Physical or digital content?

[Deleted]

Nowadays, do you prefer your media/entertainment content such as music, games, movies, books or magazines in physical shape or distributed digitally?

Vote!

[Deleted]

Depends on content.

[FuxieDK]

Music: CDs
Movies: BluRay
Games: Digital Download
Magazines: Paper

[Deleted]

Digital every time, I have not brought a disc in years.

[Zao]

Games: Physical. I'm a big fan of collector's editions.
Music/Movies: Digital unless it's something really special.
Magazines: Digital.

Books: I prefer Physical books. But I've run out of shelf space ages ago, so nowadays I mostly read them on my kindle unless it's one of my favourite series.

[Wildtree]

I think the correct term would be analog vs digital.
Or virtual vs physical.

Digital is the current hype, but as an oxymoron if you will, there are aspects where it starts to revert, rightfully so.
For example, heaps of established musicians going back to recording, and performing in analog technique. Because fact of the matter is, as sophisticated digital may seem, it isn't nor ever will it be able to beat the quality of analog technique.
This is also true for pictures, whether stills or moving pictures.

Virtual business will not go anywhere, it will rather increase. The transmission of data of any kind happens digitally. But, for certain fields to have the very best quality, there's no other way than analog.

[Blueobelisk]

I like physical (CDs for my games) for the expensive things I get, but if it's cheap then I don't mind digital.

[Deleted]

As much as I love to pick up "special" editions instead of standard ones,personally digital vs. physical heavily depends on the content of each. If its crappy like WoW's DE,not including the soundtrack or a digital artbook,I'd definitely go with the physical edition. Otherwise,unless it contains something special,I'd go with a DE.

[Nirawen]

I prefer everything other than books in a digital format/distribution, as long as there are no time/use-amount restraints.

[Feral Camel]

Everything digital and everything legal, which sucks when you live in Australia.

Mind you, the librarian in me loves a bound leather set of books and old records.

[zorkuus]

CD's, DVD's etc. are both physical and digital. Infact I have all of my CD's ripped to the computer so that's it's easier to pick what I want to listen to, I have the physical content but I just don't use it.

Oh and I forgot about books. I can't read them in digital format, I've tried, it just doesn't work.

[zealo]

Games i prefer physical, i have perhaps 50-60 games in my bookshelf currently to both PC and various console games with a larger number of older cartridges not being on the shelf currently, makes a nice collection together with several collector's edition boxes.

Music - Digital, with the amount of music files i have it would be a pain in the ass to store if i where to burn them to CD's and store on a bookshelf. Same goes for movies, the archive system i have on my NAS really shines with both of these.

Magazines i prefer in paper even if a PDF does work as well.

[Spectral]

I have no use for physical content. I'm messy enough without more clutter.

[Aspect of Death]

Depends on the content, normally i don't mind things to be digital content. Except for books, those i want in physical form always.

[Pitkanen]

Mainly digital, except video. But video's preference is due cable provider choking / HD space.

[Ciddy]

Going with "depends on the content itself" here. I have a shit ISP with shit download speeds, so I usually go for physical copies of stuff unless the download is not massive, or there is a huge price difference in download vs physical copy.

Games - mixed. I buy a lot of games on Steam, and for non-Steam games, if there is a digital download option, I'll usually go for it. I only go for physical copies if I get something cool like a poster, art book, etc. I've been on a big retro gaming thing lately where I've been grabbing old SNES / N64 cartridges off places like eBay. I will also still occasionally pick up a used game at Gamestop. Console games, I always go for physical copies.

Music - almost always digital (legally purchased, of course). I can't remember the last time I bought an actual CD. I do still have my old CD collection from the days before digital downloads became a thing. And even a few old cassettes.

Books - always physical. I always prefer those the old fashioned way. Preferably hardback, but I will sometimes get paperback versions when the price difference is significant enough. I can't really explain it, but devices like Kindle just don't feel right to me when compared to a real, physical book. ebooks just don't do it for me.

[Reeve]

These days I get virtually everything digitally. I like paper books, but I'm not about to hoof it over to the bookstore and hope they have the book in stock when I can just pull it up on my kindle in seconds for less money.

I use Netflix, HuluPlus, AmazonPrime, and HBOGo for my video entertainment.

I sometimes by giant comic book compilations if I'm going to be on a long flight somewhere, since comic books are lighter reading, which is nice in a distracting uncomfortable environment like an airplane. I also sometimes buy magazines in the airport. These two things are pretty much the limit of my physical content purchases.

Someday when I have kids, I'll probably buy their picture books as actual books, especially stuff like Dinotopia:

[Masark]

Digital. I haven't bought a game-on-disc, a paper book, a DVD, or a paper magazine in years. Last music CD I bought was in 2012.

[Jester Joe]

Physical, unless it's a digital sale on a game.
If I'm paying the same price for a digital as a physical, you bet I'm gonna want to be able to actually hold the game, and lend it out, or sell it.

[fooliuscaesar13]

Depends on the content for me.
Music: digital (unless it's local, then I buy the disc)
Movies: physical
Games: If it's a game that I'd by the Collector's Edition of, physical. All else: digital unless only physical is available.