The Importance of Real Things

What's also crazy is recently a librarian came across my Tiktok FYP and explained how libraries pay for their copies of books and digital media. They typically pay higher prices for a permanent physical book but it's on their shelf and can be loaned out infinitely. Whereas the digital copies of books cost libraries more by doing pay per check out and have to be renewed constantly with the publisher. The push to digital media has harmed the library more than even our individual wallets. I have come to understand that digital media is almost always predatory.

Ted’s mom here! Thank you to everyone watching, and for your thoughtful and kind engagement! I’ve known for a long time how talented Ted is :) but it is nice to hear from so many others. Stay real.

i sort of relish this era of YouTube where amazing stories are being told in the deep recesses of a platform dominated by attention-grabbing, repetitive slop. this video is fantastic, your skill and passion is apparent, and this video matters in a tangible way even though its reach is still limited. please keep making videos, I can't wait to see what's next.

I am sincerely one mental breakdown away from just printing all the pictures I care about and keeping a physical photo album and (metaphorically) chucking my phone into a river. I started a little CD collection as a very young teen so I could play One Direction in my mom's car and a couple years ago I just decided to start growing it again, I have bought most of it second-hand and it is my pride and joy. It also completely changed how I listen to music. Sure, individual songs stand as complete works by themselves but when I play a full album from start to finish in the order it was devised by the artists behind it I feel like I am almost paying it respect by listening with intentionality and appreciation for the whole thing. Plus all the cracks and scratches on my CD cases will be a testament to my love of the music far superior to a Spotify wrapped. And the same goes for my books! My love will outlive me in all those bent spines.

I am now validated in my book buying. Kidding but my parents never understood why I would buy so many books, movies, and cd's. They would always say, "Why are you buying the books your not going to read them." Or "Those movies are on streaming services, why are you buying them." To me it is the feeling of owning something physical and being able to call it yours. So watching your video has basically been what my heart has been saying this whole time. So thank you for that Ted. Great Video and sick typewriter, makes me want to break mine out and do some writing.

this part. I hate how art has become this curated, algorithm-based content thrown at us. no longer are we walking through a record store, talking to the clerk about what vinyl calls to us, but instead we are thrown a mumbled, algorithm-created playlist that requires no actual thoughtfulness. you hit the nail on the head here, great video.

In my opinion, libraries, music streaming services, and online databases are incredible tools for discovery and exploration, as well as for things I know I'm only going to consume once. For example, I don't need to own a physical copy of every textbook and academic source that I need to read for university classes. However, with media that I will return to over and over, I want the security of a physical copy. I love the fact that I have solid, physical ownership of C.S. Lewis's books, and CCR's greatest hits, and all Shakespeare's plays, and prints of the great Renaissance artworks. Basically, we should do our best to make sure that if the grid goes down, we'll still have the media that makes life worthwhile.

ironically, im extremely happy the algorithm brought me this video. awesome work, i loved every minute.

One of the best dates I went on was going to a bookstore and we literally just browsed and showed eachother our favorite fiction books, the genres we liked, the stories still being printed, then back to their place to look at their bookcase and they excitedly showed me all their grandmothers books they still had, and others no longer in print, and i would spot a title I'd read as a teen that I'd forgotten about and got so excited, and then told them about how we had a first copy of the Hobbit at my mother's house, and all these sketchbooks and photo albums, and vinyl covers and handwritten recipe books. Having a book is having a time capsule to someone's heart and brain, holding their idea in your hand not just of the author but of the person who loved it enough to keep it and move it house to house, and annotate the edge and recommend it to a yound relative who recently got obsessed with reading sci fi. Books are one of the most important things we as a species create, and that includes Chuck Tingle and all the other crap out there haha

the little inside joke was brilliant actually

Little anecdote here: I study Fine Arts in my country (Uruguay) and a little activity we had last week was bringing five objects that we deemed important for us and explain to the class why we brought these things. It was so inspiring to see how mere things can have so much importance to someone and "owning" something sometimes isn't just a property thing, it holds a lot of emotional value and speaks about your life, the life of other people and humanity on itself. We been doing this since old times, keeping stuff for luck, for good fortune...to remember parts of our life. Humanity can suck hard sometimes but this kind of emotional responses are what keeps me engaged to watch how life unfolds

I appreciate that for a good portion of this video, there is no music, it doesn't force an emotion on the watcher. Instead, you get to focus on what is being said substantially, and it allows space for actual reflection and assimilation. Pretty dope! I wish more people realise this and adapt a similar style when the topic they're sharing requires some reflection :)) The video is fantastic btw, the topic and the flow of it is great. Made me reflect on a lot of things!

