Regrets about switching to all digital/almost all digital?

[dsheinem]

I am increasingly tempted by the idea of going almost all digital in an attempt to downsize all of my various media collections (mostly CDs, games, and movies). I know we have a lot of old topics about starting to do this, but I thought I'd start a thread to see what people who have already done this (especially sometime over the past few years) have found after making the leap. Do you have regrets? Do you find that it has been harder to replace something than you thought? Did you find a comfortable middle ground between lots of physical items and no physical items? If so, how? Did you find doing this worked well with some media (e.g. music) but not others (e.g. games)?

If I were to do it, I'd probably try to hold on to just a few carts or discs that hold sentimental value or that can't be easily replaced (though eBay makes almost anything I'd want to reacquire attainable for a price). Likewise, I'd probably get rid of consoles that I can easily just rebuy if/when I want to spend some time playing with them. I am also unsure about, if I do it, how I'd want to handle keeping or selling the few complete sets I have (The 32X set, the 7800 set, the PS1 longbox set, etc.).

[ElkinFencer10]

I've gone all digital with my music and movies (except for the Resident Evil series and My Little Pony; I want them on my shelf), but I will remain as purely physical as possible with my gaming. With movies and music, I have those because I enjoy them repeatedly. With games, I have them for the collecting as much as I do for the actual playing, and a game's value declines DRAMATICALLY for me if I can't put it on my shelf.

[Blu]

Paging Noiseredux. I am also interested as well on people's thoughts on this topic. Subscribed.

I have a binder of DVD's that I haven't touched in several years. Rarely do I use my CD's anymore, my wife tends to help out with the Aux cord when we're driving on trips and listening to podcasts/music. I have all of my music burned onto a external hard drive with backups on a flash drive or two.

Games are really the only media that I have a significant mass of. I'm trying to cut down on that as well. I'm really tempted to dip out of what I have to shrink down to less than 200 physical games total, just to make the process of moving/inventorying that much simpler.

[Stark]

I've largely done this where I can. It's just way too convenient not to. Movies, games, television (gone to streaming only, kind of relevant), and music.

Movies - I rarely watch a movie more than once, so why was I buying them? It was mostly the kids movies that get watched over and over. And then I found sites like http://ultravioletcinema.com where you can often get movies digitally when they come out for less than renting them. Now I mostly buy there or wait until it comes to Netflix or another streaming outlet.

Games - Again a thing where the reason to buy physical is that you can possibly recoup some of your purchase, by selling it to the next guy. Well, I was rarely doing that anyway, so why not purchase it digitally for cheaper? It's also way too convenient to jump around from game to game when it is digital.

Television - Televised sports is usually what I miss out on, but even then it is sometimes available streaming from a PC. I have a PC hooked up to my TV so that mitigates some of the issues. Otherwise a sub to Hulu gets you most regular TV shows.

Music - I rarely buy music at all, but if I do it is on a digital medium that I can put on my phone or a usb drive for the car. This one doesn't seem to have that much of a discount for going digital, but it is convenient for me to have em digital.

[marurun]

I prefer to buy CDs for music, since they can often be cheaper, especially when purchased used, that the digital alternatives. Then I can rip them to MP3 using my own preferred settings, meaning I control the compromise between quality and space. And then I can tuck the CDs away into storage, keeping them as a backup in case something critical in my digital system fails.

The only area I've gone digital without recourse is Steam. Steam is just too tempting, with too many sales. But I also haven't played even half of what I've bought.

[travis_stywall]

With my movies and games, I'm purely physical. I just like to see what I have on the shelf just to remember that I have good taste. However, with music, I've gone digital. Sure, I have a couple of CDs around the house and some vinyl on the wall (just for the art), but my car and laptop don't even have CD drives anymore.

[ElkinFencer10]

My car and laptop don't even have CD drives anymore.

My car still has one, but it rarely gets used. It only gets used in times like now where I get some CDs cheap used (got 3 of Disturbed's albums and one of Slipknot's) but am too busy to put them on the flash drive I keep plugged into my car's USB port.

[fastbilly1]

I swapped to primarily digital music over a decade ago, never looked back. I have been given CDs, or found one second hand since then, but any new music is bought digital or on vinyl with a digital version. Other than the Witcher 3 soundtrack I was given in April, the last CD I had in my car was Blues Traveler's four. Which had been in the drive for over a year.

PC games are now 95% GOG, Steam, Humble/Internet Archive, 5% physical (mostly indies with no digital release, though even those are scarce now).

Movies I still buy hard copies, since those that I buy I often watch films multiple times.

