Album Review: United States Albums

Not a bad idea Art. I think Scott has been reluctant to go forward with the newer technology.
Tom

The underlying mechanisms to create things like a searchable database and custom-made albums aren't too complicated. I think the biggest thing holding Scott back from creating a much richer database is simply the amount of time and effort it would take to update hundreds of thousands of listings with more information. In the case of topical information, there might be several topics that one stamp falls under, and you'd really want to list as many as possible. Add in paper type, printing method, color, denomination, perforation, year of issue, etc (much of which Scott should already have in a database) and you're talking a lot of information for just one stamp.

In a perfect world, the database would be searchable by any piece of data. Maybe you only want to collect engraved stamps of a certain country and/or era. Maybe you want to search for surcharged yellow stamps from pre-1940 printed on granite paper that catalog under $10. To have that level of functionality would require a lot of time just to input all the data. I can't see Scott paying a bunch of people to do that anytime soon, so it would almost have to be a volunteer project. I'd think a few dozen or so dedicated volunteers could input enough data in a reasonable amount of time, just using information from the catalog.

Take a minute to think about that for a minute and how it could really revolutionize the hobby unlike anything in a long time. Think about how much time it would save in finding stamps that really interest you, in automating want lists and inventory tracking. All of it is technologically doable without all that much difficulty, it's just a question if a business interest can look at it and see profit potential. It would be a sizable upfront cost that would take awhile to pay off, so the risks would be significant. Amos is a sizable company, but I don't think they're so big that they can afford to lose a multi-million dollar bet.

Art, a truly visionary idea. Let's hope Michel or Scott reads these forums :-)

A year or two ago I started a open source community effort the standardize on a worldwide philatelic database schema. The idea was to develop a standard that anyone could use if they wanted when it came time to store any type of philatelic information in any type of database. The implications are enormous; the objective was to ultimately be able for all the various databases to be able to easily share information.

In some ways the GPL (Global Philatelic Library) is pursuing something similar although its scope is limited to sharing their databases for profit. Obviously commercial entities like Amos and ebay could also be shareholders in something like this.

But I was never able to garnish enough support and closed the web site and SQL databases that had been put into place for the effort.

At this point the window of opportunity to do this as a community effort is just about closed. Philately will probably just end up just following the lead of whichever the of the largest commercial interests invests the soonest and the most; everyone else will then have to simply follow their lead. My fear is that this will become ebay. They are accumulating huge amounts of philatelic data, not just in terms of pricing but also item availability, image databases, various search metrics, and even email lists.

Amos and other album/catalog publishers may indeed find themselves having to interface and buy ebay data in the near future. Guess good news is that this will give folks plenty to beef and complain about!
don

Heck, it could be Google, but the stamp market is too small potatoes for them. I say Google because they likely already have all the images and other necessary information already stored in their cache somewhere, they'd just have to figure out how to pull it all together.

Fascinating discussion - my next question: it seems to me that the digital revolution and online album creation tools has led to, in my opinion, some very very ugly and boring pages. As Apastuszak and I discussed, different people have different types of collections, and the ability to customize pages to their liking would be nice. With these types of database driven online tools, are we limited to lowest common denominator fonts and design?

The pages I created for my collection are a response to both the cost of commercially available pages, and the look of DIY album tools. Would it not be possible to create available styles within these tools to create really nice pages? Can we utilize the Google font API? I would be open to lending design advice if a programmer wants to volunteer their expertise.

Well, if stamp albums and catalogs were a multi-billion dollar industry, you can bet all sorts of different options would be available. If you look at how most software is sold these days, there are different versions, a cheap one that just does the basics, an intermediate one that gives you more features, and the "Professional" version that has all the features. Such a program could conceivably come packaged that way.

However, stamp albums/catalogs are decidedly not a multibillion dollar industry, so the options will probably be somewhat more limited. My guess is that early versions of such programs will do the basics (and hopefully do them well), and that the mfr will gradually add more features allowing more customization in new versions.

In my never-ending quest to find a new stamp album, I came across a supplier I had never heard of before. It is called Canadian wholesale supply. They seem to be the "Mystic" of the Canadian market. Anyway, they offer a few American stamp albums. The pages are pretty much all the same, but the paper is different in size and weight. Their "premium" album is the Sentinel. It comes in 8-1/2" x 11" on 100# heavyweight paper and in full color. They also offer the book in black and white. Each stamp has a good bit of information too. I have been looking for a stamp album like Scott Minuteman or Harris Liberty on better paper. I was even contemplating buying one of those albums and having it copied onto better paper. But, they use an odd paper size and I wasn't sure how to go about that. I think Mystic's layout is a bit boring for me. I like White Ace, but they are pricey.

The Canadian Wholesale Supply offers the Sentinel pages without binders (I didn't like their binders) for roughly $265 with no tax and free shipping. Of course it can never be perfect. They break out se-tenant sets and show the block plus the individual stamps. I only collect the blocks. Ugh! But, I figured if the pages are in color, maybe I could live with it. Hmmm??? Or maybe back to the drawing board. I swear I would create my own album if I had the time. Anyone familiar or have an album from Candian Wholesale Supply? There website is http://www.collectorssupplyhouse.com/. I am attaching a photo of one of their sample pages.

Mikepack, I have used them on a few occasions and have found them to be very good and very helpful. I am still using an old Canada Parliament Album from the seventies that they still support and have supplements for. Very helpful people and easy to deal with.

Also now that the Canadian dollar is about 10% lower than the US buck there is some savings on the conversion for us in the US. BTW, the album you are considering looks beautiful.

Nice pages! There are a lot of binders to choose from out there at varying price ranges. The only ones I have experience with are Lighthouse Vario binders, which I'm very happy with. They're not too pricy, they're sturdy, and they look really nice, in my opinion. They'll hold any 8.5"x11" standard 3-hole punched page. The best place to buy them is probably this seller on ebay. I've bought from him multiple times and got prompt service:

http://stores.ebay.com/Mit-63-Store...4634.c0.m322

Emtpilot, nice looking pages! Here is what I store my 8.5 x 11 pages in. The brand is We R Memory Keepers and I get them at Joann.com. Look under scrapbooking supplies. They have many sizes and colors, they are padded with REAL stitching, metal corners, and a metal tag holder on the spine. They are D-ring and lay flat. Best of all the price is only $13.79, order over $50 and shipping is free.

A did a review of the Bindertek binder a while back.

https://goscf.com/t/17401

A 2" binder costs $12. Slip case is $10.50

Some great information here! Southpaw - feel free to email me regarding Spain. I purchased the PageMaker files about 10 years ago and created some of my own pages in PageMaker at the time. I've since upgraded to Illustrator so I'm eager to pull the old files up and try some of the ideas you have shared.

Paul

A seller just listed supplements for the Scott Platinum albums that I am so fond-of, by year, ranging from 1998 to 2008. I purchase 1998-2002, and 2006, but was outbid on everything else. In case you are wondering why I am making a big deal out of it, these supplements are no longer available. Look what the 2007 supplement sold for - 20 pages for $91!!

http://www.ebay.com/itm/Scott-Unite...p=true&rt=nc

Brian