decisions, I can only try to be better in the future.
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Oct 14, 2021 00:45
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I collect things that remind me of happy memories from my life. Also plastic dinosaurs because dinosaurs are cool and fun to look at.
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Oct 14, 2021 01:33
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I think it's easy to default to thinking about funko pops or video game merch or anime figurines when talking about 'collections' but I think collections of those types really discount how many collections can be seen not as consumption masquerading as personality but rather extensions of real world knowledge. For example, my wife has a collection of taxidermied insects that she herself has preserved and posed. She has a very real passion for Etymology, and her collection is a showcase of that. The mere act of having a collection of some sort represents some form of expertise, sometimes that expertise has merit (I know a guy who collects historic maps.) and sometimes that expertise is embarrassing (a funko pop collection is, at the very least, a very shallow depiction of marketable pop culture).
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Oct 14, 2021 06:17
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Plebian Parasite posted:She has a very real passion for Etymology, and her collection is a showcase of that. Otherwise this is a v good post though 
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Oct 14, 2021 18:49
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money means nothing and you have to be brain damaged to collect it. much better and healthier to trade it for things like fun games, vintage tools, swords, various books and art, etc. literally anything is smarter to collect than money
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Oct 14, 2021 19:38
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I’m not a person of funko pops or beanie babies so I can’t comment on that sort of collection, but I think my collection of old film cameras is neat because in addition to being clockwork marvels they’re also tools that can be used to this day to create art. And the old computers I keep around, such as a 1984 Macintosh, are a really unique piece of history despite having limited practical use today. Even the ever-growing basket of throws and blankets next to the couch keeps me warm in the winter. jarofpiss posted:literally anything is smarter to collect than money *Stares in numismatics thread* corgski fucked around with this message at 20:00 on Oct 14, 2021 |
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Oct 14, 2021 19:51
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Ayin posted:I.. I think you mean "entomology" That's what I wrote initially but it autocorrected and I just shrugged my shoulders and assumed it was correct.
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Oct 14, 2021 20:01
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When is something a collection? We own probably thirty or so board and card games, and people have referred to them as our collection while visiting but I've never really considered myself a collector. Is something a collection when you the collector deem it so, or does something become a collection when the number of items reaches a certain threshold?
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Oct 14, 2021 20:11
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Jaxts posted:When is something a collection? We own probably thirty or so board and card games, and people have referred to them as our collection while visiting but I've never really considered myself a collector. i think it’s a collection if it’s curated
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Oct 14, 2021 20:13
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jarofpiss posted:i think it’s a collection if it’s curated What is it if it isn’t? And how do you define curated?
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Oct 14, 2021 20:16
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Xenomrph posted:What is it if it isn’t? it’s a bunch of junk if it’s not curated. collections have individual pieces representative of some significance in the genre.
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Oct 14, 2021 20:21
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mel gobson compulsively bought every copy of catcher in the rye in that movie. not a collection, just a bunch of copies of the same book
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Oct 14, 2021 20:22
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jarofpiss posted:it’s a bunch of junk if it’s not curated. collections have individual pieces representative of some significance in the genre. https://youtu.be/OUOMoNkQF3s
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Oct 14, 2021 21:06
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i think it's a collection when the point is owning it. if you have a bunch of board games because you play them, you have a bunch of board games. if you have a bunch of board games because some are rare and some are misprints or whatever, you have a collection basically to me collections are ownership without utility i guess. the same exact pile of stuff could be a collection to one person but not another, like when you see great-grandma's sowing gear end up in a shadowbox on someone's wall
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Oct 14, 2021 21:16
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I think there’s a good degree of overlap - I own a lot of DVDs, but I also watch them so there’s utility there. It’s also curated in that I don’t buy random movies just to have them, and some of them are unique editions. And then there are movie collectors who genuinely do buy a crazy number of movies just to say they have X number of movies and keep them all organized in a library of shelves, sometimes including multiples of a movie and with no intent to watch any of them. I would consider that “collecting” as well, but just a different style and it’s not a methodology I personally enjoy or practice. Having such an insane number of movies is visually impressive, but it lacks the utility of being movies I actually want to watch so it’s not appealing to me.
