"The things you own, they end up owning you." -- Tyler Durden in Fight Club

What makes people collect things?

I feel like I should know the answer inherently because I have, at one time or another, collected all kinds of things. There were toys at first, mostly Transformers but also G.I. Joe and the like. I didn't just play with the ones I had, I always wanted to get more. In fact, when my friends and I would play with one another, if there was a character we didn't have we would actually build a proxy version out of Construx. I can't say what motivated us to keep expanding and expanding our rosters. It's not like we could ever possibly play with all of the toys we had, but somehow more toys equaled more fun in our young minds.

It wasn't long before I moved on to video games. My parents were passively accepting of my video game habits without actually aiding me in my efforts to buy games. Aside from an initial compromise from my mother who agreed to pay for half of an NES if I achieved a certain amount in the sixth grade, I was always on my own for purchasing new software or hardware. I found it surprisingly easy to meet my goals by saving my allowance, money from my paper route or whatever other funds I happened to come across.

Once I bought a game I played it as much as I could. Even if the game wasn't good (Anticipation, anyone?), I always kept at it for a long while before moving on. When a game was "done" (a state which varied from game to game) I just put it aside and thought about what might be next. Certain games were never "done" while others were occasionally resurrected when I learned something new about them or when a friend came over and had never played it before.

It was years before I even considered selling old games to make way for new ones; eventually that became my modus operandi. I was in a near-constant state of flux, selling and buying, trading things for store credit then immediately cashing out. Since the process was never a one-for-one deal, my collecting days were over as I began playing more and more titles. As the console competition began to increase, I actually sold entire systems in order to buy new ones. Maybe it was commercial peer pressure that drove me to cannibalize my collection so that I could keep buying newer/faster/bigger games and systems, or maybe I simply realized that holding onto games I didn't play was meaningless.

Then again, perhaps I just substituted one collection for another. As my stockpile of games and paraphernalia decreased, I started spending more money on movies. At first it was VHS tapes, but I became one of the "early adopters" of the DVD format. My interest in movies was nothing new, as I had always been nuts about going out to see new films in theaters and I was the major catalyst in our family's video rental membership, but it wasn't until high school or so that I really started buying a lot of movies and keeping them in a closet. Part of it had to do with my new-found interest in foreign films and anime, few of which were even available for rent in our local store, but I owned plenty of mainstream Hollywood films as well. My collection certainly wasn't just for show - I actively watched and re-watched everything when I had time, and I took great pleasure in loaning or showing new things to my friends. At my urge's strongest point, I honestly had a "buy first" rather than "rent first" attitude. Sometimes this led to pleasant surprises (Unbreakable is still my favorite M. Night Shyamalan film) while other times it led to extreme disappointment (insert random kung-fu flick here, especially since they often cost double or triple a domestic film).

Things got really ugly when collecting became a means to an end. Owning more toys, games or films doesn't enhance your ability to enjoy them - it just means you have more stuff. When I discovered Magic: The Gathering, that was not the case. Buying more Magic cards gave me more options for playing the game and the constant introduction of new cards, combined with the power of rare-by-design cards, drove me to spend thousands of dollars on the game when I rarely earned more than a hundred in a week's paycheck. Once I started working at the post office and earning a real salary, I spent even more. The game was, and still is, tremendously fun. I cannot deny enjoying those late-night sessions I spent facing off against my friends using our various decks of cards. However, the collection aspect of the game demanded too much of me. Not only was I spending money on new packs of cards in the hopes of finding rare cards, I was buying individual cards to strengthen the decks I already had.

As my collection grew I needed to spend money (and goodness knows how many hours) on binders, boxes and folders just to keep all the cards in order. Then came the magazines and buying guides that both showed me what cards might be useful to me and how much my current cards were worth. I spent less time playing Magic: The Gathering and more time just Gathering my Magic. Looking back it was a kind of sexy nightmare; a gilded cage I built for myself, loving every minute of it even as I poured money out the window. When the time came to shed my massive collection, the whole thing netted me $300 - surely less than a tenth of what I had spent.

So what now? All my collections from the past have been scattered to the wind and now sit in at least three separate locations, sitting in someone's closet or basement thousands of miles away. I no longer buy any toys or movies (at least, not since dropping 9000 Yen on that Japanese copy of Grindhouse *_*) and while my video game buying habits are still strong, you could hardly describe my handful of titles a "collection." Have I gone cold turkey? Am I just one new obsession away from succumbing to the cry of the collector?

At this point I believe my collection needs are being met virtually-speaking, thanks to the PlayStation 3's trophy system. They are the perfect collectible, honestly. They have no mass and cost no money. There are no "limited editions" or artificial scarcity. I will never need to re-acquire an old trophy or replace one with a newer version. They cannot be broken or stolen. All I can do is earn them by playing video games which is a hobby I already practice. Best of all, they have no use whatsoever. I am free at last.

This post originally appeared on my blog but after both the latest episodes of the Bitmob podcast and the Pixel Revolt podcast brought up collecting, I thought I'd share it with the community. For the latest updates in my work, please view my Twitter feed @feitclub