State of the Hobby

From: Richard Erlacher <edick_at_idcomm.com>
Date: Thu Jul 1 12:02:51 1999

This argument is getting to where it's pretty silly.

I don't see how anyone can complain about buying used computer hardware for
considerably less than it cost when new.

The mythical "free Altair" which pops up again and again is generally sold,
even in "better than new" (properly assembled and functional) condition for
significantly less than what it cost new, in "real" dollars. -- YES -- even
on eBay!

The typical PDP8 owned by persons in this particular interest group were
certainly not purchased for what they cost new, even in inflated dollars, so
I really can't see what the complaint is. Sure, some people are able, and,
some, misguided though they may seem to be, even willing to pay more than I
think they should for a given item. To them, I sell what I can.

In a recent auction on eBay, a MITS Floppy Disk Drive was auctioned off at
$565. "WOW!" you may say, but that unit cost $1300 when new, and that was
in dollars that were a DOLLAR, and not just the price of a candy bar. I'm
presently in the process of selling off excess 8" floppy drives for $5 each,
functionally tested and aligned, plus the estimated cost of packaging and
shipping, since I don't want more work on top of the alignment and testing,
estimated by Mailboxes, etc, which is where I'll have them boxed and
shipped. I've offered these same drives to people, as is, for just the cost
of shipping, and most wouldn't pay even for the shipping.

When I bought my first pair of 8" floppy drives they cost $675 each. The
last pair I bought cost $470 each in 1981. In 1980, it seems to me, a
typical S-100 CPU cost $250. A floppy controller cost about the same, and a
terminal cost $750.

If people wanted more than that for these devices, even though they were in
perfectly functional and cosmetically perfect condition, I could understand
the complaints. I won't be convinced that the prices being paid at auction,
publicity or not, for "old, used, obsolete" computers or component are
unreasonable until someone shows me a similarly pristine '55 Thunderbird
that's going unsold because its price is over half what it cost new.

Dick

-----Original Message-----
From: Jeffrey l Kaneko <jeff.kaneko_at_juno.com>
To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers
<classiccmp_at_u.washington.edu>
Date: Thursday, July 01, 1999 10:36 AM
Subject: Re: State of the Hobby


