Hi Everyone,
Everyone comes to CPC from different angles, for me it was my first ever computer and I have been a user of it (with some gaps here and there) until now. I have a large collection of games too because I also happen to collect them. When I was a kid, I had some original titles but of course piracy was big then - you can argue all angles, but honestly, if I had never pirated anything I would never have bought as much stuff as I did, both then as a student short on money and now as an adult with not as much money as I wished I had.
Part is nostalgia, but other parts of my collection are less-nostalgic. I want to make a wall like a computer shop wall with lots of games on it so i can see the awesome artwork and presentation of them.
A software that I have been developing for a bit is called Loot - it is for maintaining collections of things - Video Games, Computer Games, Movies etc. It supports lots of medias, lots of genres, and lots of platforms. You can enter them, it works fine on a PC with 4K monitor and of course a smart phone. It has audit flags so you can track your collection auditing (i.e. what is the condition?, does it have a battery?). You can chart things and so on.
I have of course used ebay now for close to 20 years (my gosh a long time) and all I can say is that it has never actually improved during that time. I am not trying to compete with ebay, but ebay doesn't provide what *I* want as a collector. I want to maintain my collection and easily sell or trade things without the hassles and (to me) huge listing expenses. I am tired of listing something on ebay for a period, only to have to list it again in future if it isn't the most popular item in the world - and waste another 3 to 5 minutes listing. In bulk I can streamline ebay listings down to a minute or two, but it is far from fun.
This is where Loot comes in. I can maintain my collection, i can keep it private - Users can even remain anonymous if they want to maintain their collection only - they can remain partially anonymous if they want to trade or sell 'in person' at a physical meet location - I can list an item for sale or trade (both the intent) within a few seconds! The data is already there in a consistent format, images can be attached. My goal was to make the system entirely free for those collecting to maintain their collections (families and individuals) but charge a fee for 'businesses' that might like to sell on the system.
Have I seen other similar types of products? You bet!!! I have found one I like actually, but... for me it isn't good enough - in fact it has a LOT to like, just there is nothing worst than not being able to add something that you have to your collection because they want you to choose from a pre-defined list!!!
Does such a system appeal to anyone here like the idea? Do you collect stuff that isn't listed here?
btw, does anyone here use or have used Alyssa in the past on the CPC?
https://cpcrulez.fr/applications_util-alyssa_ATK.htm
This is very interesting. I keep my collection on an Access db (good enough for such stuff).
One worry with a platform like this is, what happens with my data if it goes tits-up? Should I spend all this time typing in my collection data to see it disappear at some point?
I should check out Alyssa too :)
Btw, just a small note, in my collection db I also have a field for the box type - you know, jewel, double jewel, small/big carton etc...
I used access for years, one of Microsoft's best products I think.
I don't like web-based software that let's you lose your data - or ... not grab a copy and re-load it easily - so that feature is a must. Currently there is an import feature.
Likewise I don't like web-based software that vanishes when businesses / websites go broke or get bought or just close down - so as a minimum, I think the collectors version should be freely available indefinitely - for self hosting if that ever were to happen.
Box type is a good suggestion. If audited you can probably have it calculate how many in each condition too so you can know how many cracked jewel cases to buy for example.
I'd definitely find useful to have such tool running on my server (Raspberry Pi :D) so I can access it anywhere.
And being able to export/import the data is crucial. I could also backup the sql database if that's what the tool uses to store the data.
Another field I'm using: original release/rerelease/budget release.
But this leads to probably just allowing the user to define their own fields? Just saying, it's something I missed from Alyssa.