State of the Hobby

From: Merle K. Peirce <at258_at_osfn.org>
Date: Thu Jul 1 14:40:13 1999

Many systems develop a negative value. We were given one system, for
instance, which would have cost the owner $1,000 to dispose of. We have
several other systems which would have represented a significant cost to
their owner if they had not been given to us.

As for the $1300 MITS drive, has anyone ever heard of depreciation?
After 5-10 years it is worth NOTHING. Something to counterbalance the
belief in wonderful deals on eBay.

On Thu, 1 Jul 1999, John Foust wrote:

> At 11:02 AM 7/1/99 -0600, you wrote:
> >
> >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 suppose there must be a web site, somewhere, that would let you enter
> a date and a US dollar amount, and would show you the equivalent value
> in today's dollars, accounting for actual inflation, etc. in the
> intervening years.
>
> Which reminds me, when I was in high school, we sold candy bars to
> fund the purchase of a few K of RAM for the IMSAI as well as a floppy drive.
>
> >I'm presently in the process of selling off excess 8" floppy drives for $5
> each,
>
> Similarly, you'd think there would be a web site somewhere to
> remind people of the rapid devaluation of the value of computer
> equipment - say, perhaps the flip side of Moore's Law, that shows
> how simply purchasing and opening the box of a new computer causes
> a significant drop in value, followed by subsequent halvings of
> resale value every six months, until it quickly reaches the
> "nuisance fee" level mentioned above, where the cost of shipping
> and packing seems to exceed the street price.
>
> - John
>
>

M. K. Peirce
Rhode Island Computer Museum, Inc.
215 Shady Lea Road,
North Kingstown, RI 02852

"Casta est qui nemo rogavit."
              
              - Ovid
Received on Thu Jul 01 1999 - 14:40:13 BST