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Oct 14, 2021 21:37
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I've always felt that stuff becomes a collection when it's no longer just a means to an end. If you're buying a DVD and keeping it around just to watch the movie or hanging on to books because you use them to look up things, those aren't really collections. But if you're getting that DVD or book because you want every Fellini movie or the entire first print run of Book of the New Sun, well, you're collecting those, aren't you? It's a blurry line, of course, because only you can say why you own certain things. Still, it's an important question to ask yourself, especially when your collections take up a lot of time, money, and space. I don't think there's anything wrong with collecting things. It can be a piece of your personality rather than a substitute for it, no different and no more detrimental than your favorite color, food, or football team. But I've seen the results of unexamined collecting. My uncle passed away a few years ago, and he ran up a ton of debt just because he collected everything: sports cards, beanie babies, coins, DVD special editions, Minion toys, fast food glasses, and live turtles. We're still sorting through all of it, and I'm just glad he never discovered Funko POPs.
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Oct 14, 2021 21:39
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Ha wondered what was going on in here, didn't expect it to be an examination of why the gently caress are we doing this poo poo. Hell, why am I doing this poo poo? I suspect it's mostly the thrill of the hunt for me coupled with the aesthetics of the crap I buy. Lately I've been trying my damndest to hold to the minimalist idea of buying fewer, but more desired (and probably more expensive) items rather than filling the void with good enough or close enough stuff. I still manage to gently caress it up from time to time; I got a couple of bids on Ebay poo poo I'm actually hoping to be outbid on because I jumped in too soon and found something better elsewhere. But it's poo poo nobody really wants so the odds of me winning it on minimum bids are decent. My real problem is divesting collections I'm no longer into but am still emotionally attached to.
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Oct 15, 2021 04:50
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well, i have a bunch of RPG books but i keep them for use so i guess my major collection then is my coin collection, which is whatever cool weird canadian quarters fall into my hands and also brand new coins that are shiny and make my magpie brain happy
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Oct 15, 2021 06:52
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A friend abandoned their collections of antique things (smoking paraphernalia mostly) because the internet has made it "too professional". Now everybody can look up anything and get a good idea of what it is and what it's worth, the hunt through junk sellers, charity shops and antiques fairs is less of a thing, and what would have been there is instead priced out of their reach by professional resellers. Basically, the internet ruined everything. Again.
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Oct 15, 2021 12:31
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jarofpiss posted:mel gobson compulsively bought every copy of catcher in the rye in that movie. not a collection, just a bunch of copies of the same book Xenomrph posted:So buying multiples of the same thing isn’t a collection? i have a few incomplete copies of hero quest but together they make a pretty decent complete copy so that doesn’t count
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Oct 15, 2021 13:48
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goatface posted:A friend abandoned their collections of antique things (smoking paraphernalia mostly) because the internet has made it "too professional". Now everybody can look up anything and get a good idea of what it is and what it's worth, the hunt through junk sellers, charity shops and antiques fairs is less of a thing, and what would have been there is instead priced out of their reach by professional resellers. This is true. Combing through junk stores, thrift shops, and flea markets used to be a lot more cheap and fun. Same with used book and record stores. I will say that the internet has made finding specific, weird poo poo much, much easier, but I do miss the thrill of the hunt.
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Oct 15, 2021 14:25
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Gutter Phoenix posted:This is true. Combing through junk stores, thrift shops, and flea markets used to be a lot more cheap and fun. Same with used book and record stores.  I stopped going to thrift stores regularly because there's nothing but borderline garbage junk in them. I was doing pretty well at flea markets for a while but the pandemic killed that off for the past two years. And I've noticed that antique malls don't really have good turnover of stuff here and most of is the more traditional items I don't tend to collect. A lot of hunting for little personal reward in those places as they tend to be huge. I'm kinda in flux as to what to collect currently as I've hit some dead ends and run out of poo poo to collect with some of my stuff. Retro games in particular, I have nearly every thing I need there. It was a pretty directionless collection to start with, definitely best to embark on a new collection with some rules in mind to follow. Keeps you from buying all of the things.
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Oct 15, 2021 15:17
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Turbinosamente posted:
Jack Chick tracts are my favorite thing to collect because most of them are super cheap, but they also have a ton of variations and there are some rare, old ones from the 60's and 70's. A collector who knows what to look for can still find rare gems for dirt cheap.
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Oct 15, 2021 15:25
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Thanks for the opinions on my question all! This thread, and RSF as a whole is very interesting.
