Stamp Collecting for Beginners and Philatelists
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Stamp Column Archives
Glassine Surfer June 2004
Auxiliary markings are postal markings applied to covers showing that they were given special attention under special circumstances. This is the realm of those "Return to Sender" stampings and those yellow forwarding labels. And as with most everything in the Web Age, there's a website for collectors of auxiliary markings.
The site is new, but there you'll find a wealth of interesting material, especially with regards to earliest known usages, as well as links to similar material. The site is the Web presence of the Auxiliary Markings Club and hosts the normal club and society information, as well as tables of contents for their newsletters.
Understanding the usage of the markings could help your forensic philately and collecting won't strain your budget.
Auxiliary Markings Club
http://www.postal-markings.org
In response to my comments in the last column about the OWASU and Fran Adams, I got a few pokes in the ribs via e-mail from readers who gently pointed out that I'd mis-gendered Fran. Everyone, except me, was well aware that the OWASU creator is a fine gentleman with a handsome and long standing profile in the philatelic community.
One missive issued from the keyboard of OWASU president Merle Farrington, claimed that with a two-gender name like his/hers, (s)he gets the same misconceptions all the time, though he makes an effort to put "Mr." in his e-mail signature.
If you were as clueless as your humbled writer, please take another look at Fran's Old World Archaeological Study Unit and see if you now see it in a different light.
Old World Archaeological Study Unit
http://www.owasu.org/
Stamp Scandal is a small site with the self-proclaimed mission to reveal "the shabby practices that currently operate in the philatelic business, practices that are plunging the once reputable world of stamp dealing and collecting into the twilit world of the barely legal and downright illegal."
And there's quite a lot here to turn your stomach. The stories include philatelic wrongs involving Madagascar, Monaco, Mountainous Karabakh, Niger, Princess Amalia, and Sieger, among others, some of which are covered in quite some detail.
There's also a very helpful links section, which anyone who needs help should consult. This site appears to be one well-informed persons effort to alert stamp collectors of issues embarrassing to the hobby, but hopefully, more will realize that protecting philately is worth a few red faces.
Stamp Scandal
http://www.stamp-scandal.com/
Tool Bars Redux
Brand loyalty is a habit that's hard to break, and one of the Web's hallmarks of branding is the browser toolbar. It's like giving your favorite TV station its own very large and prominent button. You just know your gonna tap it in a moment of ennui, and that's what our Net friends know.
Over at eBay, you can now have your own personal eBay toolbar to track whatever auctions you decide and you can access your account/auction in a flash. It is very handy to spy on the price of those items you're really interested in without having to do a whole lot of clicking.
It downloads and installs easily, and there's a good amount of support material on the Website to check over first. Just remember, you won't be getting a discount for your increased usage or spending, though I sometimes think that would really fuel increased consumption because there's nothing like savings to increase sales.
eBay ToolBar
http://www.ebay.com/ebay_toolbar/index.html
