I believe what makes some of these items useless is that they simply are useless. for example alot of these items dont have much uses. Ive seen older items that have changed dramatically because they have better ways to be applied on the site. One of my favorite changes was the delphi carnival, i play on and off again but ive been very active because of changes like the carnival. some of those items used to be worthless but now they give a bit more value since u have to earn them. just an idea. instead of retiring them just find a diffrent use for them. that will give other players opportunities to get the items they want and up the price at the same time.