please see embedded comments below. Dick -----Original Message----- From: Tony Duell <ard(a)p850ug1.demon.co.uk> To: Discussion re-collecting of classic computers <classiccmp(a)u.washington.edu> Date: Tuesday, June 29, 1999 11:14 AM Subject: Re: Article about collecting in Antique Trader. later. That's true, but it applies particularly to money because that's why we have it. Even money involves a little speculation. In general, however, the value of money varies very little with fads or changing tastes, and relatively little over time, at least a lifetime. The value of most "collectible" computers is not generally higher than the money it took to buy them when they were new. In fact, I've observed that even the more famous collectible computer stuff sold on the eBay auction doesn't go for more than it cost new. . . . as it does to all other durable goods. If you think an eBay IMSAI computer is unreachable now, consider what it cost in "real" money, back in the days when it was on the market, which was back when a dollar was a DOLLAR and not just the price of a candy bar. As for why the Alto costs less than the Lisa, consider how many people have the knowledge and resources to do anything anything even remotely useful, to an average person, i.e. something other than creating software or meaninless calculations. It's not really easy to get software to make the Lisa do anything useful, either, but it's probably billons of times easier (forgive the weak attempt to quantify something unquantifiable) than for the Alto. The difference is between showing off what a LISA is known (to a small but significant few) to be able to do (I even made overhead slides with one, having hooked it to a laser printer myself), and just going in the back room and saying OOh! and AAh! at the computer the capabilities of which are certainly unfamiliar to me.