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I know I wrote that my last post was my final one for a while , but before my Internet connection gets cut off (like losing my right arm) I just have to post this image. It is so clear that it is just like looking at the original plaster cast. Nice eh?I have now booked my flight ( August 7th) and arranged to rent a house for a few weeks whilst myself and my wife look at properties in Spain with a view to purchasing one. A little adventure we are both looking forward to. I will post a picture of our actual choice of home at a later date when we know for sure the deal is done and dusted.
Commenting on Larry's post (below) I have signed the petition myself and have to say I also believe that Royal Mail will just dump it in the bin.
I totally agree with Larry's perspective, Royal Mail seem to be following in the footsteps of other countries. Look how much interest (and money) from none philatelists the Star Wars stamps have created. If a product makes money then its here to stay.
Tat tar for a bit
Roy
1 comment:
Mike, or Larry, a few days ago I read the Rockingham letter in th stamp Addicts forum and came to the same conclusion posting the following comments.
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Dear fellow collectors and friends,
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Chris' correspondent poses an interesting question, one that I have heard before many times in the last forty years.
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" ....Do you think the British Royal Mail is issuing too many stamps? .... "
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First I do think Royal Mail, US Postal Service and several other administrations produce more stamp issues that are called for.
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" .... We get letters from collectors every week complaining that there are
just too many stamp issues and they can't keep up. .... "
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I am sure you do, and for every collector who feels strongly enough to write a letter there are, no doubt, ten more who share the feeling of being drowned in a sea of needless postal emissios of all kinds,
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However there is a far more important question that needs to be considered; "Does the Royal Mail or the US Postal Service care one whit what collectors, real collectors think ?"
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That answer my friends is a big resounding "NO !".
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Why do I say that ? Because as long as people, accumulators, and casual collectors buy the paper they print and sell, what serious collectors do is inconsequential.
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Every year, Linn's Stamp News conducts a census of US Collectors and discovers that there are less than 100,000 real collectors who fret over the hobby and who try to assemble some kind of collection, subscribing to one of the other of the ever decreasing stamp publications still existant here.
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But there are several 100,000 casual collectors who buy an issue in one form or another but are nor what we would call serions collectors who are joined by several million accumulators who occasionally buy some extra postal item and stuff it in a drawer somewhere for the kids or grand kids because somewhere in the back of their mind they recall something about some stamps somehow becoming valueable someday. Then there are even more people who buy a sheet or sheetlet and never get around to using all the stamps before losing some or damaging them beyond use.
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Quite simply, serious collectors are the tail that in this instance fails to wag the dog. In that respect we are quite close to the part of the dog where the tail attaches. That is as long as we let our collecting habits be determined by some postal marketing administrator who preys on that sacred word, "completeness".
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As long as collectors buy what is produced, producers will produce their products.
(Personally at this point I usually insert a promotion for the collection of postally used stamps, but I'll forego that point for now.)
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So I will in a spirit of solidarity be glad to sign the petition but I doubt it will have any more effect than the proverbial sailor standing on pier six trying to raise the tide all by himself.
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By the way, what is killing the hobby is the age of the collector and the enticements available to entertain the younger generation, usually electronic and almost always accompanied by throbbing sound near the upper range of human tolerance .
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When I was young it was fun to sit home in the evening alongside parents with albums open and a packet of stamps from some obscure country open on the kitchen table, spending an evening travelling around the world in a vacarious dream. Perhaps a globe or an Atlas near at hand alongside a Gibbons or Scotts (one volume).
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Fifty years ago I could not wait for one of my cousins to visit so that I could show her the neat set from Otre Guiba I had mounted, hoping that she would bring her album and extra stamps to trade. We had one telephone, a party line, one small radio on a shelf in the kitchen and a combination record player-radio console in the living room. Today, well you all can look around your own home and count the TVs, VCRs, TiVos, Cd Players, Play Stations, Cell Phones, Kareoke Machines and computers, Fax machnes and printers in constant use. It is a different world and children as well as young adults have many very exciting options beside which poring over an album pales to insignificance in their minds.
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Charlie
Lecanto, Florida
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