Avertising Cover, Bisect, Cinderella, and so on...
September 17, 2004 7:01 AM   Subscribe

Dear MEFI, I just love Alphabetilately, and I think you will too! Yours sincerely, taz.
posted by taz (19 comments total) 2 users marked this as a favorite
 
Easy index here.
posted by taz at 7:02 AM on September 17, 2004


that's a neat site, thanks taz. i love stamps... not enough to collect them, but i think they're wonderful little works of art and graphic design. i've always been jealous of how many interesting & beautiful stamps the usa and other countries have, but the last few years canada has been getting a bit more adventurous.
posted by t r a c y at 7:41 AM on September 17, 2004


Wow! "Year of the Monkey" is gorgeous. Does MoFi know about this?
posted by taz at 7:58 AM on September 17, 2004


Great stuff, iconomy! -whoops, I mean, taz!

If the rest of the letter pages are as good as M, E, F and I, this is a terrific site and more than makes up for that annoying cursor trail.

Speaking of adventurous, has anybody tried this? I was wondering how much you could get away with - not in terms of obscenity or anything, just in terms of submitting, say, a "photo" of artwork. How far does the category "business and charity logos" extend?
posted by soyjoy at 8:01 AM on September 17, 2004


Well this is much better than the frog and llama stamp sites that I was going to post. Today.

*seethes*
posted by iconomy at 8:10 AM on September 17, 2004


Heh. I actually came across that site when I was looking for poscards for your Ask question, ico. But you know how it is - when it comes to stamps, we have to stick together!
posted by taz at 8:15 AM on September 17, 2004


Speaking of adventurous, has anybody tried this? I was wondering how much you could get away with

my dad bought me personalized stamps thru' canada post a few years ago and i thought they worked out ok (he didn't choose the best photo for such a small item)... but we weren't, erm, pushing the envelope in using a photo of one of my cats. for canadian picture postage you can only use images that you hold the copyright to but they allow artwork, company logos, etc.
posted by t r a c y at 10:43 AM on September 17, 2004


More MoFi: Chinese 'Year of the Monkey' stamps through out the years. (The article itself is in Chinese, sorry.) The first Monkey stamp has always been highly sought after (current market value about 1300 RMB, or $156) since its release right after the end of Culture Revolution, because its groundbreaking style was so different from, ur, communist camp.
posted by of strange foe at 10:58 AM on September 17, 2004


Here's another charming one.
posted by of strange foe at 11:08 AM on September 17, 2004


Soyjoy,

People got away with enough that Photo.Stamps.com modified their agreement and now severely limits what they will print.

You agree to use the PhotoStamps service solely for the following image categories:
  • Babies or Children that appear to be pre-teenagers;
  • Pets and Animals;
  • Business and Charity logos or graphics;
  • Landscape and Wildlife; and
  • Vehicles
No images depicting teenage or adult persons will be accepted.

See the smoking gun for examples of what they managed to order.
posted by DBAPaul at 11:19 AM on September 17, 2004


Hey, monkey, monkey, monkey! And this one reminds me very much of the Barrel of Monkeys game I had when I was a kid.
posted by taz at 12:23 PM on September 17, 2004


Thanks for the TSG link, DBAPaul. While it seems kind of lame that the Smoking Gun documents in this case were intentionally generated by TSG itself, that's redeemed by this summary.

This was just an exercise to point out that the only people truly worthy of stamps are statesmen (George Washington, Benjamin Franklin), civil rights leaders (Martin Luther King Jr., Thurgood Marshall), and cartoon characters (Wile E. Coyote, Jiminy Cricket).

It still seems odd that you can get children on stamps but not adults. So I would not be able to get a sheet of stamps with my father-in-law's picture on 'em, but one of my neighbor's 5-year-old would sail right through... wacky.
posted by soyjoy at 12:42 PM on September 17, 2004


Very nifty! I like stamps, not enough to collect them, but the artwork on some of them is just fascinating.

DBAPaul: For some reason, that seems sort of silly for Photostamps to do. No photos of adults or teens? BUt babies and preteens are ok? Doesn't make sense. I guess that ruins my friend's plan to use her engagement photo as a stamp for their wedding invitations. I'll have to convince her to use a pic of their pets.
posted by Orb at 1:13 PM on September 17, 2004


OK, so who's going to send in pictures of, say, Jon-Benet Ramsey and try to get pictures of children banned too?
posted by kindall at 2:14 PM on September 17, 2004


Thought of that. JonBenet falls under "celebrity."

I hereby apologize to iconomy taz for dragging the thread off onto this tangent.
posted by soyjoy at 2:22 PM on September 17, 2004


soyjoy, I'm actually getting a little confused now. I know iconomy loves alphabet-themed collections, and has posted several great ones. Is it that? We also share a fondness for children's books, fairy tales, vintage images, and a lot of other topics, so it would be surprising if we didn't sometimes post similar things... Or are you trying to say something else?
posted by taz at 3:05 AM on September 18, 2004


yah, colour me confused too. i just assumed it was an inside joke between the three of you...
posted by t r a c y at 7:34 AM on September 18, 2004


Yes, taz, you've nailed it: I'm saying that you and iconomy are the same person. You know, just like Miguel and Carlos.

No, really, no offense intended whatsoever - it was just a play on my own reaction to the post, which was to immediately assume it was one of iconomy's. And then to play that I still couldn't remember correctly. You have to look at it from inside my head, where saying a post is easily confused with iconomy's is purt near the highest praise imaginable.

I hereby apologize to taz iconomy t r a c y everybody for dragging this very worthwhile thread off onto yet another tangent.
posted by soyjoy at 10:11 PM on September 18, 2004


Okay! In that case, I'll accept the compliment. And don't worry - sometimes I get confused myself. Whenever this happens, I just remind myself that iconomy's the one who is a freelance hitwoman, and I'm the one who hasn't thought of something clever to put in the "Occupation:" field of my user page yet. That usually clears things up right away.
posted by taz at 12:00 AM on September 19, 2004


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