Thoughts by Jamie Murray.
You wouldn’t put retro collecting and addiction in the same sentence normally – like you would drug, gambling and the likes – but it is a thing. My personal experience with it has grown over a few years since joining retro-related Facebook groups. I’m sure you’re aware of them but if you’re not there are certain groups you can join, some specialise – like Sinclair, Apple, Commodore and so on, then you have just general groups for all things 8-bit/16-bit/general gaming.
The way these groups are set up are eBay-like in a sense, but only with buy it now and no auctions, so first to see the item can buy it. A nice simple format. But therein lies the problem. If you let your retro collecting get out of control, first to see can buy. At one point I did let this get out of control, I wanted to buy everything!
When I first joined these groups my mind was blown, there were more people like me! For 20 years my family and friends thought I was a bit strange wanting to collect this old stuff. I’m sure we have all had the same questions asked; “Why do you want it?”, “What you gonna do with it?”, “There are better things to play games on”. We have all been there – but suddenly I’m in the company (virtually obviously), of other people who think the same as me! YES, im not the only sad git, and for a while I had to find my feet.
I found there was a “going rate“ for most items and it takes a while to learn the pricing and to control the urge just to buy everything you see. Even though joining these groups is the best thing I have ever done for my hobby – caution should also be excercised – seeing through a window of a shop that sells everything you want is a dangerous thing if not controlled. I started to gain a lot more knowledge, hell of a lot more than I could have previously found on Google, things like variants of hardware and software. Atari and Sinclair are my true loves and both have their fair share of hardware variants, especially Sinclair! So I started on the slippery road of trying to get the different issues of boards, but that wasn’t enough as theres the 16K, 48K, 128K and everything to do with all types, Samsung, Thorn EMI, rubber key, plus, ‘toast rack’, black, grey and that’s not even touching on board issues! The same with Atari – heavy sixer, light, Wong, junior, Vader, 4 switch, 6 switch etc. the variant list is huge.
So there I was, occasionally picking up the odd item here and there – and then COVID hit. At home all day everyday, nothing else to do but buy stuff. Every time a notification came through I’d pick up my iPad. Wanted to be the first in. First to grab it. First to comment. It became second nature to have my iPad to hand, through COVID lockdown I was never too far away from it. I could hear the ping every time one came through and I was compelled to see what it was. It could be something rare, something obscure or just a bargain.
Parcels were coming in thick and fast and the more I got in first, the more the adrenaline would pump. It was getting to the point where I was having boxes stacking up in the garage for weeks/months without being opened. But I didn’t care – the fun was in the chase. Then lockdown was easing, we were all getting jabbed up, the world started opening again – but I didn’t want to leave my iPad. “What if when I’m out, I miss something?” “What if a raffle takes place and im not in it?” What if.
It got to the point of when I was watching a film and a notification came through I would have to look to see what it was! Whenever I walked past it I would ‘just check’ to see if I’d missed one. At that point when everything was going back to normal, I wasn’t. I am coming to terms with it now, knowing that its an addiction that I’m going through. It is hard for people to understand unless they have gone through it, although I’m sure it’s the same in all types of collecting.
I’m starting to stand back and just enjoy what I have now. I do look sometimes and think “do I really need 16 spectrums or 11 ZX81s?” but I’m not at the point yet of getting rid of my ‘variants’. But at least now I am being more selective of the ones I actually ‘need’.
I find it helps to turn my iPad off when its not being used, then when I have a spare ten minutes turn it back on and have a look. Yes, I miss stuff but it will come along again another time. Hopefully.