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The lost civic life of movie rental stores

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Re: The lost civic life of movie rental stores

#231

Post by ghaff »

AngryData wrote: post #157
xp84 wrote: post #102

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yeah, I've reversed course on both those things now. I literally just tell my spouse, "I think tonight at 8 I'm going to go see Project Hail Mary" since I'm the only one interested in that kind of movie. And dine wherever I want when I'm alone. I think it was a lot harder when I was 18 because I saw being alone as a reflection on my worth as a person.

I always recommend people to go to a theater themselves, it is really an enjoyable time. Some people act like you are crazy when they hear about it, but everybody already watches tv shows or movies by themselves.

I'd probably do it more if it were a convenient walk down the street but the nearest decent movie theater is probably an hour round-trip between driving and parking. The setup I have at home is good enough and I have access to more than enough media even if not always the latest and greatest.

Re: The lost civic life of movie rental stores

#232

Post by jzebedee »

cyanregiment wrote: post #197
chrisco255 wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even in 1982 you could mail a letter from your house, order shoes from a catalog, and order delivery food to your house. Admittedly, your choices were basically pizza, subs or Chinese for that type of delivery, but still, DoorDash mostly competes with cooking at home not with going out to restaurants (in fact, it has become more common to dine out than it was in 1982). I do lament the decline of brick-and-mortar reta…

> your choices were basically pizza, subs or Chinese Subs blew my mind because for almost all my childhood it was only pizza and Chinese. I was at a friend's house and they got them for the whole family, couldn't believe it. Then in cities, at first, it was like any ethnic food. Then that crazy bastard started taking photos of people's menus.

> Then that crazy bastard started taking photos of people's menus.

I don't get the reference. Is this a startup origin story?

Re: The lost civic life of movie rental stores

#233

Post by donatj »

There is a space in my town that has sat empty for many years now. Well over a decade. It used to be a video rental place. I don't know if anything's been in there since.

I've kind of half joked with my wife about the idea of opening a modern video rental place there. We both lament the loss of a place or you could go and chit chat about movies.

The common refrain is "no one even owns DVD players anymore" to which I say "we'd rent them out too, for a couple dollars a night". I'm sure if I went around garage sales one weekend I could get a stack of them.

My wife's idea is to have a number of rooms people could rent for a couple hours for viewing movies in spaces done up in the style of various eras TV rooms.

It's kind of depressing just how hard it's become to even try to connect with people through modern media. It's so disposable. I try to talk to my friends about music for instance and the refrain is basically "I don't know, I just put Spotify on". Basically no one's heard of let alone seen most of the shows I watch, nor I theirs.

The modern world is a weirdly lonely existence.

Re: The lost civic life of movie rental stores

#234

Post by fsuts »

donatj wrote: post #233

There is a space in my town that has sat empty for many years now. Well over a decade. It used to be a video rental place. I don't know if anything's been in there since. I've kind of half joked with my wife about the idea of opening a modern video rental place there. We both lament the loss of a place or you could go and chit chat about movies. The common refrain is "no one even owns DVD players anymore" to which I…

> I've kind of half joked with my wife about the idea of opening a modern video rental place there. We both lament the loss of a place or you could go and chit chat about movies.

South Park did an episode where Randy Marsh does this

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/A_Nightmare_on_FaceTime

Re: The lost civic life of movie rental stores

#236

Post by adestefan »

ViscountPenguin wrote: post #176
chrisco255 wrote: post #164

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Even in 1982 you could mail a letter from your house, order shoes from a catalog, and order delivery food to your house. Admittedly, your choices were basically pizza, subs or Chinese for that type of delivery, but still, DoorDash mostly competes with cooking at home not with going out to restaurants (in fact, it has become more common to dine out than it was in 1982). I do lament the decline of brick-and-mortar reta…

I've always found the concept of mailing a letter from your house really interesting. My understanding is that it's common in the US (which is why they have the little red thing on their mailboxes I think?), but I've never lived in a place where it's a thing. For such a capitalistic country, the way the US historically treated the USPS as a common civic good is really cool.

The Postal Service is one of the few entities directly authorized by the US Constitution. From Article 1, Section 8:

> The Congress shall have Power… To establish Post Offices and post Roads

With that one of the hallmarks of the USPS is they really strive to service every person in the country no matter how remote.

