Anyone Know The Rules For Using Michel Catalog Numbers?

The Ukrainian Post Office uses Michel numbers right on their web site. I thought it might be nice to use them on my Ukrainian stamp pages. I sent an email to them both in English and German. I never got a reply.

Rules?

Not sure what you mean by this but I would think that if you are considering using Michel numbers in your own personal album, there shouldn't be a problem.

Michel has a copyright to their numbers like most major catalogues and I would have to think that the Ukrainian post office received permission (?) Just a guess.

Chimo

Bujutsu

The Hungarian Stamp Catalogue (Magyar Posta- és Illetékbélyeg Katalógus) uses sometimes (mostly in brackets, especially when dealing with perforation varieties) the Michel numerotation, on second page stating: `We thanks for MUNCHEN SCHWANEBERGER VERLAG for permitting us using the MICHEL-KATALOG numerotation`.
So maybe you shoud try at the publisher???? MUNCHEN SCHWANEBERGER VERLAG

I have emailed the publisher and have gotten no replies from them. These are my personal pages, but I give them away on my website for the world to use. If Michel's parent company issues stamp albums, then I would be in direct competition with them.

At least that was Amos' opinion when I tried to get permission to use their numbers on my free album pages.

@apastuszak... Give them time. People at Michel will respond eventually (at least that's my experience). But it takes at least few days, sometimes longer. If you don't get an reply by email in week or so, I would consider posting your question on Michel-forum (it's in German, but they can read/reply in English when required).

FYI, Schwanberger/Michel doesn't have a line for stamp albums (but I think they have some kind of relation to Schaubek. However, they do publish software called MichelAlbum, which is for people designing album pages based on Michel.

Anyway, Michel website has links both to forum & MichelAlbum. Please do check them out.

Thanks for the advice. I have some knowledge of German, so I should be able to post and reply in German if need be.

Ok, it's now November and I have gotten no replies via email or the forum. At what point do I say "**** it, I tried" and just use the numbers on my pages?

Hi,

try to mail Michel staff members directly, e.g. Maren Pohland (sub-forum "Fragen an die Redaktion"). To do this, click on her name, then click on "Private Nachricht senden".

Klaus

Hi apastuszak,

Copyright laws generally allow exemptions for various non commercial uses, such as for academic scholarship or teaching use, research, private unpublished uses and so on. Writing up a stamp album should fall within this exemption. The US Copyright Office includes this in Section 107 of their legislation. There are similar permitted uses in English Law and I would assume German law also has this exemption. The main proviso seems to be that the use is non-commercial and not for financial gain. Should you need more detail you might get a faster reply from the US or German Copyright Offices. Hope this is of help to you.


Terry

Problem is, I publish my stamp album pages for free. So, it's definitely not private use.

Danke, Klaus

I just sent her a private message using as much German as I could remember from high school and Google translate. I included English on the botton, in case my translated intention was not clear.

Hi apastuszak,

Ah. If you publish your pages then even though they are free you will almost certainly need permission and/or a licence from Michel to use their number reference system. I seem to recall that someone running an on-line stamp site wanted to publish a cross reference of the number systems of Gibbons, Michel, Scott and others and was prevented from doing so because of copyright infringement. Personally I thought this complete pig headedness as such a cross reference could only be a benefit to all of the catalogue publishers and their customers.

Terry

I'm sure I do. But I tend to think that Michel may be more lax with whom they give licenses to, since I see Michel numbers used on a lot of sites, and on the sites of foreign post offices.

Full marks for at least trying.

I requested permission from an ebay-er, to use his image
for an early meter cover from Romania.
Never heard back unfortunately :(

So, someone from Michel finally got back to me and told me they would review my request and get back to me. If they let me use the numbers, I would be willing to put a full page ad in one of the PDFs for their Ukraine catalog. Let's see what comes of it.

So apastuszak, any word from Michel about using their numbers?