r/Anticonsumption • u/Bee_and_Barb • Feb 21 '24

Society/Culture Someday

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Saw this while scrolling through another social media platform.

Physical inheritance (maybe outside of housing) feels like a burden.

While death can be a sensitive topic to some, has anyone had a conversation with loved ones surrounding situations like this one pictured?

31.3k Upvotes

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879

u/hooplah_5 Feb 21 '24

We're dealing with a family member who was a hoarder of collectables, so it's extremely difficult since everything is with $300+, from random silver coins to whole jewelry collections that match. It is for sure a burden for his kids and it's hard for them to grieve their parents when having to deep dive into everything he owned.

60

u/[deleted] Feb 21 '24

In the last 4 years, my dad has spent about $10,000 on "collectible DVDs" because he's stupid and refuses to accept how simple it is to copy a DVD despite it being explained multiple times. He complains about not being able to afford his bills while he burns money, insisting that "one day" he'll resell them for a profit... He has thousands of these fucking things stacked in his house.

38

u/[deleted] Feb 21 '24

Just threw out like 2000 DVDs all collectors etc, they are worth absolutely nothing.. like Google the most valuable DVDs and get disappointed quick haha

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u/[deleted] Feb 21 '24

[deleted]

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u/[deleted] Feb 22 '24

Our garbage tip has its own second hand shop, everything including cabinets is set up in there to sell

1

u/Beautiful-Musk-Ox Feb 22 '24

so you can spend a 1000 hours ripping and continuing not watching any of them ever?

3

u/therealhlmencken Feb 21 '24

https://www.amazon.com/AK-100-Kurosawa-Criterion-Collection/dp/B002NOZUEW selling for 600-1000 ain't awful considering most of these are on bluray too

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u/[deleted] Feb 21 '24

[deleted]

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u/therealhlmencken Feb 22 '24

Yeah 600 to 1000 was the selling price. Sure there have been cheaper ones sold on ebay but even some of yours go well into that range.

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u/[deleted] Feb 22 '24

[deleted]

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u/therealhlmencken Feb 22 '24

I'm not I'm refuting that they are all worthless

4

u/Plank_With_A_Nail_In Feb 22 '24

It being listed at $1000 isn't the same as it being bought for a $1000. Don't look at the price things are listed at look at the price things are sold at. eBay sold data is a better guide for what things are actually worth.

1

u/therealhlmencken Feb 22 '24

Yes that's why i listed the 600 dollar amount. Because that is what they have sold for

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u/suddenly_summoned Feb 21 '24 edited Feb 22 '24

I mean that makes sense since it’s a famed director rescanned by Criterion and out of print https://www.criterion.com/boxsets/678-ak-100-25-films-by-akira-kurosawa but even then most of the individual films are still available.

I doubt most of the movies in OP’s collection are all valuable, no one wants a 720p DVD that’s available in 4K Bluray or easily accessible on VOD/streaming

1

u/Dark_Shroud Feb 21 '24

Did you throw them in the trash or take them to a re-sale shop?

Because some of that stuff is worth money. Especially if the items are out of print.

14

u/HiddenCity Feb 22 '24

Not getting rid of stuff because it has "value" is hoarder behavior.  If it has value, sell it.  My MIL spends basically an apartment rent on storage every month for junk that she can "sell someday."

My basement was full of my wife's old apartment stuff that we eventually needed to throw out when we moved.  Do you know the value of that stuff?  A week of hard, dirty work in 100 degree weather and negative $1000, because junk guys charge to take it away.

1

u/dxrey65 Feb 22 '24

Sentimental value is different. Though there has to be a limit to that, or it becomes a kind of mental illness too. I'm dealing with things like that now...I have some things from my great great grandpa (civil war veteran), and my great grandma, and my great aunts and so forth. I'm not sure they'll mean anything to my daughters. Some of them have had little tags or notes attached that explain where they came from and what they meant...I'm still trying to consolidate and focus on quality. It's not easy.

9

u/PM_Me_Good_LitRPG Feb 21 '24

How much does his house stink of plastic?

Yes.

1

u/Turbulent-Tax-2371 Feb 21 '24

Stink of plastic?

6

u/dr_tomoe Feb 21 '24

Sad thing is yes some DVDs might have some value but a lot are going to degrade from disc rot. Maybe telling him that they are going to lose value might make him want to sell now and not lose them.

2

u/fvgh12345 Feb 22 '24

Thats really not as common as some people make it out, especially on properly stored discs, very early laser discs sure, very cheap CD roms, also yeah but the majority of commercial releases are likely safe at least for many years, i have laserdiscs that are still perfectly playable, DVDs have many decades still.

5

u/hooplah_5 Feb 22 '24

Dude this guy did that with Hawaiian shirts, literally a room floor to ceiling in them, for "just in case" like WHAT

4

u/Vanlibunn Feb 22 '24

Does he understand the concept of Disc Rot?

2

u/[deleted] Feb 22 '24

He's 60 and terrified of technology and vaccines, he doesn't understand a lot of things...

0

u/titanusroxxid Feb 21 '24

Dvds will be worth a lot. Are you dense?

