h2g2 The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy: Earth Edition

Actually a surprising number of people collect - possibly up to a quarter of the UK population for instance. They can't all be obsessives and social misfits. The desire to collect must be one of the more common human traits, and makes a rather fun hobby.

Interestingly, the types of things people collect generally fall into broad stereotypical areas as regards gender. (Susan Pearce has written a very interesting study of collecting, Collecting in Contemporary Practice, Altamira Press).

Men collect manly things - war stuff and militaria, sciencey things, stuff relating to technology and machinery. Women collect cuddly things, toys; dolls; ornaments; knick-knacks; 'junk' e.g. plastic bags; tea towels, egg cups, domestic things; and objects with personal connections. (One of the areas of collecting with equal gender balance is record collections).

Men also tend to collect more stuff. I think they tend to take a more academic or systematic approach to collecting - studying the history of their field, classifying and ordering the collection. Hands up those who sort their record collections alphabetically by artist, or who sort their comic collections into date order (and protect them with polythene covers)...

A study of a collector :
(my brother, actually)

I think a lot of gaz's collecting behavior is fairly typical of how most people collect. I don't think he sees himself as a collector as such.

He collects records - of the vinyl variety. I guess it's a pretty small collection compared to a real enthusiast - but it must be up to a couple of hundred records by now.

Mostly secondhand (as it's not exactly found everywhere now). And he rarely spends more than a few quid - the cheaper the better actually. He buys them from charity shops, car boot sales (Tijuana Brass anyone), secondhand record fairs when he's after something specific. I guess he must buy about 2 a week? Something like that.

He keeps them in his bedroom stored in alphabetical order by artist. He will buy multiple copies of records he's already got. He's got up to 4 copies of some - in different states of disrepair.

Tijuana Brass? isn't that the album with the woman covered in whipped cream or shaving cream or something? My parents still have that album.

I collect DVD's. I'm a guy, so I suppose this makes sense. I currently have about 160 in my collection, and, in guy/geek fashion, I have every one of them entered in a spreadsheet (later to be moved to a database for selective queries. ha ha). Each entery includes the DVD title, the running time of the movie, who produced it and in what year, who released it on DVD and in what year, how many sides the DVD has, whether it's single or dual layered, what aspect ratio the movie is presented in, what type of dolby digital encoding is used (eg, stereo, pro-logic, 5.1 channel), who directed the movie, who stars in it, and what special features the DVD has, if any.

This consumes a good deal of time, as you can imagine. I also collect Heavy Metal magazines (I have all issues from the first six years 1977-1982) plus most issues from then 'til now - still missing several here and there). I collect these with far less intensity than with DVD's, although I have read every page of every issue.

In my younger days, I used to collect just about everything: stamps, coins, newspapers (still have a bunch - "KENNEDY SLAIN", for example), Wacky Packages (anyone remember those?), posters, Star Wars memorabilia, the whole nine yards. Still have some stamps, some coins, no Wacky Packages (my younger brother gave them all away), but I don't really collect them anymore.

I suppose I could be considered to collect game consoles and home entertainment equipment (see my home page - I'm not gettin' into that here).

But DVDs are my current fascination. My favourite DVDs are (in no fixed order and for various reasons:

The Matrix (the coolest)
Contact (it's an SFX extravaganza)
Starship Troopers (best image quality)
Ghost In The Shell (best anime)
Antz (computer animation technical achievement - no horseshoe teeth)

And, during lunch today, I just picked up Arlington Road (haven't seen it, but I like Tim Robbins and Jeff Bridges), and Muppets in Space (I was going to pass on this one, but had to buy it when I saw that it had running audio commentary with Kermit, Gonzo, and Rizzo).

Just found this on my brother's website, which sums up his fixation with music quite nicely :

Gareth William Owen was born in 1972, at a time when the No.1 single was Lieutenant Pigeon's "Mouldy Old Dough" and the No. 1 album was K-Tel's "All Time Hits Of The Fifties."

From here it could only be uphill.

Two years later, to the day, Muhammad Ali regained the Heavyweight championship of the world by knocking out George Foreman in Kinshasa, Zaire (now the People's Republic Of The Congo).

The first single I ever owned was "Car Wash" by Rose Royce, and the first I ever bought was "Eighth Day" by Hazel O'Connor. The first album I ever bought was a badly scratched copy of Bob Dylan's "Planet Waves" and from them I've found it physically impossible to walk past a record shop.

My last record purchases were:

Babylon by Bus, Bob Marley and the Wailers.
Pet Sounds (another copy).
Three Buzzcocks singles.
Total cost, 9 pounds the lot.

The other hobbies I manage to fit round scouring Cheshire and Manchester for cheap vinyl are rugby and reading.

Hi. I collect coins. Coins fascinate me because they combine 3 of my favorite things: Money, history, and art. I am American, and I have obsolete American coins from throughout the 20th century and earlier. I also have coins from over 20 other countries, plus a really old one from the Roman Empire.

