I look up on eBay, and I see DVDs sold for $40-70 just for an early copy of Gangbang Girls. I also remember seeing an interracial Dogfart movie go for $90. Whereas I remember, they were going for $15 when they came out years ago. Comics and baseball cards are commodities due to the rareness and popular demands and often sold at high prices. Is this what's Adult DVDs are heading towards as DVDs become obsolete in the next few years due to downloading and piracy. I see on ADM where there are listings for some DVDs at $100, which is a bit crazy to buy a porn movie. I can think of other ways to spend $100. I tried looking for past topics on this subject, but I couldn't find anything on it.
^ there will always be people on ebay selling stuff with crazy prices, in the hopes of a sucker buying it, while you usually can find these titles for a much lower price somewhere else, often new.
But there are certain DVDs which are definitely "rare", and which you cannot find anywhere else, simply because they're out of production. But more and more video rental stores are closing, selling of their product, but often to ridiculous prices. I know of some local stores which demand 40$ (and more) for 20 year old DVDs (and which already had that price 20 years ago), i.e. the seller did never adjust the price, perhaps in the hope of "I bought that item for amount xx, so I'll have to sell it for xx+y", even if it doesn't get sold at all.
With DVD on the decline (or practically dead?), it's probably only the suckers without internet who buy this, or collectors who specifically are looking for a certain DVD (like me).
A very interesting topic and I would say that certain studios and titles will always demand top prices for whatever reason. One that sticks in my mind is the Pornstar Punishment series which aside from being removed from the internet was also released on DVD in a number of volumes. After these sold out I used to see them go for high prices along with Max Hardcore European releases and some JM titles too. I guess that the extremity of the content along with the policing of the internet plays a big part but you're right in saying that as a physical format it will always command prices because like comics, football shirts, music etc. it has a large fan base and as such demand will always be there.
As for DVDs as a format then I think it will always have a future especially given the ways in which society is moving towards surveillance and algorithms. It's largely traceless, tactile like a book and always enjoyable especially when it's a title you've wanted to see for ages!! I do however hope that the studios up their game a bit and give people more incentive to buy the title. One of the big draws to any title going back to the mid 2000s was the behind the scenes extras that were added. It just doesn't happen anymore which is a shame because the personality of the performer involved is as important as what takes place on screen. The best release in recent times reflecting this was the 2018 Legal Porno 10 girl orgy. Really good stuff indeed!!
As a collector ould you consider purchasing a rare DVD (I don't what would be considered rare DVD) like someone would purchase a Topps Mickey Mantle rookie card? Again, I'm still in disbelief someone purchased a DVD for $90.
^^ about the collector. I'm collecting primarily to get some series complete, mostly from certain directors or certain starlets. I'm under no illusion that this will ever be a profitable business for collectors (i.e. resale value), though. Unless something drastically changes and stuff I have on physical medium would disappear from the Interwebs. But to be honest, even then there's only a limited marked of people looking for older stuff - everybody seems only interested in the newest starlet performing her first anal, and then move on to the next. Not to mention the casual consumer, who simply goes to one of the tubesites and doesn't even know/care of the people in it, but simply browses along until something piques his(her) interest. That was the case in pre-internet times, too. Too often have I seen simple collection DVDs with "8 hours of Anal" or "12 hours of Blowjobs"... I would reckon those seeking out special names and/or directors always were in the minority. I remember one time in the video rental store one customer complaining about a DVD box set not playing totally, and the clerk then responding: "but you got 4 hours worth of porn here, so no issue if one disc (i.e. 2 hours) don't work" As if he were selling/lending porn by weight, just as a butcher would.
For a given porn DVD to sell for a premium doesn't qualify it as a commodity. A commodity by definition is an item that becomes interchangeable at a given value regardless of who manufactured it.
Are you sure you're not conflating a commodity with a collectible?
^ yeah, probably true. OTOH porn DVDs inherently do have one producer/distributor, so you wouldn't find DVD X from distributor X and the same content from Distributor Y, so there is a monopoly (of sorts) by definition.
