Cancel to Order CTO Stamps

Rbridge28570, I avoid putting CTOs in my country albums but when it comes to topical collections, I don't care if the stamp is a CTO. Most of my topical collections have good number of CTOs in them.
Mike

The CTO is our elderly, slightly eccentric aunt, whom quite a few of the family don't want to talk about. If they let her anywhere near the house at all, they shove her into a separate binder and hope the neighbours won't notice her.

Well, I actually think she's a rather loveable soul, who has just as many interesting stories to tell as her ladida sisters FU and MNH. OK, it probably pays not to spend too much money on her. But under her skin she's a human stamp like the rest of us - a genuine part of the Stamp Family history. And if she was a bit of a slut when she first came out, what with her wearing gum and postmark at the same time, and all - so what?

Greetings Fellow SB Boarders
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Many folks forget that the hobby is called "Stamp Collecting."  If the item collected is NOT a stamp, then it does not fall into the realm of stamp collecting.  That's the way I see it.
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If folks want to collect pretty pictures that look, smell, taste, and/or feel like a postage stamp, that's fine with me.  As far as I'm concerned they can cut glossy little pictures from magazines and call them stamps.  What upsets me is the dinar that is spent on fake stamps by so called stamp collectors.  What happens here is that it creates an artificial value to real stamps in the stamping community where stamp collectors are the losers and the conniving second-rate government/non-government postal authority and sleazy stamp brokers reap the winnings making it a legalized black market.   I don't understand why folks happily go along with condoning the lining of the pockets of scuzzy slime-ball crooks.
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Now don't get me wrong.  There is nothing wrong with the cancel-to-order legitimate stamps.  First day covers, special event cancellations, or just plain asking a postal clerk to hand stamp a letter are common and legal practices.  I just don't happen to go out of my to collect stuff like that.
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Also, cinderellas are fine too.  Christmas/Easter/TB seals serve their purpose.  Obscure island labels are often cute and whimsical.  Cinderellas provide inexpensive advertising for services, products, and organizations.  I tend not to go out of my way to add them to my collection, but understand why others may want to.
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But the down right issuance of glossy fake stamps has undermined the hobby of stamp collecting.
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Respectfully,

Gordon Lee

PS.  How's this, Mr. Bear, for advocating discussion/debate?

Watching for the sparks to fly and witty Banter!!!

What I gather from some collectors they feel they are real because the post office issued them without sending them through the mail but just going ahead and canceling them when you buy them? Man this can get confusing!!!

The spate of so-called "fantasy" stamps (like ones that glorify Nazi Germany found on Ebay) is another example.

This is not a joke.

You may well consider it is insane- but it is not a joke.

I think it would be a really interesting project (and ultimately perhaps even a generally useful one) for a serious collector of a state that issued a fair amount of CTO to do a sub-collection and study of the CTOs, and to establish and make public:
all the issues sold CTO
the dates and post offices of all CTO cancellations
an approximate reconstruction of all CTO postmarks. In most cases this will require finding 4 stamps, not neccessarily of the same denomination.


 

Well Bear, we all know how I feel.

I agree with Craig, with what he is saying.

I have a email out to the Vietnamese on the stamps I have been posting, because of this reason.

They issue there stamps for "REAL" postal use, then they take it off after a time.

Why, I have no clue, yet.

Now are these "pretty pictures" the ones that are sold as legit stamps for postal use, CTO's now.

I am waiting for an answer from them to clarify this.

There answer could put the "pretty pictures" right next to the United States first day covers, now that is all I have to say till I post about it again.

But it is amazing how a stamp is sold could fire up such fiery emotions.

People collect stamps for so many different reasons and there are so many different collections.

People who collect, dead reptiles, bugs, peoples heads, and pictures of old type of transportation.

No disrespect intended, just making a point on how one classifies what people collect.

I would say "People who collect, dinosaurs, butterflies, KGV, and steam trains.

Though I do not prefer CTOs, they're a less expensive option to fill empty album spaces.  I usually replace them when I acquire a more appropriate example.