I had a coin collection, but it was stolen a couple of years ago. It was nothing fancy, but it did have some rather old Canadian coins and many old coins from other countries. Nothing as old as the Roman empire, mind you, but hey.

I know nothing about coin collections - but I assume as with things like stamps there is a point in history somewhere (for the country you live in) between things being made that have some tradeable value (i.e. bronze axes), and things being made to be solely used as tradeable objects (i.e. plate scrap of bronze).

Does your interest in coins go back as far as these tradeable commodities (despite their not being coin-shaped) - or are you particularly interested in the periods after coins started being round and with a recognisable pattern?

Sorry, that was a bit bit bonkers. Not thinking straight. For the UK, as far as I am aware, the history of coins (as circular type stuff) only dates back as far as the Iron Age (i.e. staters; quite some time ago). I suppose Roman coins are the earliest dateable coins in England.

The only coins I collect are pennies (one from every year going back into the sixties) and quarters, now that they've come out with those "50 states" ones. I used to collect Koosh balls, but that obsession has pretty much died down now, although I still have all my old ones. Now I just collect Magic cards, and of course books and CDs (but very selectively). And yes, I alphabetize by artist.

Interesting stuff - loads of questions, please answer if you have the time..

Firstly - what are Koosh balls, and Magic cards?

Do you think you'll always collect stuff? - does it just happen accidentally (well I guess you are quite systematic about the pennies?) or are there any reasons why you start collecting something?

What's a koosh ball? Imagine a thing made of rubber that's round but is made up of hundreds of little rubber tendrils emanating from a small rubber core. They range in size from a couple of inches to about six inches in diameter. I think they're supposed to be some kind of stress reliever.

The big trend nowadays is to take an arbitrary item and put a koosh ball around it. The worst example of this I've seen is the "Jar Jar Binks koosh ball". Ick.

They sound quite fun actually - I think I know what you're talking about - just never knew the name...

Can't stand those things. That's one of the reasons I stopped collecting them: you can't find any normal ones these days, just the stupid cartoon character ones.

Oh, but they did originate as toys, not stress relievers...the idea being that they're easier to catch than most throwing objects (great to juggle with) and don't hurt as much when they hit you.

The Koosh question I see has been answered; Magic: the Gathering is one of those trading card games traditionally supposed to be played by people with no social life, which of course is complete bull since you have to have people to play with and to trade with, and the game itself makes a great conversation starter.

Will I always collect things? I think it's quite possible; I always seem to find something to collect, and generally there isn't much reason except that a particular thing takes my fancy. I seem to remember this being true ever since I was little, so probably I really do enjoy collecting for collecting's sake. As long as I don't get too obsessive over anything...which I doubt I will since so far I've eventually grown tired of just about everything I've collected.

Does it happen accidentally, you ask, or are there reasons? That gets very complicated. I think it's a bit of both, depending on how you define those terms. Each individual collection starts sort of on a whim, but I always do have a reason--it's just that the reason is usually "because I happen to like X" or "because it would be nice to have a complete set of X" or usually some combination of the two. In other words, I don't have any serious reasons, but I do have reasons that have to do with my personal sense of aesthetics or whatever. If that makes any sense.

Makes sense to me. I have a strong tendency to collect all kinds of things, but I exert a conscious control over these urges long enough to think about the consequences (financial and storage related) and then make a decision as to whether collecting is feasible.

Lately, this has resulted in my collecting DVD's and Heavy Metal magazines. I rather impulsively started collecting Pokemon cards at one point but managed to stop myself before losing my mind over them.

But sometimes, it's _very_ hard to fight the urge. Very hard, indeed. There must be something primal about this.

Ok someone left a message asking me about my own collection so I will reply.

I started collecting Marvel comics when I was about 16 when a comic shop opened in the town where my mother worked. Like most Marvel fan I started with the X-men comics. Later (2 years to be precise) the owner of the shop approached me saying that someone had dropped off a set of around 60 X-factor comics and he was asking for £30 for them. I knew enough to know rhat the original X-factor line up was the 5 original X-men and so I was interested enough to buy the comics. Now, whilst I still keep up to dayte with X-men I do go to collectors fairs etc to find back issues of X-factor to complete my set.

I don't consider myself a mad collector of these, although I now own well over 100 X-factor titles and about 50 X-men ones, with a couple of Excalibur thrown in for good measure.

I hope this was the kind of information Fizzychick was after.

Yes, the financial concern is a serious one. That's why I usually stick to toys and stuff rather than actual "collectors' items." But it is hard to fight the urge when it comes to Magic cards. Fortunately I only collect certain cards, otherwise I'd be spending way too much money on them.

Another magic person. Whilst I do not play the game myself (I prefer Star Trek CCG) I know a lot of people who do.

It's odd; in high school I knew plenty of Magic players, but since starting college all I've met are ex-players. Very frustrating.