Well, I was thinking if you had 30 snakes, it would be hard to think of all 30 of them as family pets. We currently just have 1 BP, and he is clearly a pet. Of course you would still appreciate them and care for them, but perhaps not have such a personal connection.
But, that I suppose is what my question was about.
The other way I was looking at it- you can't likely have a large # of snakes in nice display tanks- I think once our collection starts to grow, I would still like to keep 1 or 2 out in the open rather than have them all in the rack.