Quote Originally Posted by Vaer View Post
I get what you're saying, but even IRL there are collector's items and limited editions that are actually kept for their rarity and/or prestige. I mean I might not give a damn about a rare baseball card, it's just a piece of paper with a drawing right but others might. So really it seems the impasse is that it's a digital item.
The point of the post was that your comparison was a bad one. You'll note it doesn't depend on the digital nature at all and merely points to the differing elements between the two things that were compared.

Frankly, people who collect real life rarities do so at their own risk as well. There's nothing stopping the original manufacturer or whoever ends up with the patent rights from resuming production of those items. However, their value tends to be preserved because time ages things and often there are ways to discriminate between an original and a modern reproduction and it rarely happens because it's much harder to reproduce items in precisely the same fashion as was done decades ago due to changes in regulations and industry practices. So no, there's no hangup. I'd be every bit as unsympathetic toward wailing and gnashing of teeth because Topps decided to start reproducing Babe Ruth rookie cards that were indistinguishable from the original run. It's just not a realistic concern due to differing aspects of physical and digital goods.