Laserdisc
April
29, 1999. Ken and I were leaving that evening out of
Newark on a flight to Tokyo. I guess the normal thing
to do would have been last minute packing or picking
up something to read on the plane. Well, I spent most
of the morning running around buying copies of the New
York Times since I was being featured in an article
in the Circuits section. You see, for the past couple
of years I had been a moderator of sorts on an internet
newsgroup - alt.video.laserdisc. My frequent postings
had somehow caught the eye of a reporter from the Times
and I was contacted to be interviewed and photographed
for an upcoming article. The article ran at what was
probably the high point in laserdisc popularity.
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It
all began back in the mid 80's when I bought my first video
projector. I had also bought a Pioneer 1030 Laserdisc player.
The first disc I bought was "Ferris Bueller's Day Off".
Back in those days home video was strange world. When a movie
was first released on videotape it was "priced for rental"
at about $100. Months or even years later it would be re-released
at a much lower price for purchase. Laserdisc never followed
that business model so all releases were for purchase. The
prices typically were $29.99 to $39.99. The pricing encouraged
collecting of titles, something that never really happened
in any big way with videotape.
Starting
with Ferris Bueller, I began to build a collection that would
culminate in the Times article. By the end, I was actually
buying discs by the caseload. It was one hell of a ride. The
variety of titles was absolutely amazing. Laserdisc introduced
concepts like box sets, running commentary and bonus footage.
Soon
my appetite for titles wasn't being satisfied by the "normal"
domestic releases. One day I casually learned that the old
"Thunderbirds" tv series was being released in Japan.
That was the beginning of the era of the blindingly expensive
Japanese box sets. Some of the sets ran as much as $1200 each.
Soon I was collecting the box sets. Then all of the available
Disney titles. Then I started adding television series. The
end of my laser collectiing was almost like a star exploding
into a supernova. Laser's end was brought on by the advent
of DVD. In its final months I was buying hundreds of titles
at a time. And then it was gone.
The
cool thing is that I can look through them all now and remember
the moment when I picked up a particular title. It was a wild
run while it lasted and I have so many great memories as well
as a terrific collection. I did clear out a lot of titles
in my early eBay days - duplicates and titles that I realized
I would never watch. I learned a lot from collecting Laserdisc
and have not gone as crazy with DVD.
On
the following pages are some of the highlights from my collection...
Click here to continue
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