cool newspaper article about B&M card stores.

Thanks for sharing. The article spotlights two key issues for our hobby:
1. What does the diversification of American sports interest mean for baseball card enthusiasts specifically?
2. What does technological advancement mean for the simplicity of sports cards in general (e.g., the writer talks about modern kids wondering if collectible cards "do anything" other than just being cards)?

Value-wise, I don't know that these issues impact collectors negatively, though I don't see that they necessarily have a positive impact, either. Ultimately, we own pieces of history. They are limited and non-reproducible (not legally reproducible, anyway). They are like the old axiom about real estate: "Buy land, cuz God isn't making any more of it." He isn't making any more of the 1957 Topps set, either, or the T206 monster. For those of us who possess classic baseball cards, we own something finite and valuable. That value is fluctuant, certainly (we've all seen that over the last five years), but nonetheless real and alternately constant.

The one aspect of collecting I miss, though, is the storefront. When I first got madly into the hobby in the mid to late 90's, there were so many brick and mortar sites. I live in the DC area, and at that time I had a choice of probably 10-15 nearby stores where I could walk in and buy cards, resources, and other sports items (jerseys, posters, banners, signed items, etc.). Now there's only one anywhere near me, and by his own admission he only persists based on signage revenue (i.e., a major sports figure--generally someone with local appeal--agrees to make an appearance in his store). Otherwise, he would've been gone long ago.

It's disingenuous to suggest that technology isn't changing our hobby. The web has given a lot more potential buyers access to our collective. Despite the vagaries of economy, this generally means more revenue for most of us. That's a good thing, certainly, but what it means for the overall future of the hobby, who knows. We'll see. Lord knows, a day will probably come when collectors e-mail or text images of relevant cards and think nothing of the actual object. We'll have 'text collectors.' That would be a sad state of affairs, but I don't put it beyond the modern human. (In fact, sh*t, I have a horrible feeling that I've donated the group their moniker.)

Talking about the decline of the hobby due to the decrease of b&m card stores is synonymous to talking about the decline of transportation due to the decrease of horse-drawn carriages.