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Indeed! 

I like reading them now, but it's great to read letters pages from decades ago, including titles published before you were born. They provide a great "snapshot" of history. I wasn't around in, say, 1960, but if I can pick up a 1960 comic, and read the thoughts of readers from that time, it's satisfying.

And that's why I was a bit frustrated to read a comment a few posts back referring to them as "dinosaurs". I picked up a shitload of STAR TREK: TNG (DC) comics at Birmingham ICE recently. The stories are great, but so are the letters. There's people complaining about the first season of TNG, there's folk asking if TNG will ever get a big-screen movie, there's others commenting on all sorts of interesting things. A TNG TPB would be good for story content, but I wouldn't be able to read the thoughts of readers.

I was thinking about a topic where some could name their favourite letters page title EVER. Just one. But you know how such requests usually go...

All of which are things that are nostalgic for people over 40. I'm not saying there isn't a market for back issues, but it's an aging, shrinking market. Maybe at some point there'll be some hipster comeback, like with vinyl records, but for now, dinosaurs seems apt.

I can sometimes find some better deals on rare Funko Pops at a con than I can online. None of this invalidates the idea that cons were once one of the only ways of acquiring older material and now they are not.

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Nostalgia plays no part. 

I like to read what people were thinking about an old issue. I'd love to read letters about the original Galactus trilogy. Which was published before I was born. I'd be interested to know how Galactus was received by readers at the time - and what sort of topics the letters covered. He first appeared in 1966.

One can hardly be nostalgic for a period (1966) that one didn't live through.

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I wasn't alive when Star Trek TOS or Batman '66 or the '67 Spider-Man cartoon first aired, but I'm nostalgic for those things because I watched them as a kid. You aren't talking about the content. You are talking about the smell of the comics, the letter pages, the silly ads. That's what you are nostalgic for, regardless of when the actual content was created. Those aren't experiences kids have today.

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I guess you skipped the part where I posted about desiring to read letters pertaining to the original Galactus story. No nostalgia there, just a desire to learn what the viewpoints of fans were as it pertains to FF comics of the time - and that particular story.

That's no different to perhaps desiring to read a newspaper column from the day after the moon landing. No nostalgia, just an interest in learning what the mindset was at the time.

Panini Comics (the successor to Marvel UK) still have letters pages. 

I like it when I see letters in modern comics. Some mini-series even have them.

I don't or haven't seen many letters pages in modern DC or Marvel comics. That's disappointing to me.

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Wrong!

Love how people assume things. Gotta love the internet, eh?

Can't speak for others, but I wrote a shitload of letters as a kid. Was often buying stamps. Airmail stamps (most publications were US). And I never stopped. I switched to e-mails once I got hooked up to the internet. 

Bill Collins has seen letters of mine (he's mentioned them) in magazines and comics.

Not many are printed, but, yes, might be best to ask me next time if I write letters/have written them - instead of assuming I love letters columns but never wrote to them.

As for your post, do you have proof? I'd DEFINITELY listen if you have. But that would seem odd if most publications were publishing fake letters. Wonder if the ones I wrote (some of which got printed) were fake. Perhaps my very existence is fake...