>This will draw alot of flames, and may upset certain people.
>Please send personal attacks to me directly.
>
>On Wed, 30 Jun 1999 10:20:38 -0700 Kai Kaltenbach <kaikal_at_MICROSOFT.com>
>writes:
>> Classic computer collecting is rewarding on so many levels. And in
>> so many senses, we have a collector community relationship that rivals
>those
>> of much more established hobbies. That's why it's so important, as the
>
>> hobby begins to reach maturity, that we not lose sight of our
>fundamentals.
>
>But you've missed the one 'fundamental' that uniquely gives our hobby
>its true appeal: Our hobby exists (existed) purely for its own sake.
>No strings, wire, or unneeded baggage. It existed purely for the joy
>of computing at its most base level, and the aquisition of knowledge
>of the science.
>
>> Lately, there has been a disturbing trend towards isolationism and
>> elitism among our flock, up to and including outright hostility. This
>has
>> got to stop.
>
>Hostile? Yer damned right. We're on the defensive now. The
>'marketplace'
>is poised to fundamentally change what I perceive as the original charter
>of the computing hobby.
>
>> Now, as Dennis Miller says, I don't want to get off on a rant here.
>> As much as anyone else, I'd like a world full of retired aerospace
>> engineers with garages full of free Altairs. I'd also like the IRS
>> to abolish my income taxes and give me a free Ferrari. It's just not
>> going to work that way, folks.
>
>You hit a raw nerve here, buddy boy. I don't *want* garages of free
>Altairs (or whatever). All I want is to be able to purchase the material
>
>that is of interest to me at a *reasonable* price. Now the retired
>Aerospace
>Engineer thinks he can make a fortune off his old computers. Piss.
>
>> Lashing out at people who want to publicize our hobby is like
>> sitting in the nosebleed section of your hometown baseball stadium
>> and hoping to god that your team loses big so you can afford better
>> tickets next year.
>
>This to me, clearly says you have no clue as to what is at stake here.
>>From my perspective, it's more like lashing out at land speculators
>who want to parcel out what was once tribal land, the parcels by the
>lake commanding the highest prices. What was once an almost free and
>accessable resource, now belongs only to the elite who can pay the price.
>
>
>> Get OVER it. Nobody understands our hobby, it's next to impossible to
>> properly insure,
>
>Insure. Huh, yeah right. Why would you want to insure something unless
>you spent BIG BUCK$ on it?
>
>> there's far too little real museum space devoted to
>> classic computers,
>
>Whaddaya mean by 'real museum space'?!? You mean like in the Deutsche
>Museum? The LA Museum of Sci & Ind.? The Guggenheim?!?! Tell ya what.
>When these 'heavies' get real serious about computing engines built
>during *my* lifetime, I'm outta here. No way I'll be able to afford it
>then.
>
>> hundreds of historic pieces are being tossed in the
>> dumpster every day,
>
>As tragic as this situation is, ss long as the possibility for this
>exists, there will be hope for the hobbyist with little or no money
>(this includes *most* of our young people).
>
>> and you want to keep the whole thing a big in-clique secret.
>> Does this make any freaking sense to you?
>
>Yes. This hobby is what it is because it was populated almost
>exclusively
>by what I will refer to as 'true believers': Guys with little (or no)
>money but alot of patience and a solid *commitment* to make the machines
>live.
>
>Now there are amongst us speculators who don't truly believe;
>they don't practice the true faith, and don't care to. All they
>know is that computers have become a 'hot' collectible, and they want
>a piece of the action. It is these that we must oppose.
>
>> Every time I hear somebody say something like, "Are you going to
>> sell that to a REAL collector at a decent price or are you going to
>> WHORE it on EBAY?" I just want to gag.
>
>I see the prices, and *I* just want to gag. The continued exposure
>of our hobby on forums like E-BAy will only cause prices to rise. Very
>soon, many of us will be priced out . . .
>
>> Amazing as this may seem, the people on eBay deserve this stuff as
>> much as you do, mr. nose-in-the-air elitist.
>
>Maybe they do. But they have the money; many of us 'tribesmen' don't.
>It seems you've mis-applied the 'eliteist' label, in this case.
>
>> Oh sure, who wouldn't want to buy the thing at a token "collector
>price"
>> and save a bunch of money, but don't make the seller feel like an ass
>> because he wants to participate in a free-market economy.
>
>We can't stop folks from auctioning off stuff on e-bay; that's their
>right. ALl I know is, is that prices are going up, and e-bay isn't
>helping the matter. As far as I'm concerned, E-Bay is hurting our
>hobbyist 'way of life', not enhancing it.
>
>> And quit calling the people on eBay "morons". OK, sure, the guy who
>> bid $510 for the "signature Macintosh" was a few cans short of a
>> six-pack, but if you bothered to follow up on the auction, you'd notice
>
>> that most of the bidders pulled out once they caught a clue. And
>
>I try to ignore some of the stupidity on this planet. Fortunately,
>there are still (for the moment) plenty of cheap MAC's to go around.
>
>> everybody who pays what YOU consider a high price for a genuinely
>> interesting piece of hardware is not an idiot. People pay money for
>> something because they want it. So, you're basically upset that
>> somebody wants it more than you do?
>
>SO you're convinced that someone with a pile of money to throw at
>a 'hobby' simply wants it more than someone who's broke??!! Sheesh.
>It must be nice to rich, so you feel justified in making implications
>like that.
>
>IN the hobby I knew, money was only a very small part of the equation.
>Used to be, all I needed was a few dollars, some basic tools, and a
>little luck. Now I need *deep* pockets, too. I'm upset that the
>'elite' is putting my favorite passtime out of my reach.
>
>> And while we're at it, what's with all this "some rich bastard
>> overbid me" crap. If I went through all the classiccmp posts about
>rich
>> executives, rich internet IPO participants, rich employees of big
>computer
>> companies, and replaced all the occurrences of "rich" with "black" or
>> "hispanic", the vintage computer festival would look like a Klan rally.
>
>
>What can I say? This used to be a 'poor mans' hobby. I'm seeing one
>segment being displaced and disenfranchised by another. Yep.
>
> "I'm the *angriest* computer nerd in America!"
>
>> America has always stood for a place where anybody can get rich if they
>
>> work hard enough. Are you upset that somebody else got there first?
>
>No, I'm upset that there is the pretense of a level playing field.
>It *was* nearly level at one time. It isn't anymore.
>
>> There is a lot of assumption that, when someone pays a high price for
>> a classic computer, that they A) don't know as much about it as you
>> do, and B) don't care as much about it as you do, when the reverse is
>> probably the case. Look, just because you refused that job opportunity
>
>> at Apple in 1983 because you thought the Lisa was a bomb and your
>> business selling print drivers for daisywheels was doing so well,
>> DOESN'T mean you're an idealist.
>
>All it means is that you were a little short-sighted.
>
>> Because somebody outbid you doesn't mean they deserve it less than
>> you do. Maybe they have more cash, maybe they were just willing to bid
>a
>> higher perecentage of their income than you were. Heck, somebody with
>cash
>> probably is going to care for the item better. A good percentage of
>> the purported idealists complaining about high classic computer prices
>> have an Altair on their kitchen table with coffee mug rings on the top.
>
>
>Gosh darnit, you got us there. Us pore folk generally don't have the
>the fancy display and storage facilities as do our more well-heeled
>bretheren. But then again, for us, these are objects of affection; we
>like to keep them close to us (the kitchen or livingroom seems
>appropriate).
>
>> Look, I'm impressed that you're reading this post through a custom
>TCP/IP
>> stack that you wrote for a Kaypro II. If you did that for the fun of
>it, more
>> power to you. If you think that doing your daily correspondence on a
>dot
>> matrix printer makes you a better classic computer collector than the
>rest
>> of us, that's something else.
>
>It doesn't make us better, just more joyful.
>
>> It's like that guy who coated the entire exterior of his 1952
>Oldsmobile
>> with tiny rhinestones over a grueling 5-year period -- impressive, but
>> the man obviously had too much time on his hands.
>
>But if it's something special to *him* isn't that part of what this hobby
>
>was (is) all about?
>
>> It is NOT necessary to have a Wozniak beard, live in a geodesic dome
>> house, and drive a Volkswagen Thing to appreciate classic computers.
>
>Maybe not, but the way it's going, you'll have to be able to afford
>the aforementioned house, and a *mint* example of the aforementioned
>car before you can even *consider* having a classic computer for your
>yourself.
>
>> Wake up, open up, embrace the world's coming to know our hobby.
>
>True believers only. Sorry. Greed and commercialism are threatening to
>corrupt our 'society'. Maybe there's nothing we can do about it,
>but we won't go quietly. . .
>
>> Because otherwise, one day you're going to wake up and find that not a
>> single schoolchildren remembers any of this history, because somebody
>> started making 6800 assembler coding an entrance requirement to the
>museums.
>
>True believers will always welcome initiates. But only the truly
>committed will mature and contribute. These are the ones who will
>make our hobby live. If you shut these out by raising the price
>of admission, then our hobby (as we now know it) will certainly die.
>
>
>Jeff
>
>
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Received on Thu Jul 01 1999 - 12:02:51 BST

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