I watch it to see people get crestfallen when they find out their old crap is just old crap.
Likewise, I watch Project Runway to see pretentious kids get pwned
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I think Iâd like it more if they said things like " $40,000?! Well shit, thatâs the leccy bill sorted for the next few years. Iâll take $30K in cash now if you want it."
This bullshit âoh no, we couldnât possibly part with itâ over-privileged crap winds me the fuck right up. 
I watch it to steal ideas from get inspiration for designs. 
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My uncle went on it once.
Knowing full well what he was bringing and what it was worth.
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Yeah, I donât buy this whole, âWell, I really donât know what itâs worthâ line that most of them trot out.
More honest would be something like âI reckon itâs worth this much, but I think the guy who told me that was trying to rip me off and I donât trust him.â
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IIRC, you have to submit photos etc ahead of time so theyâll have some time to research what you have.
I remember the most amusing people were those who tried to conceal how disappointed they were when their thing was only worth ÂŁ500 or whatever.
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Yeah I suspect there are a bunch like that.
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Itâs honestly funny how they carry off the conceit of the show, that everyone is so shocked about the big valuation, when the only motivation to come out for the event is to strike it rich. They try to pretend people come for the fun of it, but you know everyone is hoping, âPlease let me be the one whose thing is worth life changing money.â
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Iâd do that, if what I was bringing was totally crass and outrĂ©. Like, a lingam soap dispenser that I claim has great intrinsic, monetary, and spiritual value.
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In the NYTimes today, YET MORE TIME TRAVEL SHOWS!!! GrrrrrrrrrrâŠ
Iâm liking The Expanse, but expect it to eventually go down the time travel rabbit hole like every fucking other SF show ever. The story of the Epstein Drive was pretty handwavy, but at least it wasnât time travel. Havenât seen the conclusion of that flashback thread yet. My physics & math isnât good enough to calculate how much reaction mass youâd need, even if the drive were 100% efficient and could eject it at light speed, to sustain 20 gees for days, but Iâm guessing a lot.
At least the Epstein Drive explains why interplanetary orbital maneuvers on the show seem to happen in minutes or hours rather than months.
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I donât watch many television shows. I am extremely sensitive to anybody trying to influence my mood, which turns me off of two things instantly: advertisement and laugh tracks. Typically I download a few series which I choose to watch and avoid that stuff. Sometimes if I really like a show, I will suffer with the laugh track anyway, but it still grates.
With digital streaming enabling a television program to carry multiple audio streams, I think that laugh tracks need to be strictly optional on an isolated track.
People seem to have weirdly conflicted feelings about the illusion of participation and community that audience recordings represent. When I am working around the house and decide to make a show of joining in with the noisy applause and laughter, or cheering at game shows - those who were quietly watching the show either stare or laugh at me, as if I am being weird. Why is it weird if I get undignified and hoot and clap at your show, but itâs not weird that a few hundred other people are doing it?
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I canât recall the last time I chose to watch a show with a laugh track. The only recent sitcoms Iâve watched, Younger & Braindead, are single camera, no laugh track.
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My little one has recently inspired a marathon of every episode of Monty Pythonâs Flying Circus, because they know that many of my weird references originate there. The laughter is recorded live, and not too obtrusive, but I think doesnât bring anything to the experience.
I have a housemate who watches sitcoms on a regular basis. When I am cooking in the kitchen I can often hear the words as only a muffled noise, and this makes the rhythm of the laughter more obvious. It makes it seem less like humor than being periodically bludgeoned with a dull roar of laffs. Huh huh huh two three four huh huh huh two three four, ad infinitum. The worst offender seems to be âTwo and a Half Menâ, but I have never watched it for any length to see whether or not I think itâs funny.
Part of me would love to do dumb things to subvert laugh tracks. Such as put a laugh or two which are so silly and annoying that they call attention to the process. Or have a few people laughing at âinappropriateâ times. I canât do it with factory-pressed discs, but maybe I could distribute some really annoying torrents!
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I watched an awful lot of MASH (the TV series) during my formative years, one of only two shows I was allowed to âstay up lateâ for*. On the BBC, with no laugh track. It was wonderful and funny and had pathos and was clever.
And all the repeats I see nowadays are on freeview channels with the laughtrack, and I canât watch it.
* The other was âNot the Nine oâclock Newsâ, go figure.
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To play devilâs advocate here: if you really think about it, the idea of sitting all alone laughing at a performance is kind of strange. Itâs not what we did all through human history. We sat with groups of people and watched performances, even the King didnât watch theatre alone. So maybe the producers arent trying to manipulate us, merely trying to soothe our inner baboon.
No doubt this has been studied to death by academics putting people in rooms and studying the differences in how individuals and groups react.
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Oh absolutely - the psychology is indeed pretty simple: weâre more likely to laugh if others do, then we convince ourselves that we laughed because it was funny.
Still strips subtlety out, for certain kinds of content, at least.
(Useful test: Find a friend reading a paper. Point at a random line and chuckle. They will tend to laugh back before/while checking for actual humour at that point. Then dissonance hits, they look confused at you and ask âwhatâ?
But they still laughed.)
[ETA: Explaining why you did that, reveals part of the lie in consciousness, and they will hate you. ;)]
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Eh, my parents took something to them once. They knew the stuff wasnât worth a lot, but thought they might learn something.
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Like you, it was a central part of my tv watching as a kid, I was pretty fanatical about it. Laughtrack or not though, IMHO (donât mean to crap on your taste) it just hasnât aged well. Painful to watch, alternates between lame cliched jokes and maudlin. About the only characters I can stand as an adult are Radar OâReilly and Colonel Potter.
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Fair enough. Lots of things donât bear rewatching with the passage of time and mores. And tastes are personal, I assure you, no crapping is assumed, or taken. 
However, to me, the track still seems to just get in the way. Iâd like to be able to judge the aging of the humour on its actual merits, yâknow.
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Iâm pretty sure that the reason I got blocked by Graham Linehan on twitter was to do with something I said to him about laughter tracks.
(I wasnât even being an arse about it, but it seemed to be a touchy subject)
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Relevant: I mentioned this in part as I know itâs an edge case. It took something like the BBC in the 80s to have the desire to want to, and the clout to be able to show a programme like that without the laugh track.
I got that most people here wouldnât have that experience, so as it related to @popobawa4uâs comment above, and was facilitated by uncommon circumstances, I shared my one experiential data point. 
And as always, everyone elseâs mileage can (and will) vary. And thatâs cool.
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