Do You Get Your Money's Worth From The APS

I just completed a thorough review of the APS digital library (collectively known as The Philatelic Union Catalogue) and I want to share my thoughts on my experience with it.

There are 193 "Online" listings on the APRL search webpage.

http://catalog.stamplibrary.org/Inm...ie/opac.aspx

Of those, the vast majority of ebooks are actually found on other webpages including (but not limited to) the USPCS, books.google, Archive.com, and the Hathaway trust webpages. The latter requires membership to a "partner" organization (all of which appear to be university libraries) in order to download the materials, but is still view-able online.

There were a number of APRL-only books listed, but none of those were free to non-members. The only free APRL literature was philatelic exhibits from various shows.

My opinion is that this site needs some fine-tuning. Aside from the clunky search tool with limited search options, there are dozens of other sources the APRL could link to for digitized literature. Search criteria such as fee vs free, country, era, file type, and APRL vs 3rd party would be useful. Additionally, I see no effort to acknowledge the organizations who are hosting said documents - you don't know who the host is until you click the link "full display".

Although I am being critical of the APS, I see great potential in this site. A few minor tweaks, and this could become a world-class philatelic search tool for not only digital literature, but other online resources. For example, 1847USA.com and theswedishtiger both have great color and identification guides for collectors, and SCF has had some amazing articles written by members that appear nowhere else.

I'd be interested in hearing from anyone else who might have more to add ...


To answer Art's question:




I think I'm convinced. I'll post my member number soon ...

Brian

As for digitized content, I just downloaded "Counterfeit Kansas-Nebraska Overprints on the 1922-1934 Issue" by Schoen and DeVoss, so once again I just got my membership dollars worth.

As posted in another post....by me.

HungaryForStamps - did you have to pay or was it free? I think the cost of membership would be worth that book alone!

It appears they are also starting to offer more smaller on-line classes. From the AP

"To help address the challenge, we have begun offering "Collecting Connections." Through this new program
of online classes, APS instructors are able to offer smaller 1–2 hour,
modules of their popular live courses at various times throughout
the year. Students may take all of the modules or only the ones that
meet their current interests and educational needs.
"Collecting Connections" classes under consideration for 2015
include U.S. Revenues, Postal History, Germany, Stamps & Stories of
the 1920s , Collecting WWII Intercontinental Air Mail, and Com-
puters and Collecting I and II"

Riley San wrote: "Although I am being critical of the APS, I see great potential in this site......" I've been an APRL member for a number of years; in addition to my base APS membership. I've seen the Library make some great strides. Altho, as evident from Brian's note, there is room for even more improvement. I agree with those ideas.

Now, I do have to admit that it is very unlikely that I will engage as heavily in the APRL. I've always found libraries to be heavily addictive; in a positive sense; and don't have the time for yet another hobby addiction :-) . It's the same reason I avoid the American Alpine Club library here in metro Denver, even though I'm a 20 year AAC member; same for the Rocky Mountain Philatelic Library.

Ebooks are great and all, but don't compare to holding it in your hand. I've never had a book crash on me. I've dropped a couple, but that's normal.
I do like the online class idea especially for our stamp club. I'm gonna see what the costs are and pitch it to the membership.
Value earned.

Generational difference, perhaps?

I LOVE e-books because they are inexpensive, I can carry an entire library on my notebook PC, I don't have to be concerned about wearing out a rare and/or expensive paper book, I can search an entire volume in seconds, expand or enhance pictures with the click of a mouse, and I can share what I've learned with my friends using cut & paste.

Oddly enough, I don't think I will ever do away with my paper catalogues. I do occasionally enjoy disconnecting from our digital world :)

Brian

Cheaper than hard-bound books, yes ... but more expensive than paperbacks. With the current display quality of e-readers, I actually prefer e-books over their traditional counterpart. But it is still far cheaper to borrow a book (hard-bound or paperback) from my public library than to buy it as an e-book. The best of both worlds (electronic & paper) will come about if/when publishers cease attempting to limit e-book acquisition by public libraries. To borrow an e-book, I don't even need to visit the library ... I can check it out from home. Or probably from anywhere via my smart-phone (if I had one). Unfortunately, the list of available e-books at public libraries remains severely limited.
Oops! Just realized that I've contributed to sending this thread off-topic. Sorry!

Too bad Scott isn't an ebook!

That's coming this year. On the heels of the dissolution of the group that managed the Scott iPad app, they're supposedly working on an ebook version that will be avilable later this year, across multiple platforms.

Membership costs $45 per year. I thank the monthly magazine is worth that. I use to to be signed up for 22 different circuits in 2010. I was paying 32% of CV before buyers fee, shipping and insurance. When you include those items I was paying 41% of CV. That was too much so I stopped getting the circuits. Now I get my stamps at 15-20% of CV from stamp club members or when I buy a country collection at a stamp show. I have decided I will not pay more than 25% of CV for a stamp.

No matter the stamp?

That is excluding yourself from a lot of great stamps.

That ellusive stamp missing from your collection is probabally missing because of price. Say, it cats for $300.00 VF. You will pass on it at $200.00? That seems a bit extream to me, I would grab it and run like I stole it.

I'm sure that there are exceptions. There always are.

Art

In response to artlaunier post.

I am a stamp collector not an investor. I never plan on selling my collection. It will go to someone after I die. Before I pay over $100 for a stamp I will have all stamps with a CV less than $100. I would rather have a collection of 100,000 $1.00 stamps than a collection of 10 $10,000 stamps. To me a great stamp collection is on the coverage of the collection not the value. So, the answer to your question is no. Not only will I not pay over 25% for a stamp I will not pay over $100 for a stamp.

Rileysan,




I downloaded it for free. It took me a while to find it. I logged in, went to MyAPS and there was a link on the right to download.

I think you can search the APRL catalog by entering OnLine for the library and "Kansas" for the keyword and it will show there also. If you just search the OnLine library with no keywords you get a list. A lot of the links point to the USPCS site.