Record collecting versus hoarding

Not interested in moving my spreadsheet to discogs. Right to privacy and all that.

If I ever sell any, it's mostly just bringing to my local record store, and sold one or two on eBay. I am registered on discogs just so I can get market value of records I look to buy.

BTW, 98% of my records are bought new, so I don't have a RCM. I don't agree with those who say you have to clean them right out of the factory. I brush them to remove dust before every playing. A long time ago I was told by a well known respected dealer in my formative years that if a record is clean, don't wet it. That's when I stopped using my Discwasher brush and fluid (remember those?) and went to the Audioquest and Hunt style brushes.

To test my theory, I took a few records to a dealer who had a RCM (I think it was a VPI) and brought a few of my oldest frequently played audiophile records and played them before and after cleaning and didn't notice a difference. Nor did the dealer trying to sell me the machine. He admitted it was mainly for all the people who buy used records below NM out there.

Humans treasure stimulus variation. We get bored with the same anything after a very short period. We also instinctively are drawn to music. These two factors result in large record collections. He who dies with the most records wins. Collecting is hording. So what? I should be ashamed because I have enough records to feed an orphanage for a year?  I already pay taxes. I trust my government to put it to good use. ( This is where we all vomit.) 

Seriously, records and music are a way of measuring time and history, in some ways better than photographs. Nobody I know has a photograph of the first time they had sexual intercourse but I sure do remember what was playing at the time and my mind will do the rest. I have an audio record of all the important times of my life. Is this hording or collecting? I could give a rat's -ss

Dust & Grooves neglected to contact me… their loss. Though I do not live in a tent in my back yard (yet), and I am having fun. So, how many records do I own? Many, my listening room walls are lined with them. And could not care less what other folks may define that as, or what their logic of collecting should look like. I imagine though, I would consider someone like me a collector. I would call myself a vinylphile. My collection started with a very few select jazz records that were in my dad’s collection. Possessing a library of sorts is a wonderful pass time and I feel so grateful and fortunate to have what I doing . In it, there are a number of records waiting for a rainy day, to be pulled down and enjoyed as a (new) listen, at our leisure. I love to compare pressings of favored recordings and most of all, sharing these performances is the best! I also sell and trade which is rewarding. Once read in an audio magazine, perhaps Audio, a comment that suggested that if you didn’t have invested 10x in media what you have invested in your kit, you are not a music lover but, a gearhead. I have always felt that that had some validity to it and showed where your priorities were. Mine are with the music over constant gear acquisitions and tweaking.

Happy Listening

I guess @mijostyn goes against @mitchagain’s  theory of big collections being owned by lo-fi systems…..

Define "big collection".