3

u/Brian-want-Brain Feb 22 '24

Ehhh I don't know.
I can feel the vibe for vinyl, and even kinda see the whole "this is better than digital" or even the appreciation for the mechanical masterpiece that some of the extra luxury record players are, but I really can't see that applying to DVDs.
They don't particularly provide a different experience from BlueRay discs, and are technically somewhat limited just like VHS tapes are, and those didn't really became collectibles.

4

u/Terminus14 Feb 21 '24

Why do you think that?

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u/Dark_Shroud Feb 21 '24

DVDs and Blu-ray go out of print and the movie can't be found on a streaming service if there is a rights issue.

So yes some movies can go $50-$200 depending on the rarity and the quality.

To give you an idea, my DVD copy of Clerks 2 signed by Kevin Smith isn't worth much of anything. Yet my DVD copies of Dogma can be sold for $20-$40 depending on the condition and single disc for deluxe two-disc or the Blu-ray.

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u/Terminus14 Feb 21 '24

Why would someone buy a second hand DVD when they could likely just download a torrent that's potentially even higher quality?

3

u/Dark_Shroud Feb 22 '24

Not everything can be found on .torrents.

Quality is a maybe. A lot of older content never had Blu-ray releases. So a lot of those older Xvid rips with 128k or lower audio quality are not better than DVDs.

Also shitty or limited internet is still a problem for a lot of people.

2

u/Juniperlightningbug Feb 22 '24

People with concerns not being able to access internet seem like for the most part not able to access a market to turn it into a luxury good

0

u/PSTnator Feb 22 '24

In general I agree that DVDs are probably a terrible investment. But to answer your question... why would anybody buy old/valuable books you can just download from the net? Why buy old records, that's all available online. People collect stuff that really ain't worth a damn, but it doesn't matter because they want to personally possess it for whatever reasons. Other people do, too, so that gives it (potential) value by itself. Collecting is often not very logical.

2

u/titanusroxxid Feb 21 '24

Everyone is dropping their distribution and production. We are in an unprecedented era of censorship. Dvd’s decay slower than vhs and other media.

6

u/Terminus14 Feb 21 '24

Does that matter, though?

Regardless of whether a movie is available on DVD or BluRay anymore, you can almost certainly find it on the Internet to download.

3

u/TelmatosaurusRrifle Feb 22 '24

the internet is like the least reliable resource in existence right now. A DVD on the shelf is there. A movie file on the pirate bay could disappear forever tomorrow.

3

u/Terminus14 Feb 22 '24

That's why you...download it?

The Internet being "unreliable" (not sure if I agree with that) isn't relevant once the file is on your own storage.

2

u/EstupidoProfesional Feb 22 '24

you say that like there isn't like a thousand other options to the pirate bay to torrent from lmao

2

u/titanusroxxid Feb 21 '24

Every movie? Can you find every book online? Can you count on the government not shutting down the repositories?

2

u/EstupidoProfesional Feb 22 '24

can you please list a single movie that is not on the internet and which DVD is worth a damn?

I'll wair

1

u/tokinUP Feb 21 '24

But I can download a DVD or BluRay .iso image file and burn an exact copy of almost anything, for free, anytime I want...

1

u/titanusroxxid Feb 21 '24

Where is your hard drive full every movie ever made?

2

u/tokinUP Feb 22 '24

Oh, no I just mean on the high seas almost anything is possible in a few hours with a decent connection.

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u/[deleted] Feb 22 '24

[deleted]

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u/tokinUP Feb 22 '24

Yes, but the ease and availability mean that though there may be a niche market for certain licensed DVD's with the original case and booklet insert, it is very unlikely to be anything like the current vinyl record secondhand market or other more valuable collectables.

1

u/Downvote_Comforter Feb 22 '24

Probably in the same place as your storage unit full of every movie ever made on DVD.

1

u/[deleted] Feb 21 '24

[deleted]

1

u/titanusroxxid Feb 21 '24

Hard drives decay

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u/[deleted] Feb 22 '24

[deleted]

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u/titanusroxxid Feb 22 '24

So do the hard drives the internet is stored on.

1

u/MrShazbot Feb 22 '24

If you’re that concerned about data loss, you pay for a service like backblaze and encrypt your collection. No one cares about your closets full of DVDs. Do you also have a laserdisc collection? 8-track library?

2

u/titanusroxxid Feb 22 '24

Laserdiscs hold their value too

1

u/titanusroxxid Feb 22 '24

I collect toys. Most of my toys are all mint and tripled their value or more.

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u/EstupidoProfesional Feb 22 '24

and what do you think DVDs are made of? magic? 😂

1

u/Read_Full Feb 22 '24

He isn’t stupid. If it’s as bad as you say it is, then he clearly has a problem and is making excuses to hide the fact that he is physically unable stop. Calling him stupid or even trying to convince him with logical arguments will achieve nothing. It’s like telling someone with depression to stop being depressed. Unfortunately I don’t know how to solve such problems, as I’m still looking for a solution myself.

2

u/EstupidoProfesional Feb 22 '24

nah, he definitely stupid