In Half Man Half Biscuit-esque fashion, a debate is raging (okay, not raging, bit certainly taking place) right now about what Oldhammer is and what it should/shouldn't be. The usual locations offer up the most debate as expected, and here they are:
Interesting stuff.
As far as my relationship with Oldhammer goes, nostalgia is the key to the whole thing. I had no idea about Oldhammer until I came across realmofchaos80s, and I'm thankful that I did. I don't recall seeing any terminology of the sort during my previous incarnations on coolminiornot; nor did I (nor do I) see much reference to it in my forays into fu:uk (or at least not so much if at all in the past, but more so now). I always veered towards 'old skool', using the term in a completely complimentary fashion on coolminiornot when rating/commenting on paintjobs, and I even now have a fair old selection saved under my favourites on that site, 90% of which is mid-80's to early-90's stuff. There would be even more in there if Sturmhalo (see Stone Cold Lead blog) hadn't whipped his stuff down. He operates on fu:uk as Doremi Fasol Latido these days. I live in hope that his full collection of photos makes it back onto the etherweb one day. Anyway, digression aside, I came back to painting for about the fourth or fifth time recently, and it was when reading the afore-mentioned realmofchaos80s that I stumbled upon the Oldhammer thing. It was a revelation, an eye-opener, something to get excited about. And it's obviously not just me, as prices for older Citadel minis have doubled on eBay over the past year or two. Whether that's something that'll subside once everyone gets a bit sensible in refusing to over-spend or not, I don't know. It does get a bit daft though, with BIN prices somewhere between 2 to 3 times what some proper auctions sell for. Anyway, digressing again.
Oldhammer, in my view, is now suffering from what happens to all well-intentioned 'movements' (or even movements made without any intentions) once they gain mainstream-ish acceptance: increased participation and 'membership' leads to increased views and opinions, which in turn leads to splits in definition and understanding. In other words, its success is what's causing the current debate, and that's a good thing. But trying to pin down a nebulous idea is going to prove difficult for anyone, so I think the debate will rage on. I'm sticking with nostalgia - no-one can argue or tinker with that, personal thing that it is.
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