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One person’s analog trash is another person’s vintage treasure.

If you have a pile of VHS tapes that haven’t been touched since the dawn of digital media, you might be able to make a fortune on them.

Blockbuster video cassettes are obviously a relic of yesteryear, with technology moving from VHS to DVDs and Blu-Ray and now onto streaming — but they’re still popular among some cult cinema collectors.

Many are going for a shocking amount of money on eBay, including classic films such as “Back to the Future” and even newer flicks with a cult following, such as the original “Fast and the Furious.”

However, simply posting a VHS on eBay doesn’t guarantee you’ll get big bucks — the condition must be top-notch.

VHS tapes degrade 10% to 20% over 10 to 25 years, and some footage could be skewed with age, according to the pros at Kodak. Tapes have a short lifespan due to remanence decay of the magnetic charge, which leads to discoloration, blacked-out scenes and eventually complete loss of footage.

Other conditions that speed up degrading of VHS tapes include storing in hot or humid conditions, storing them near magnetic sources, cheap or low quality tape, excessive rewinds and playbacks on the tape, and the tape is a second- or third-generation recording copy.

Kodak recommends storing VHS tapes in a cool and dry place “with little to no climate change” in order to keep them in the best possible shape — though even in the best conditions, they will eventually deteriorate.

That means your over-watched bright orange VHS of “The Rugrats Movie” might not be the one that gives you a pay day. However, some titles are up for auction with starting bids in the thousands.

It’s unclear how many of these mint-copy tapes have actually sold for big bucks but online shoppers are certainly bidding on and buying them. In fact, many of the sellers have “100% positive feedback” rankings.

The Post has reached out to eBay for comment about this rising retro-trend.

Meanwhile, after perusing the “aisles” on eBay, here are some of the most expensive listings for film titles on VHS as of Thursday.

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Politics

Hadush Kebatu: Migrant sex offender deported after mistaken prison release

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1 hour ago

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October 29, 2025

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Hadush Kebatu: Migrant sex offender deported after mistaken prison release

Migrant sex offender Hadush Kebatu has been deported to Ethiopia following his mistaken release from prison.

Footage captured from Heathrow Airport showed the moment he was escorted on to a plane on Tuesday night.

The government says he has no right to return to the UK.

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said she “pulled every lever” to deport Kebatu.

“I am pleased to confirm this vile child sex offender has been deported. Our streets are safer because of it,” she said.

Hadush Kebatu was arrested on Sunday after his mistaken release
Image:
Hadush Kebatu was arrested on Sunday after his mistaken release

Kebatu was found and arrested by the Metropolitan Police in the Finsbury Park area of north London at around 8.30am on Sunday following a manhunt.

Last month he was found guilty of sexually assaulting a schoolgirl and a woman in Epping, Essex, just over a week after arriving in the UK on a small boat.

He was expected to be deported, but instead of being handed over to immigration officials he was released from HMP Chelmsford on Friday.

He spent just under 48 hours at large before he was apprehended.

The accidental release sparked widespread alarm and questions over how a man whose crimes sparked protests in Epping over the use of asylum hotels was able to be freed.

Ms Mahmood said: “Last week’s blunder should never have happened – and I share the public’s anger that it did.”

Anti-asylum demonstrators in Epping, Essex. Pic: PA
Image:
Anti-asylum demonstrators in Epping, Essex. Pic: PA

On Sunday, Justice Secretary David Lammy said an exclusive Sky News interview will be used as part of an independent inquiry into the mistaken release.

Speaking to Sky’s national correspondent Tom Parmenter, a delivery driver who spoke to Kebatu at HMP Chelmsford described him as being “confused” as he was being guided to the railway station by prison staff.

The migrant is said to have returned to the prison reception four or five times before leaving the area on a train heading to London.

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‘My family feels massively let down’

Mr Lammy, who put Kebatu’s release down to human error, said he ordered an “urgent review” into the checks that take place when an offender is released from prison, and new safeguards have been added that amount to the “strongest release checks that have ever been in place”.

From Monday, new checks include five pages of instructions and demands that more senior prison staff sign off a release, according to documents obtained by Sky News.

“I have been clear from the outset that a mistake of this nature is unacceptable, and we must get to the bottom of what happened,” said Mr Lammy.

This breaking news story is being updated and more details will be published shortly.

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You can receive breaking news alerts on a smartphone or tablet via the Sky News app. You can also follow us on WhatsApp and subscribe to our YouTube channel to keep up with the latest news.

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UK

Hadush Kebatu: Migrant sex offender deported after mistaken prison release

Published

1 hour ago

on

October 29, 2025

By

Hadush Kebatu: Migrant sex offender deported after mistaken prison release

Migrant sex offender Hadush Kebatu has been deported to Ethiopia following his mistaken release from prison.

Footage captured from Heathrow Airport showed the moment he was escorted on to a plane on Tuesday night.

The government says he has no right to return to the UK.

Home Secretary Shabana Mahmood said she “pulled every lever” to deport Kebatu.

“I am pleased to confirm this vile child sex offender has been deported. Our streets are safer because of it,” she said.