The fact they’ve turned it into a “business” and not a public good is really a tragedy.

Re: The lost civic life of movie rental stores

#237

Post by steveBK123 »

enobrev wrote: post #206
steveBK123 wrote: post #4

The end of interest-based 3rd places is one of the many things contributing to the compartmentalization / socioeconomic bubble of modern society. People used to frequent in person things like specialty retailers, arcades, hobby clubs, religious groups, etc. When you meet real life people in person based on shared interests, you make connections across socioeconomic groups. I just don't see nearly as much of this in t…

I miss the neighborhood officianados. The movie buff at the blockbuster. The music fiend at the local record shop The gamer at the mom & pop game store. The guy at Egghead Software who would let me play battle chess for hours. Of course there are millions of them online these days, but that face-to-face interaction with the local officanado was a different thing. It wasn't a forum. And oddly, it wasn't a library eith…

There's still some record shops if you know where to look. Physical media is making something of a resurgence including with GenZ.

I was half joking with a friend that I want a everything-middle-aged-man-store open weekends (and maybe 5-8pm thursday/friday) that carries a hodge hodge of physical media, used hobby kit and maybe serves espressos/teas, does hair cuts.. and maybe do some basic EV car maintenance like tire rotation/annual state safety inspection.

Some place I can take care of needs and also enjoy some wants.

Re: The lost civic life of movie rental stores

#238

Post by bookofjoe »

01284a7e wrote: post #21
steveBK123 wrote: post #4

The end of interest-based 3rd places is one of the many things contributing to the compartmentalization / socioeconomic bubble of modern society. People used to frequent in person things like specialty retailers, arcades, hobby clubs, religious groups, etc. When you meet real life people in person based on shared interests, you make connections across socioeconomic groups. I just don't see nearly as much of this in t…

Putnam's "Bowling Alone" (2000) is about this, and it is something that has been in decline since the 1950s: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bowling_Alone .

"The Pursuit of Loneliness" (1970) — Philip Slater

https://www.amazon.com/dp/0807042013?lv=shuf&channelId=500&p...

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Philip_Slater

Re: The lost civic life of movie rental stores

#239

Post by roysting »

darth_avocado wrote: post #132
steveBK123 wrote: post #4

The end of interest-based 3rd places is one of the many things contributing to the compartmentalization / socioeconomic bubble of modern society. People used to frequent in person things like specialty retailers, arcades, hobby clubs, religious groups, etc. When you meet real life people in person based on shared interests, you make connections across socioeconomic groups. I just don't see nearly as much of this in t…

Lack of cheap real estate is the root of all problems. Some will point to private equity buying up everything and ruining (baseball, bowling etc.). If you had cheap real estate, you can still operate a business and compete, but once your landlord raises rent every year regardless of how your business is doing, even the successful ones have to pack their bags. So many successful businesses in my city and the neighbori…

[flagged]

Re: The lost civic life of movie rental stores

#240

Post by steveBK123 »

chrisco255 wrote: post #166
brightball wrote: post #43

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yea, agreed completely here. I spent so many hours at our local mall with my friends growing up. It had an arcade, a movie theater, book store, game store, place to eat. Our parents could just drop us there for hours. Skating rinks and bowling alleys were also a solid option. It's one of the things that make it worth the time investment to follow sports, even if you're typically not interested in it. Getting people t…

Small town malls have suffered the most but a lot of large cities still have vibrant malls to shop at and hang out at if you happen to be a teen. Dave and Busters and other similar arcade/mixed entertainment centers are also way more common now plus random things like climbing gyms, trampoline places, etc. From what I can tell skating rinks and bowling alleys are still reasonably popular especially when you factor fo…

I recently stopped by my hometown mall for the first time in 20 years. I described it to a friend as "it was like a neutron bomb went off".

It had been a middle/upper middle class mall back then - big fast food filled food court, Macys/Filenes/Lord&Taylor, it even eventually got (and lost) an Apple Store.

It was essentially empty and the stores had all gone down market. The nicest clothing store was H&M, and a bunch of storefronts were taken over by random nameless resale small businesses.

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