Virtual possessions

Talking to my teenage son about what he plans to do with the 900 upward photos he took on his trip, he said he would select 20 or 30 pictures for friends and family to look at and then copy the rest onto his external hard disk. 

I was appalled, why did he want over 900 photos, some of the blurry and unfocused, crowding up his hard disk? He said he wanted the images just to “have”. To him, unlike me, virtual possession or collection has material significance. In the same way I used to collect books and records, he contains mp3 files and photos. They actually translate materially in his mind. Isn’t that phenomenal?