What is your "inexpensive" hobby that turned out to be expensive/ you gradually invested lots of money into?
Edit: so it turns out that every hobby can be expensive if you do it long enough.
Also I love how you talk about your hobby as some addicts.
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Vinyl records... 25 years ago you could hardly buy them . I listen to punk and they never gave up on the format and so it was cheap and collectible because print runs were small.. from 2010 onwards, they came back in fashion and the major labels started clogging up the pressing plants and then pre-orders became a thing and the price started creeping up...now, in my country a vinyl that used to be $20 is now pushing $55 and mainstream artists are pushing $70 ...my desire has really waned.. I'm priced out of finding new artists because I can't buy everything all the time like I used to.
Speaking of which, DJing too.
You start off with just your computer and a free copy of Virtual DJ Home; next thing you know you're spending $1300 on just a single turntable, and as we know you need at least two, plus a mixer, plus the $400 software needed to run it all.
Or you could go the vinyl route as a DJ and end up spending $70 on a single record as you've stated. Either way, you're spending thousands.
I can appreciate the appeal of physical copies, but if it's hindering your enjoyment then why not just listen to digital copies? The vinyl records are probably being scribed from a digital version, anyway.
Not OP, but I generally do listen to most of my music via streaming these days but it sucks: it's not immersive, sound quality is garbage and I miss the ritual of examining the art and liner notes while listening. When you listen to an LP you're more invested in it because you paid for it and also because you're in proximity to the record being payed and you're physically interacting with it. you end up listening to the songs in the context and sequence that they're supposed to be listened to.
I know that a lot of this is intangible, but there is value in it
I have 1500 LPs from my collecting days but have bought only a handful of records in the last few years for this reason. Last time I mail ordered 2 LPs it came to $75.
LPs were $8 when I first started collecting
jesus christ, where are you living? 70USD for an LP???
$70 Australian.. which is still like $40usd on a good day
aaaaaaah thank you.
thats dicked up. although I'm in the same boat as you, but in Ireland. If can get my hands on an LP for less than 25 its a fuckin miracle