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Oct 15, 2021 15:27
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Gutter Phoenix posted:Jack Chick tracts are my favorite thing to collect because most of them are super cheap, but they also have a ton of variations and there are some rare, old ones from the 60's and 70's. A collector who knows what to look for can still find rare gems for dirt cheap. I swear to god I'm gonna pivot into letterpress blocks for similar reasons. They're cheap and easy to find on ebay and demand for them isn't huge so I can be extremely picky about what I buy. I am also a sucker for 60s and 70s visual designs. Already have a small set of four too: three of which I stumbled into at an antique mall and one I ebayed a while ago.
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Oct 15, 2021 15:35
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Turbinosamente posted:I swear to god I'm gonna pivot into letterpress blocks for similar reasons. They're cheap and easy to find on ebay and demand for them isn't huge so I can be extremely picky about what I buy. I am also a sucker for 60s and 70s visual designs. Already have a small set of four too: three of which I stumbled into at an antique mall and one I ebayed a while ago. I was a printer from my teens to my early 30's, and I adore old press paraphernalia. I would collect that sort of stuff if I had more space. There are still a lot of obscure niches where a person can find weird poo poo for cheap prices. You just have to know what you're looking for.
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Oct 15, 2021 15:40
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Turbinosamente posted:
have you considered producing something for a change?
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Oct 15, 2021 15:41
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pnac attack posted:have you considered producing something for a change? You don't get it, and that's OK. No reason to poo poo all over people who have different interests, friend.
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Oct 15, 2021 15:43
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Gutter Phoenix posted:You don't get it, and that's OK. i don't get it in the same way i don't get cancer, ie limiting my exposure to environmental factors i know to be detrimental to my health and i'm not making GBS threads all over anyone, i'm providing a contrapoint to this celebration of compulsive consumption. you taking it so personally kinda gives validity to the idea that a lot of people fall into using this stuff as a personality replacement
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Oct 15, 2021 15:56
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pnac attack posted:have you considered producing something for a change? That hurts man. I've had a creative block for years and am always dissatisfied and disappointed in the artwork and crafts I've produced lately. My own e/n bullshit has gotten in the way of it; I'm super good at holding myself back because of perfectionism. Gutter Phoenix posted:I was a printer from my teens to my early 30's, and I adore old press paraphernalia. I would collect that sort of stuff if I had more space. That's cool! Most of the blocks I run across are super tiny, so they won't take up a ton of space, and I like to look at them even if the image and text is reversed. It satisfies my love of miniature poo poo as well and gives me a focus while I deal with my other dead collections. Opening up the box of tiny stuff they were in and getting hit with a wave of degassing plastic made me realize how silly the rest of the miniature collection was. I hadn't looked at it since I packed it away so it was also a revelation on how much of it didn't actually matter to me.
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Oct 15, 2021 16:04
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pnac attack posted:i don't get it in the same way i don't get cancer, ie limiting my exposure to environmental factors i know to be detrimental to my health I'm not taking it personally. I don't give a poo poo what some random person on the internet thinks. You ask a valid question, and I think it's an interesting topic to discuss. I like collecting weird, obscure, old things, or stuff that triggers happy memories from my life. I agree with you that collecting new, mass-produced "collectables" is sorta lame, but it's none of my business what people wanna hoard.
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Oct 15, 2021 16:07
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Turbinosamente posted:That hurts man. I've had a creative block for years and am always dissatisfied and disappointed in the artwork and crafts I've produced lately. My own e/n bullshit has gotten in the way of it; I'm super good at holding myself back because of perfectionism. do you think it's possible that expressing yourself through the things you choose to buy is a part of what's inhibiting your ability to actually create?
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Oct 15, 2021 16:09
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Assembling my models distracts me for a few hours and then I get a cool robot out of it. I honestly don't like having all the robots around, but it also feels wasteful to throw them away. The latter could be some latent hoarder issues though.
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Oct 15, 2021 16:17
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Why is producing any better? You still just create a bunch of junk no one needs? Are the people producing the Pops better than the people buying the pops? Why produce in a world where no one wants your poo poo? Lots of questions about relative values.
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Oct 15, 2021 16:19
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I think there's a huge difference between people who collect things they enjoy and people who hoard things with the intention of selling them later for big bucks.
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Oct 15, 2021 16:22
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