Rob Jarrat wrote:
If there were no interest in things that pre-dated our
own lifetimes then
there would not be any museums.
Of course, but that wasn't my point. My point
is that I observe there
to be, in general, LESS interest in collecting items that predate our
own existence. For example, I know many more people who own classic
cars like Mustangs simply because they always wanted one while growing
up, or maybe had one... than those collectors who own Ford Model Ts.
You could make the argument that Mustangs are more readily available,
but that wouldn't be true. It's just that few if any those Mustang
owners have any interest in Model T's for any number of valid
reasons. So, I'm drawing a distinction between personal nostalgia and
emotional response, vs. collecting purely for historical enjoyment or
purposes.
Rob Jarrat wrote:
The peculiar problem faced by computer
history is perhaps the frenetic pace of computer development, which has
meant that historically interesting computers are not generally recognised
as such because they are still relatively recent and become obsolete so
quickly that they are discarded far too readily.
Excellent point. Which leads to
wonder if only the early computers --
when development moved slower and there were far fewer models in
existence -- will remain the collectible ones. I don't see any
computers in most of the 90's, and none at all from 2000 onwards that
I'd ever want to collect. Wonder how others feel? Will a Dell PC
ever be collectible? Are Apples the only ones that might stand a
chance? Are all computers now merely appliances with zero personality?
John Singleton