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~Tiff
Hey Kids, I’m making the move to my OWN lovely new blog… Same goodies, same ramblings, but prettier and (as Jason put it) Where I have all the power in the world – cyberly speaking, of course – Mwuahahahahahaha.
So head on over, reset your bookmarks, and let me know what you think!
There aren’t a lot of video places in Prescott Valley… in fact I think there was one. Was being the operative word, since Hollywood Video was it’s name and now bankruptcy is its game. I walked in to the store today with every intention of renting myself something delightful (Census taking is over early folks, we were just too efficient!) and instead walked out with a fistful of reduced price movies.
You better know what you want to watch, because there's no shelf-strolling here
And I like the reduced price movies part… I’m just saddened that all PV will be left with for rentals now is the Red Box thing, which requires you to know what you want up front and be ready not to get it (they have a pretty limited selection- I mean, just how many DVD’s can you fit in a big red box?!). Gone are the days of aimlessly wandering down aisles of flicks… gone are those moments of hand-holding while you try to figure out which movie your date will make out with you to… Instead, it’s downloads, internet orders, and Redbox.
(sigh)
Where’s the fun in that?
And it got me thinking… thinking about the ways of money and how we build to excess… Hollywood Video obviously overextended itself. Blockbuster has been closing stores all over the place. I imagine when HV was trying to find someone to bail them out, the investors said something like this: “Video stores?! Haven’t you heard of Netflix? There’s no money in rental houses anymore. Get online, conquer Netflix, then we’ll talk.” Because it’s all about money. All these invisible people who sit around buying and selling stock… they’re the ones deciding our worth as consumers, home owners, and business-people.
And it sucks.
I’m not a business major, I’m not a money expert (obviously) – But in today’s economy, doesn’t it seem like we should be doing everything we can to hang on to our assets and stop handing portions of it over to traders in NY? Will we change our business practices at all? I mean, it’s a totally ridiculous proposition, but would we still be in the slump we are in if we hadn’t handed so much control over to these big business people in the first place? Those men up on the mountain top nickel and diming each other to death over the value of businesses sprinkled all over the world? Is this economic slump/depression really an opportunity for revolution?
Can we give up our abject fascination with getting everything as cheaply as possible?
Because that’s the other element to this… the “Who’s got the better deal” syndrome that has become an international plague. We aspire to build up our own wealth by spending less and less… driving for the lowest production rates, lowest consumer prices… until what’s left? Of course we’re broke and all shopping at Wal-Mart. We bought in and rode it to the ground… Them (the big money men) and Us (the cheap-skates making their job easier) Feeding off the same unhealthy cycle. How on earth do we break free?
I don’t know. I just cringe to think at how little control we have over things anymore, and how few people hold the purse strings… It seems to me, in a world as ever-expanding as ours, that there ought to be more balance.
There ought to be more video rental stores.
Awds And Ends 