Every year I do an end-of-year cleanup of my stuff. (I try to at least) Somehow there always seem to be so many CDs/DVDs/books/comics to sort up and shelf or sleeve or whatnot. I’m growing tired of it all.
The other day I was planning to backup everything on my computer to DVD when I realized I was just adding more to the pile. I’m not sure if there’s any important reason to backup all the episodes I’ve been watching to DVD when I’ve already watched them all. Of course the argument can be made that it makes it easier to lend out to people, but truth be told there are a lot of people I know who already have such copies so my keeping backups is just redundant. And it’s not like the world would end if someone wasn’t able to borrow the last season of Heroes off me.
I’m especially wary now about committing stuff to optical media; going through all the discs I had I encountered quite a few that were already beyond recovery. I’m considering reburning some of the older stuff from CDs to DVDs, both to conserve space and to make sure I can still access those old files later on. But I’m unsure now how to dispose of the stack of dead CD in an environment-friendly manner.
So, am I too much of a packrat? I dunno, like I said I know people who have loads more stuff on CDs/DVDs than I do, and they’ve never watched them all. At least I’ve managed to consume at least 90% of the stuff I archive. I guess it’s a geek thing, to want to have access to “historical data” and stuff. Organizing all of it is probably a geek thing too. Heck, I’m trying to think of a way to have everything be searchable.
I’m considering buying something like a 250 GB external and just using that as a backup. Eventually it would run out, but by then something like 1 TB drives might be common enough. Tempting…
You're probably too much of a packrat. And you don't need to compare yourself to people you know. What's important is if you need those videos, and from what you said I'm guessing you don't. Don't backup those videos unless they're very rare or your favorite of all time.
There are a couple people I know who back everything up, and sometimes I borrow from them. A lot of other people borrow from them too. I think we only need a few them. If you're not the go-to-guy for these things, don't backup.
You might even find it refreshing if you throw all those CD's away. Sometimes it's good not to have these attachments.
…or maybe you're just not geeky enough. :p
Or maybe it's a boy scout thing. You always need to be prepared to whip out half a season of Heroes on demand.
I probably will dispose of most of them. I'm keeping the Simpsons ones though.
"Spider-pig, Spider-pig, does whatever a spider-pig can…"