I’ve always enjoyed owning physical media. Ever since I was a kid, there was something satisfying and fulfilling about buying a brand new DVD or Videogame, taking it home, tearing off that plastic, opening the case and getting a big ol’ whiff of factory sealed media.
But my unhealthy obsession began around 2011, when I brought my first Blu-Ray movie. A copy of David Fincher’s Se7en (the perfect movie for any 12 year old). Ever since then, I’ve used buying and collecting Blu-rays to fill the unfillable void. It eventually grew into other forms of Physical media, first starting off with graphic novels, then moving into books, then manga, and more recently vinyl’s.
I’ve always wondered why me and so many others are like this. Spending stupid amounts of money consoooming all the physical media we can get our hands on. Especially in the day and age of streaming and downloading platforms such as Netflix, Spotify, Kindle, Steam and many others. So when asked to propose a research topic for class BCM212, I straight away gravitated toward this as a topic. Understanding why people still buy physical media in the day and age of streaming and downloading. I believe that this research question is timely and relevant as in my own personal experience, I spend more money on physical media than I do anything else. I want to understand why I and others do this and I believe asking myself and others this question will help why we choose to still buy and advocate for physical media when we could just stick to online services. I think another aspect I could bring into my research would be the current pandemic. During the pandemic I’ve spent more money on physical media than I did before it, when I could have just viewed, listened to or read all of this media online. Now I still spent a lot of money on physical media before Covid-19, but I want to take this into account when researching as well.
Here are a few articles I’ve read that talks about this topic and that I think is relevant to why this is something worth looking into.
https://www.gamesradar.com/au/Is-it-just-me-or-has-the-death-of-physical-media-been-exaggerated/
In these articles and videos these people talk about the decline of sales for physical media due to streaming and downloading sites. One article talked about the sales decline of Blurays and DVDs from 2014-2018 which was 48%. This drop in sales seem like a major deal but they also bring up the point of the rise of die-hard film nerds actively searching and purchasing restorations of older movies that aren’t looked at by major streaming sites. These indie distributors include Arrow Films, BFI, Curzon, and Criterion. These avid films fans (myself included) aren’t looking for the latest release on streaming sites, but are instead turning towards these restoration companies for films. This is just some of the research I’ve looked into for movies and there’s obviously a lot more to look into, not only in movies but vinyls, videogames, books and comics.
So what would my research include? Well first of online research in the form of articles like the ones above, academic sources, and Youtube videos. I’d also conduct research into UOW students through the #BCM212 tag on twitter and set up polls through either the twitter polls or a site like strawpoll, and ask students:
- Is physical media something you support and buy?
- What physical media do you buy?
- Why do you buy physical media?
- Do you prefer to own Physical media or use streaming/downloading services?
Research can also extend to other places online such as Facebook groups like ‘The Kinoplex’ or Reddit threads. I also want to incorporate researching family and friends on their opinions and beliefs. And finally looking more introspectively at myself and why I choose to buy and support physical media.
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