YouTube is a streaming platform though and so is band camp and I certainly wouldn't own any song I stream on it. So you kinda made my point. Of course there are ways to access music online without paying but solely because streaming exists. You just proved why its so important. And the people im arguing against dont want those either. Physical only. Youtube is good. It's a very useful public tool like Wikipedia. Wikipedia doesnt destroy physical encyclopedias and the need for them. Its a completely different resource. They coexist. Without all streaming. Free or otherwise. Id have to literally source all my music physically. Pirate it illegally. Or hope the radio plays it so I can record it. Just like the 90s. Pre internet music was almost purely physical and public radio.
I think some of the convo here is missing the context of the people im referencing so i'll add that to see your stance on it They basically are saying everyone should live a physical only existence because all digital consumption is theft and killing physical. That includes all streaming both paid and free. They have called to boycott tubi, disney, and even steam. And digital gaming as well. Some are calling to intentionally hack switch 2 because since they made soke games digital only it is justified to pirate them games" Calling to take physical media and basically form.your own platforms where you can access these medias as a family with no contact with things you dont actually own. That to me is something I intend to do as well. With my physical stuff. I dont even mind people mentioning doing it though. It's cool advice. My issue is where they insinuate most people have the means or wish to do something like that. Or that it fully can replace my need for all digital media. I cant afford that. It requires a lot of money, patience and time. The average consumer is not like us even let alone an extreme curator.
The people that I am referencing are not counting digital as a alternative either. They say if you dont own it they wont support it and nobody else should either or "you are part of the problem" its physical or nil to them. And that hysteria has gotten loud. I just think it's pretty preachy lately.
As for your lending games. Maybe I misread. You just said it cost 800 dollars to send them insured safely? You just said that this was meant to be a cost effective option for people to consume media. That's big money talk lol. That alone already makes what you did impossible for like 80 percent of middle America. And even if you dont insure the games. It's costly to ship stuff. But to me what is more likely to make that hard is the trust aspect. That's a beautiful thing you trust a person enough to lend them games that cost so much but i'm sure you do admit that both you and your friend are in a very specialized circumstance there. Id be lucky if my own brother would do what you did. Most people arent part of a community like this dealing with specialized friends. If I want to borrow silent hill or say rule of rose. Maybe I could message you. If you wanted to borrow one of my games. I'm sure that could be arranged. But that requires having a friend that not only collects games but has that level of commraderie with you. Which is pretty hard. Harder even more so in the digital age post pandemic. You can't just meet someone at a game convention and be like "hey can I borrow your 200 dollar survival horror game. Trust me bro" lol. You have trust I assume because you know this person. Also its a collector forum so you assume we all are good at taking care of games. What about some new comer you meet on reddit? Would you do the same? I just think that idea takes a level of socializing and networking most introvert gamers arent willing or cant do. But I do agree what you are saying should be part of our community. We last the community aspect of this hobby. It should be organized and more help eachother. Soon im gonna give all my doubles away to collectors. I want to benefit the communities as well.
Not once throughout any of my posts have I argued that streaming is unimportant. My argument is against premium, pay-to-access subscription services—so not examples like YouTube or Bandcamp—being viable alternatives to physical and digital mediums that I think I've already made clear. Concerning Bandcamp specifically, you are wrong. When purchasing music from Bandcamp, users are given a permanent link to download their digital library in various file formats to save locally; so yes, users have access to whatever is uploaded and sold for an indefinite amount of time. By all accounts, physical items, digital files, and premium streaming services can coexist. The third, though, is most unnecessary and could be entirely removed without anything significant lost regarding content itself. Like I said before, there was a time before any streaming existed at all, and things were fine.
I've not encountered anyone arguing against digital media altogether, let alone streaming. I'm sure those arguments exist, and maybe they're gaining some sort of social media traction, but it's not as if those people themselves have any sort of control over how entire industries function. Only if some sort of wide consumer change would those sorts of internal decisions be introduced, so it'd be (slightly) warranted if that were the case. Like the opposite now with some physical media, the entire removal of any means of access is problematic—consumers should be able to choose how they engage.
You did misread, although perhaps I could have worded that statement better. The games I lent were approximately valued around $800 at that time, so extra money was spent on shipping for that much insurance. That extra money was something like $20. But yes, I agree that my personal experience I've recounted with lending games most recently is more of an extreme. And again, I acknowledge that most people would not be willing to part with items with that sort of market value attributed to them without some sort of collateral. However, the principle of lending, borrowing, and trading remains. Just because the items in my scenario were valued high doesn't mean that every item wanting to be borrowed will be. Long ago—and especially in people's youths when a larger social circle was more available to them—it was far more common to encounter instances like these, when some common game was exchanged for another over the weekend or a holiday break. That sort of community could still exist. It's something I think should and likely will grow in these changing times regarding physical and digital ownership, but it's largely dependent on where one lives and the social connections they've cultivated. I wouldn't expect someone to lend items with a total stranger they've just met, and that includes me too. So, naturally, forming those good-faith communities online is difficult to do. Nevertheless, local institutions like libraries offer opportunities to rent items.
I agree with most of this. Esp the terms of borrowed media and the need for it.
But to sit here and say strreaming is a medium that can be fully eliminated without "any significant loss" is looking at things solely from the perspective of a physical media curator and it directly seeks to effect the quality of my life and is why I get so defensive of it. It's just not true. I hate how physical only as a movement is not seeking to lift their media but kill all the other ways people consume theirs. The permanence of the content itself is not the only thing that matters and to some? It doesnt matter at all. It seems you keep putting so much subjective.emphasis on a medium existing in permenence of ownership which is physicals advantage but so much so downplay the advantages of streaming. "there was a time before streaming and we were fine" I mean there was a time before electricity too, doesn't mean those times were superior. If the electric grid goes down a candle is forever. Do you not use the light bulb? There was a time before the cellular phone. I never once said you can't live without streaming but let me emphasize how it'd personally harm my life.
On my morning commute to work, I have a Playlist of 2000 of my favorite childhood songs on apple music, black screen on trains, on my car. This scientifically and personally alters the quality of my mood and performance on my work which brings me a living. Without streaming (apple music) id have to what? What is your alternative? Either buy 2000 CDs for like 5 grand and move them in a wheelbarrow? Pirate the files illegally and rip them into folders on my phone requiring massive amounts of space. Or do what I do normally. Pay 10 dollars a month to have all my music in one spot permanently. Without streaming I and millions if not BILLIONS of people would lose ease of access to music and art. Educational resources. College textbooks. No way around that. In the 90s you had to hold a microphone to a radios speakers to record a song because without paying 20 dollars for a CD disc you were locked out of music entirely. Streaming yes even paid streaming makes an ocean of content available at the price of one CD a month weather you own it or not. And you cannot tell me it's a thing that can be extinguished and we just move on. Music as a medium from artist to consumer is far more dependent on streaming than physical in today's age. And I think its a good thing.
No other physical collector would have paid my 5 thousand dollars in educational resource text books. Maybe I would have failed. Maybe I would have even dropped out on top of brutal tuition debt. All of these books I got on Amazon kindle unlimited for 5 dollars a month?
Perhaps you mean it more from a place of "its important but not as important" and I can accept that but the way you worded it seems you said its basically disposable. No I dont want streaming to die just because I want physical to live. And if streaming went away. Would we survive? Of course. But to say no loss? I can't agree. And the more people push to take things I like the more i'll rebel even if its against the other thing I like.