I always love when artists I like make illustration books. Since I never see their work other than on the internet, buying their physical books allow me to see their art indefinitely, no matter whether the artists drop off the internet forever or not. Any artist can delete their account(s) and never post their art ever again, for any reason at any time. I work in retail, and I've become low-key friends with a few coworkers. Eventually they're fired or leave, and I never see them again. I know it's so normal! I try to not take for granted the art I love seeing on the internet, as well as the connections I make with people. I try to own at least a little bit of my favorite art books, and stay in contact with the few people I like the most. One of my coworkers currently holds the 4th volume of Witch Hat Atelier, a manga I collect. He keeps forgetting to give it back to me lmao. If he's fired tomorrow, maybe I won't see my book again. I'll be mad, but at least I knew the risk when I lent it to him. Even when I own physical books, I know it'll never be 100% permanent ownership. Nice video! :)

A few years ago I decided to stop getting spotify and start spending that $10 on a CD every month. I ended up spending some extra because CDs are by and large a bit more expensive than a spotify membership but it's been worth it to own the music I really love. (Plus I've loved being able to get my little dinky MP3 player out and listen to music while working without having the distraction of an entire smartphone in the palm of my hand.)

The internet is the largest collection of knowledge man has ever made. It's also the most easily accessible, therefore it has no value beyond the instant you need it, and people freely treat art the same way

The desire to create as a human being is something that you cannot get rid of. To be remembered, even by a piece of paper or by being a blip in the digital media. This inspired me to keep working for my book. Thank you for this.

I have memory issues and struggle to keep track of my favorite art and media. Having physical copies of movies, albums, books and even posters helps me feel well versed in the world and in my own brain. I keep my CD collection in my childhood dollhouse, and my vinyls in a shelf my grandma painted for me. And as someone who also has trouble making decisions, having what I know I like laid out before me makes thinking and choosing much easier and less stressful - it’s so easy to pick a DVD movie than it is to scroll on a streaming service for forever. Want something new to watch? Go to a thrift store or Walmart and find a random movie. Even better? Closing your eyes and picking a random movie/CD, one of my favorite things to do with friends.

Piracy is owning. Buy a couple of 6TB hard disks and torrent everything. If a movie isn’t that important to you you can manage with a ~2.5GB file, otherwise a BluRay dump is like 20GB. Ebooks are a few megs, no PC game worth playing is more than 40 gigs, and up to 6th gen included is like 10gigs (besides, you’re not gonna play PS3 games, are you?). A whole album in FLAC is half a gig. And most importantly, don’t people know that CDs, DVDs, game cartdridges, basically any physical support past VHS is digital? CDs are not magical, they’re optical support and if they’re pushing 40+ years you gotta watch for disk rot.

This video made me want to not journal or scrapbook digitally anymore, I love the convinience and endless amount of free layouts and templates available to write about my day or layout my month or week and the hundreds of stickers I can download to decorate them and put in photos from my camera roll seamlessly but I never really feel like it’s mine and if they decide to put a paywall or a subscription I can’t afford on it it’s not mine. Not that there’s anything wrong with digital journaling as a whole but now I’ll be using a cute pink notebook I was scared to write in because it’s too pretty but now I’ll be putting it to use. I also want to get into collecting vinyls even more now once I save up!

We don't need to own books, but we also shouldn't not-own media from big corporations; instead we should realise that it's literally the same to not-own things from libraries but way cheaper and more social. Like literally Amazon and Netflix just reinvented libraries but in capitalist. (also I love the inside hommage with the top-down lying on the floor sad boy techno-depressed shot)