JimRochester

STOP THE MADNESS

I started collecting in 1998. I'm a rather compulsive person anyway so I went rather overboard. When a local rental shop went out of business a few years ago, I picked up a couple hundred discs. Birthday and Christmas was for DVDs. I found a nice music shop with used DVDs for $10 so every week I would pick up several. I started doing DVD-rs. I now have close to 2000 discs including box sets, documentary, TV on DVD, and movies. IF DVDs were heroin I'd be dead.

After building 2 more shelves for DVDs I decided that enough was enough. I have close to 100 DVDs unopened. I had a hundred in binders that I had seen and knew I would never watch again. Now I'm looking at upgrading some to Bluray that I've never watched the SD yet.

I didn't wait for New Years for this resolution. I'm now getting my rentals from Blockbuster in Bluray and actually watching the movie before I send it back. Prior to that they would just accumulate in the binders. I cleaned out the binders and eliminated 1 whole binder (150 - 200?)

Instead of running right out and grabbing all the big releases, I'll get the rental and then wait for a gift giving getting occasion or wait for a trade or used deal. I'm giving away some of the older ones and trading in to DVDPlanet a bunch. It works out to 6 or 7 SD to 1 BD but what the hell, they're just dust collectors.

I know people have bigger collections than I and I have no problem with that. I just ran out room and am tired of all the shelves looking packed with discs I never watch.

Brian Shannon

I have been collecting since 1998 as well but only buy what I like. As such I have only recently crossed the 400 disc mark.

I applaud your efforts.

Adboy151

Been in this since Xmas of '97 and I've been there with 500+ titles in a collection -- and likely three- or four-fold that has come in-and-out during that time.

Right now I sit with about just over 100 DVD and about 40 BD titles. That's plenty.

My rule for the better part of two years has been consolidate/sell-off and every six months take a look at what I haven't rewatched.

The proceeds from any turnaround go into my general fun money and new discs can only come from that pool. I find that I don't actively wait for Tuesday to roam around and feel better off Netflix-ing than consuming.

visitor Q

10 years and you've just realized this!! What a way to celebrate an anniversary. Ha ha ..

Of course I am joking. As I've known that for years, only after having accepted that I had a problem did it become gradually easier. It feels good letting it out though, ya!!?

Due to recently losing my second DVD player in 9 years (began collection in Sept 99), I too have decided to start paring down my collection, this time in mass. Thankfully, I haven't amassed a quantity as large as some here, so I don't have a as much to get rid of. I've breached the 1000 mark a couple of times, but due to constantly weeding out the "lesser" material it's always hovered a couple of hundred lower than that. Thank that to blind buys and an always evolving taste in film.

Good luck with the process however. It's a pain in arse ..

But in the meanwhile, feel free to glance over my items for sale (shameless plug).

clckworang

I have been collecting since Christmas 1997 and was a very avid collector up until about 5 years ago, when I just didn't have the money to keep on doing that. At least I recognized that I needed to bring things to a rapid halt. I shudder to think how many movie (and debt) I would have now if I hadn't slowed my pace.

Now that the money situation is far better, I have started buying more, mainly Blu-ray. I'd like to get rid of some of the DVD collection (it just takes up so much room!), but the collector in me finds it hard to part with any titles.

I certainly understand the shelf situation, though. I have always had my collection on DVD racks, which almost literally took up my entire living room. I finally got tired of staring at them, it began to feel like the walls were closing in on me. Now, I have the majority of my collection set up in a spare room. The need to purge some of my collection isn't quite as great now.

Travis McClain

Dude, that should be your new signature!

rfduncan

I am with you, dude! I wasn't as bad but had WAY too many DVDs. Recently donated almost 500 to VA hospitals and the military (http://operationdvd.net/ - the soldiers have portable DVD players but not much to watch on them) where they can be passed around and enjoyed instead of collecting dust on my shelf. I have moved on to Blu-ray and am sticking with renting via Netflix over purchasing. As it is I have had 2 movies sitting at home from Netflix that are 3 weeks old. Hard lesson to learn, but you can break the habit!!