I do have my music collection backed up on a local portable harddrive and a remote one (out of state). I will likely be doing this with GOG and rare Digital Only Movies aswell, since harddrive prices have dropped again.

[J T]

I visited Bruce Lee and Brandon Lee's graves a couple of years ago, since they are buried nearby. Brandon Lee's tombstone has a passage written on it that I think of all the time. Here's a picture of it behind the spoiler tags

Relating this to game collecting, how many more times will you actually play any particular game/CD/movie in your collection? Do you really need to own everything you are interested in? I ask this because when you collect physical, you have physical space limits to what you can keep so you keep only what you most cherish and use, but when you collect digital, it's always just another hard drive to add even more. This limitlessness of digital collecting is both a blessing and a curse. If you want something, you can always add it, but the more files you put into a folder, the less meaningful each file seems to become. Especially when you add a bunch of cheap/free stuff in there and then you have to shovel through all the shovelware to find your good games.

My movies are entirely DVD, my music is roughly 50% CD and 50% digital, and the majority of my games are digital. My game collecting is the most out of hand, as anyone knows who has taken a look at my steam library. I additionally have a substantial gog library, mounds of freeware, and a whole lot of retro roms. My point in all this is, as I slowly realize what it is myself, is that I am much more proud of my physical collections than my digital collections. I'm actually slightly embarassed about my glut of digital titles. My shelves are a thing of glory, but my harddrives make you feel like you're watching an episode of Hoarders, only it's all digital.

The starkest contrast can be seen when you compare my CD shelves to my Google Play Music account. My CD collection is full of only things I love: Miles Davis, David Bowie, Nine Inch Nails, Aphex Twin, etc. My Play Music account is entirely free music from promos, and maybe a few $1 albums, so it is full of things I got curious enough to take for a possible future listen, but usually know I won't like them much: Ariane Grande, Blake Shelton, Linkin Park, Imagine Dragons, etc. Blech!

In Steam, that stuff's all mashed together in a giant game wad. I have so many awful bullshit titles from bundle deals mixed in with classics and gems. My digital library is ugly. It looks like a clearance bin. Actually, it looks more like one hundred clearance bins all thrown together.

When I'm playing a game though, I don't really feel the difference between physical and digital. I get lost in the world and enjoy myself either way. I will say that my experience of music is different. With a CD, I'm not going to bounce around. I listen to albums from start to finish, and maybe skip a track if I really dislike it. With MP3s I do that too, though, I'm more likely to shuffle, bounce around artists, etc. Not really a bad thing, but the medium changes how I listen.

One thing I like about physical anything, is that I just put it in and play. I'm not interrupted by a virus check, I'm not fiddling with a scroll bar or wheel, I'm not hiccuping on a streaming glitch, etc.

I should also add that I do somewhat regret my digital purchases that were not DRM-Free. DRM games like those on Steam are licenses, not games you own and store yourself. They are tied to a service and that service can end your collection entirely.

That being said, I feel fortunate for all the things I have and any "regrets" are really just first world problems, not real problems. I'm mostly just prattling on about perceived differences between digital and physical collecting. Carry on.

[Tanooki]

I don't regret it because I mostly haven't. On the stuff that I have though I do regret it some because I've had some problems and they're not uncommon which I think should be a bit of a wake up.

The latest was all Nintendo's fault. I found at a garage sale an impecible 3DS XL and wanted to keep it, Nintendo's system wouldn't allow me to carry my stuff from 3DS to 3DS because it was older (WTF?) I had to call them, talk with the woman who felt bad about it. She eventually agreed to escalate a case but said that it's up to them and them alone if they'd do it or not. Ultimately they did, and I sold the New3DSXL I had to a member here. The thing is, why should I have to qualify what console or handheld I have to keep what I paid for and have access to it?! I get it if you're going from Wii to WiiU or something incompatible, but between 3DS models is garbage.

And then the classic one anyone has suffered in some form. You buy a game, you lose access to game, you just lost your money. Did your system die and it was account bound (cough Nintendo?) How about licensing slap fights where a game gets removed from the company storage so if you reinstall it's gone? How about accidentally (or not) violating some TOS or perceived so, and a company just erases your stuff in spite due to the rules...they just erased your money. There's lots of reasons which all tie back to owning something, then having it stolen out from under you for whatever reason because it's not a physical object. Another would be on the side, not allowing multiple installs so you want to take a game to a friends house to play, too bad.

Other than that and giving companies total control to never lower the price being a monopoly of sorts while also not allowing returns of a game you hate for a refund sets up another interesting trap. I know Android (google play) allows returns for X hours or days if you hate it, this should be required anywhere.