New Stamp Issues Poll: For, Against Or Neither?

I am for them but not in the quantity that all administrations are pushing. I voted neither - I hope that stands for neutal

Peter

Neither is neutral.

I think you need more options for this poll. Like the poster above, I am for them, in moderation. After all, whenever they change the postal rates they need new definitives in those values, even if you think commemoratives are an unnecessary extravagance.

Just too many issued by the British Post office and they aren't readily available for use anyway. I think current issues should be back of the book they don't qualify as postage stamps, in my opinion. I suspect Canada and the US are the same but I don't know.

I'm for new stamp issues, but I would really like to see a greater emphasis on producing stamps which have a longer range meaning than some of the topics which have been selected over the past couple of decades.

Historical topics, scientific topics, achievements in medicine, and the like are always acceptable. Homer Simpson, dragons on U.S. stamps? Harry Potter showing British actors on U.S. stamps? I get the pressure to provide relevant pop appeal, but I'm not sure postage stamps are the place for that.

I'll come down off my soapbox now...

Love them, and find the design quality for new issues in general continues to improve over previous decades. Though of course there are a few design tragedies every year (the US Airmail Centennial Stamps for example, no I do not like their design at all). Many nations are very good at using stamps to market their societies to the rest of the world.

In the end one tends to fixate on raw numbers, but given the complexity of modern societies, I think worrying about the number of issues is less of a concern than the total cost of the issues (unless you are Australia, where for reasons I never have comprehended, the PO still believes it needs to issue both traditional gum and self adhesive versions of most issues, which significantly inflates the cost of what otherwise would be a fairly reasonable stamp program).

And I am all for a mix of "pop" and "serious" issues...going back to the days of celebrating the achievements of only "great people" as it was in the past would be the surest way to finally kill off any interest in philately among younger generations. Need to have a balance between the two, that will really capture the spirit of the society the stamps derive from. Some on here in another thread decried the Australian "Vintage Jam Labels" issue from last month, but I thought they were brilliant - capturing a piece of Australian commercial history and a topic that itself has a collector following (jam label collectors).

Only thing I do NOT like in general are those issues produced by philatelic agents for, generally, developing nations, which are never release in the nation of purported origin but rather are sold directly to the philatelic trade, often have topics that have no local relevance (or even would offend local sensibilities), and issues at face values that meet no apparent postal rate in the country they supposedly come from. Yes, IGCP and Stamperija, I am death-staring at you both. If you removed the questionable wallpaper produced by these two companies (who do, it must be noted, produce a small number of stamp issues for local use for their client companies, though Stamperija does NOT distribute those local issues to the philatelic trade) then you would cut the number of new issues produced globally each year by something like 30 to 40%.

Since I stopped trying to keep up with all the new U.S. issues in 2005, I don't really buy any new stamps except for commemoratives that interest me topically. This is true of the panes and booklets I save for my collection as well as the stamps I buy for actual postal use, and in both cases I tend to prefer stamps with pop culture themes. Today I bought a pane of Mister Rogers stamps to use on actual mail; I may buy another to save. I'll unquestionably buy several panes of the forthcoming John Lennon stamps, both to use and to save.

The only issue I bought last year was the Total Solar Eclipse; I still need to buy the Disney Villains. In 2016 I bought Shirley Temple (to complete the Legends of Hollywood series), Star Trek (far inferior to the Canadian issues), and Wonder Woman.

"Like the poster above, I am for them, in moderation.} Me too.

I collect modern US but do not think much of many of them but the stamp program has been that way for many many years. I thought engraved definitive series were the good ones.

You and I think very much alike, Angore. I also think it is a terrible idea to commemorate everything under the sun. Gone are the days when they glorified our institutions and our history.

Jack Kelley

Meh.

Not only is Canada Post issuing to many stamps annually, they are issuing too many variations of the same stamp. There are stories, (rumors?) of clerks refusing to sell newly issued stamps before the stock of current holdings are gone. At times, I find it difficult to understand or create the rationale that Canada Post supposedly uses. It certainly doesn't always promote philately.

Modern postage is good for mailing things.

@rogdcam, tell that to some of the clerks I encounter. They only want to use those barcode stickers

Peter

That was the nail in the coffin for me with U.S. stamps. It just became too expensive to buy umpteen varieties of "Flag Over Porch" and its ilk, not to mention the mounts and supplements to house them. I wasn't deriving enough enjoyment from it to make it worth the expense, and it certainly wasn't a good investment. If I feel the compulsion to fill spaces in my U.S. album, I still have plenty of gaps in the Fourth Bureau Issue and before, thank you very much.