Yakuza Bengoshi

It's you people that are curtailing your discretionary spending that are wrecking the economy for the rest of us!

MrE

^

darkside

I definitely agree somewhat. I'm buying very few of the new big releases and renting more. I'm focusing mostly on the must haves I really want, but I'm still a fan of the cheesy and cheap DVDs and don't mind picking up the marginal stuff for $5 on occasion. Most of my big dissapointments lately have been the big mainstream titles so those are getting RedBoxed and I'm saving my real money for stuff like The Abbott and Costello collection that are must haves for me and for new movies I actually would want to own like Wall-E.

JimRochester

I pulled Hannibal off the shelf to trade it in and realized it was a Christmas present and it was still sealed. Then I found the SE of Bugsy. Then I looked and found Indecent Proposal, Urban Cowboy, Risky Business, Big, Night Shift, Trading Places, Blade Runner, Clash of the Titans, Cocoon, Big Easy, Basic Instinct, and Cape Fear. Those are only the new ones never opened. I still have tons I bought used and never opened and DVDs opened but never watched is even more.

My name is Jim and I'm an addict..


Hi Jim


I wonder if people who gave me these for Christmas ever notice 2 years later their present is still on the shelf sealed?

pd071

I guess I am quite the opposite. I just continue to add to my collection things that I find interesting, movies that I don't have, and what not. I have around 850 bought and another 1200 or so burned. I find myself watching random movies occasionally, pulling old titles off the shelf to watch again.

matome

I'm doing the same. With almost 3000 purchased DVD's & BD's and around 400 unopened I no longer have the storage space or time to invest as heavily as I have. For the first time in my life I joined netflix and am now screening movies before purchasing to eliminate bad blind buys.

Paul_SD

I started an excel list back in the spring with the point being to see if I could recall everything I owned just from memory. I couldn't. It took several weeks of adding titles here and there as I remembered I had them and even then I finally gave up and had to check to see what I'd missed ( a lot). It also helped to quantify just how many were unwatched/unopened (over 400 as of now with a good 20% being multi disc TV sets).
But I can't seem to stop and even slowing down is difficult because sales have just been insane this year. New $40 msrp Criterions for $16...good anamorphic big studio catalog titles in the $3-5 range...superbly produced classic TV season sets for $13-$22!?! Being an old Ld collector, prices like this just seem like a mindblowing value. Even compared to just 7 yrs ago, when my 'impulse purchase comfort zone' was about $15 a title...hell, the recent cost for several 5 film Warner box sets was just a few bucks more than that in a recent sale (B1G1 averaged cost).
Hard to let opportunities like that pass by...even with the substantial backlog I have.

BuckNaked2k

movieguru

I'm up to 600-700, a small amount compared to many on here. I've got nearly 2 Ikea Billy's full of dvd's. I haven't paid a lot out of pocket for them with doing creative purchases during sales and sell on eBay to offset the cost. I still have room for them so I don't see any need to get rid of any yet.

JimRochester

I would guess I've traded away, sold or traded in at least a couple hundred over the years. I used to buy used for $10 and then trade them in for $6 if I didn't like the movie, I looked at it like a long term rental for $4. So I have gotten rid of things in the past. Just way too many I would keep thinking so and so would like this movie or maybe if I see it again I'd like it better. I would trade but I wasn;t too terribly concerned about accumulating more.

Mikael79

It's odd, because with DVDs we had basically gotten to the point to where any new big studio release was close to perfect, or else it would get rocked in reviews. Now I'm finding myself afraid to spend $20+ on Blu-ray titles that eventually may become like the very first DVD releases - good for their time, but quickly overshadowed by the maturity of the format. I have to read 2-3 positive reviews before I pull the trigger, and it's cut down on my buying.

DeanoBKN

I've been collecting since 1998 and have about 600 DVDs, including TV, Blu-ray, and HD.

While that number may seen like alot, I also have sold back 100's during those 10 years because of bad blind buys, double dipping on special editions, or upgrading to BR/HD.

