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that might degrade them, by always keeping them concealed and never removing
them from their special plastic protection.
By such practices, collectors redefine use values, rather than obliterate them.
Collecting practices express and assign different kinds of use values to things.
Affective and symbolic values are also use values, only of a different subtype to the
kinds of communication for which media commodities are normally intended. Status
value is another use value that may be added to the mediating and affective values. A
vast, unique or beautiful collection may give its owner prestige or even honour, and
consequently may also be used with that in mind by him or her. Nevertheless, the
status value of items in a collection probably contributes to the quite common
outlook on collecting practices as being non-utilitarian or even pointless. The redef-
inition of a tangible thing into a collectible one, normally also affects its exchange
value. With stamps as an historical example, some things may accumulate consider-
ably higher economic value when they become collectibles than they did when they
were merely considered as mundane but useful, even beautiful objects.
In the same way as collecting gives a special character to the selection, acquisition
and use of an object, the disposal of collected items is treated with care and is often
experienced as loaded with strong feelings or anguish by collectors. This is often
revealed when record or video collections are put up for sale on the Internet, as in the
following case:

Personal Record Collection Clearance
(and a few music videos)

Genuine reason for sale not commercial.
Due to a change of lifestyle and an extreme shortage of storage space,
the time has come to part with my beloved ‘Record Collection’.
Collecting records has been a hobby of mine for many years and the
thought of taking these along to a car boot sale just didn’t seem right!
So I am offering them here on the Internet in the hope
that they can find a trusted home. 25
Collecting or saving objects, in whatever form it takes, thus disturbs the ordinary
chain of consumption. As Benjamin points out, a collector’s care of things seems
‘archaic’ nowadays and in many ways stands in opposition to the easy come easy go
mentality that is often attributed to contemporary consumerism. 26 As our examples
reveal, collectors unwillingly part with their collections and mere economic profit is
seldom the reason to do so. In the case of the personal photographs or postcards
collection, it is questionable whether it would carry any economic value on the open
market, unless the collector is a famous person. As a specific type of consuming,
collecting thus also transgresses the borders of what is ordinarily considered as
consumption. 27 In some cases collecting even serves as a way to withdraw certain
objects from the consumption market by, for example, transforming them into