Hadush Kebatu was arrested on Sunday after his mistaken release
Image:
Hadush Kebatu was arrested on Sunday after his mistaken release

Kebatu was found and arrested by the Metropolitan Police in the Finsbury Park area of north London at around 8.30am on Sunday following a manhunt.

Last month he was found guilty of sexually assaulting a schoolgirl and a woman in Epping, Essex, just over a week after arriving in the UK on a small boat.

He was expected to be deported, but instead of being handed over to immigration officials he was released from HMP Chelmsford on Friday.

He spent just under 48 hours at large before he was apprehended.

The accidental release sparked widespread alarm and questions over how a man whose crimes sparked protests in Epping over the use of asylum hotels was able to be freed.

Ms Mahmood said: “Last week’s blunder should never have happened – and I share the public’s anger that it did.”

Anti-asylum demonstrators in Epping, Essex. Pic: PA
Image:
Anti-asylum demonstrators in Epping, Essex. Pic: PA

On Sunday, Justice Secretary David Lammy said an exclusive Sky News interview will be used as part of an independent inquiry into the mistaken release.

Speaking to Sky’s national correspondent Tom Parmenter, a delivery driver who spoke to Kebatu at HMP Chelmsford described him as being “confused” as he was being guided to the railway station by prison staff.

The migrant is said to have returned to the prison reception four or five times before leaving the area on a train heading to London.

Please use Chrome browser for a more accessible video player

‘My family feels massively let down’

Mr Lammy, who put Kebatu’s release down to human error, said he ordered an “urgent review” into the checks that take place when an offender is released from prison, and new safeguards have been added that amount to the “strongest release checks that have ever been in place”.

From Monday, new checks include five pages of instructions and demands that more senior prison staff sign off a release, according to documents obtained by Sky News.

“I have been clear from the outset that a mistake of this nature is unacceptable, and we must get to the bottom of what happened,” said Mr Lammy.

This breaking news story is being updated and more details will be published shortly.

Please refresh the page for the latest version.

You can receive breaking news alerts on a smartphone or tablet via the Sky News app. You can also follow us on WhatsApp and subscribe to our YouTube channel to keep up with the latest news.

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Technology

Trump signals he could speak to China’s Xi about Nvidia’s ‘super duper’ chips

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4 hours ago

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October 29, 2025

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Trump signals he could speak to China's Xi about Nvidia's 'super duper' chips

U.S. President Donald Trump speaks to journalists in Japan aboard Air Force One en route to South Korea on October 29, 2025.

Andrew Harnik | Getty Images News | Getty Images

U.S. President Donald Trump plans to discuss Nvidia’s advanced AI chips with Chinese President Xi Jinping during their widely expected meeting on Thursday, he told a media scrum Wednesday. 

While taking questions regarding his high-stakes meeting with Xi, Trump signaled that Nvidia’s Blackwell AI processors could be discussed. 

“We’ll be speaking about Blackwell, it’s the super duper chip,” he said. Nvidia’s “super duper chip” appeared to refer to the GB200 Grace Blackwell Superchip — its most advanced AI chip.

More broadly, Nvidia’s Blackwell architecture represents its latest generation of AI chips, or ‘graphics processing units,’ used to train and run large language models.

Trump went on to laud Nvidia’s Blackwell chips, claiming that they are about a decade ahead of any other chip.

“That’s our country. We’re about 10 years ahead of anybody else in chips — in the highly sophisticated chips. I think we may be talking about that with President Xi.” 

The comments come as Nvidia faces an uncertain future in China, once a lucrative market for the AI darling.

While export controls have long prevented Nvidia from selling its most advanced AI products to China, Washington had rolled back restrictions on the chipmaker’s less advanced, made-for-China H20 chips in July. 

Trump later indicated that he might also allow a downgraded version of Nvidia’s Blackwell chips into China.

But in a surprise move, Beijing recently stepped in to prevent its companies from importing Nvidia’s chips amid national security concerns regarding the company’s technology. As a result, Nvidia CEO Jensen Huang said earlier this month that the company is currently “100% out of China” and has no market share there.

However, many analysts view the Chinese ban as likely temporary, saying Beijing could be using Nvidia’s access to its market as leverage in its trade negotiations with the Trump administration.

Despite Trump’s remarks about Nvidia’s “super duper chip,” it seems more likely that a less advanced version would be on the table.

In August, Reuters reported Nvidia was developing a new chip for China — dubbed the B30A — that would be more powerful than the H20 and built on the Blackwell architecture.

Such a chip would hypothetically help Nvidia fend off growing competition from domestic players like Huawei, as Beijing accelerates its efforts to develop a self-sufficient AI environment.

However, semiconductor experts said a resumption of H20 exports, or an additional pathway for the B30A, would also help China’s AI ecosystem more broadly and undermine Washington’s strategy to curb Chinese access to cutting-edge computing, which began ramping up in 2022.

A report released earlier this week from the Institute for Progress, a U.S. think tank, argued that allowing B30A exports to China would dramatically shrink America’s current AI compute advantage over China.

Huang, who has long lobbied against U.S. chip restrictions, will reportedly be in South Korea at the same time as Trump this week. The Nvidia CEO is expected to make announcements with local partners, which Huang said would hopefully be “delightful to the people of Korea and really delightful to President Trump.”

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