I've started to cut back very much. I don't buy a DVD unless I know I enjoy the movie and can see myself watching it again. Price makes no difference to me. I no longer blind buy anything. I signed up with Blockbuster Online and average about 17 movies a month. It's a great money saver.

Norm de Plume

Same here, and roughly the same number as well. I have no desire to own movies I don't particularly like, not to mention that I don't have the money, space, or time to waste. My criterion is, any movie I deem 7/10 or better is worth owning; any movie appraised 6.5/10 or less I probably have no urgent need to see again in my lifetime and thus can be jettisoned.

The Bus

I've curtailed ever since high def hit. At this point, it's a big deal if I buy a BD (I rarely if ever buy DVDs anymore) and when the film sucks (The Fall) I get a bit mad at having spent the price of 2 DVDs on something that wasn't as good as I had hoped.

The flipside is that I go to a lot more movies.

Cameron

you'll be back...they always come back.

Alan Smithee

I've been collecting since 1998, I haven't counted how many I have but I'm sure it's well over 500. I haven't gotten rid of a single one either, not even reissues of the same movie. I've had a rule since the hi-def formats came out though that I won't buy anything on regular DVD if it's available on HD-DVD or Blu-Ray. (I don't have an HDTV yet but will hopefully finally get one in the next few months; I already have an HD-DVD player waiting which I bought when they were being cleared out cheap.) While I have a ton of unwatched discs, I've opened them all the day I've gotten them to check out the inside and make sure the discs aren't damaged or anything.

For a while I'd buy anything that was priced under $5- one of my first binge-buys was 5 or so of those Simitar direct-to-video movies at Circuit City. Now there's so many $5 DVDs that I'd go broke buying them all, so my 'buy-anything' price has gone down to $1 since the dollar stores started getting DVDs. I've NEVER bought anything used for the purpose of saving money; I've gotten tons of titles brand-new for less than what some places sell used copies for. The only time I'll buy something used if it's absolutely out of print and no new copies can be found anywhere.

Kim Olav Svines

If you think the OP is crazy, then brace yourself for this.

I'm at nearly 6,000 DVDs (plus 400 laserdiscs, and probably 400 VHS as well). 2900 of my DVD titles I have not seen yet. And it's even gone so far that I've bought Blu-ray copies of DVDs that's still sealed. But it's a hobby, and many people drink and smoke for more money than I spend of movies. (As you may have guessed by now, I'm single).

So whenever you feel guilty about spending too much money on movies, just think about this post. Or you could just tell yourself the same thing I do, that it's my "retiring entertainment investment", and suddenly you feel positive about thinking about your golden years.

Trevor

I have always been a collector, definitely have some form(s) of OCD. The past 9 or so years, my focus has been on DVDs/movies. Some people spend $5-10 a day on a drink or two (either alcohol or coffee or soda), I switched to drinking free water only and spend it on DVDs instead. That's my justification. A weak one perhaps, but it works for me.

Since finding this forum, I average less than $5 per film. So $10 per day gets me either 2 films or one TV season per day. Do the math and that gives me about 4000 movies and 800 TV seasons. And I burn a lot of films from cable to DVD as well.

Is it crazy to have more films/seasons than I'll ever watch? Probably. But I like having a choice. Renting isn't really an option for me. Just because I put something in my queue today doesn't mean I'll have the desire to watch it when it gets to me. I like being Blockbuster for my friends and family. I like the collecting aspect of DVDs. I like the walls of DVDs that line my condo. I like the shopping/bargaining process. It's my hobby. Most people have something that others think is a waste of time and money. Mine is DVD hoarding. Some may call it a silly thing to do, but it is just as valid as your spending $ on flavored water or time on (insert hobby here).

Do I ever have moments of "clarity" where I think I should chuck it all and join the peace corps? Yes. Not just DVDs, but all material things, which mean squat in the final picture. But I won't, change and I don't get along.

But I do admire the OP and those of you who at least partially "get out".

Sorry, didn't mean to ramble, or get defensive or preachy. Carry on.