My start was when I was in tenth grade (Wow! Like Adam, I've been
at this for at least eight years!) when I heard rumors that my local barber was on Tom Kennedy's Name That Tune. I went to him and pestered him for a dub...he said the episodes were on Betamax and that he would convert them for me.
He didn't find those NTT eps, but what he did find for me proved to be the beginning of my collection: the entire run of a Bob Goen show called "The Hollywood Game" including the pilot hosted by Peter Allen, who passed away before the show was produced. The pilot was brand new to the trading circuit as it existed at the time, so that's all I needed. (Later, after much cajoling, he found three NTT eps he taped for me, complete with commercial cuts to save tape space!) I had also recorded an odd Pennsylvania Lottery 25th Anniversary special (a Jonathan Goodson production) hosted by Dick Clark in '96... no one else had that, either.
I found a guy named Steve in 1998 who lived across the county and taped a lot of dark-period GSN (which he received on Dish, local cable didn't have GSN until 2002, IIRC) for me in exchange for blank tapes...those dark-period episodes were a huge start to my collection because he inadvertently caught some gems for me.
And some of the talk on here is true: the vast majority of guys who trade and have trading sites are awesome to work with, like Chuck Donegan, Adam, Dave Zinkin (when he traded), Travis Penery from the UK, Chris Powney from Australia, and too many more to mention. There are some tools, though - one in particular who comes to mind - who don't have a shred of simple manners, like returning emails. (But now my collection is far better than the tool I have in mind, so there. Haha!)
One hard and fast rule I think we'll all agree with: stay away from the telephone. I've had two traders find my name on WhitePages or wherever and call me, which is super creepy. Email is just fine, thank you.
One tip I have, and I think it's kind of a good tip if you do what I do...I sell a lot of stuff on eBay. I open up most of my bidding internationally. Sometimes, if the mood strikes, I'll ask the buyer for a few hours of random, taped game shows in lieu of payment. Most people snap at this offer very quickly, and I've never been disappointed with what I receive...some of the best stuff I've received from the UK and Holland came from eBay deals like this...and once, someone from Hungary sent me
six tapes when I only asked for two! I'll usually research what's on air in their country and ask them to tape certain shows. Sometimes the buyers refuse, and sometimes they don't have a VCR (you'd be surprised). Most of the time, it works out well if you're looking for international shows, which I love. (And I have a PAL VCR, which helps if it needs converting...most modern DVD players have PAL conversion built-in.)
The Lovely Hayley and I are doubling our residential square footage at the end of this month, which means I'll finally have all my tapes in one location again, instead of most of them sitting at my folks' house. I'm looking forward to getting back into trading...I've been surprised at how much great stuff from the late '70s/early '80s has been turning up lately.