Studio Practice: Studio Brief 2 - Collection of information on stamps

Before i start organising all my information into a presentation document to present in the final crit, i decided to collect a bunch of information on stamps and some history behind it. My main goal behind the research was the show the incline of postage stamp. The rise of the franklin machine becoming a cheaper method. Also the rise of social media which could be the deciding factor for the elimination of stamps.

Facts

In 1849 the French Government introduced a law making it an offence to wash or otherwise clean used French postage stamps
The earliest postal markings date back to about 3000 B.C. They were used by Egyptian court officials and read: 'In the name of the living king, speed!'
A stamp was created on the Moon!
On May 6th 1840, the world's first postage stamp went on public sale at post offices in England. The first stamp was called "Penny Black" as it was printed in black and cost one penny.
The first stamp collector was John Bourke, Receiver-General of Stamp Duties in Ireland.
Potato starch, wheat starch and acacia gum were the ingredients of the gum used
The first postcards were released on January 1 1872. The text on each postcard read: "The postal authorities are not responsible for the contents of the letter".on the back of the Penny Black.
Before stamps were invented, the person who received the letter was charged by the number of pages, and also by the distance the letter had travelled.
The Swedish Treskilling Yellow sold for a record breaking 1.6m
Australian government, has come out with stamps that look like gems (complete 3D technology et al), diamonds, pearls.
The King of stamps: Elvis Presely's stamp released in 1993 by US government has been the most old stamp. It sold roughly 124.1million stamps.
China issued the largest stamps ever - 210 x 65 mm
Columbian State of Bolivar issues the smallest stamp ever - 9.5 x8mm
Cats were used for a mail service in Liege, Belgium, in 1879. In all, 37 cats were employed to carry bundles of letters to villages within a 30km radius of the city centre.
In 1973 Bhutan issued a stamp that looked like a record. Put it on a record player and it would actually play the Bhutanese national anthem!
A schoolmaster from England, Rowland Hill invented the adhesive postage stamp in 1837, an act for which he was knighted. Through his efforts the first stamp in the world was issued in England in 1840.
Britain is the one and only country whose postage stamps do not include the name of the country within their design
About one billion (or 1000 million) stamps are produced in Australia every year and about 1.3 million Australians collect them
The US Stamp glue is vegetarian. and consuming it by licking the stamp add only 1/10 of a calorie. A real fat free vegetarian gum!
The Pacific island of Tonga once issued a stamp shaped like a banana.

Statistics

Franking can be up to 38% cheaper
then stamps

Royal Mail have increased their discounts to users of franking machines and it is at present up to 34% cheaper than using traditional stamps. You will make a saving of 22% for every 1st class outgoing letter and 34% for every 2nd class letter

In 1920, 558 million letters were delivered, which rocketed to 8 billion in 1938 and 10 billion in 1959

The 10 billion letters sent was achive in 1959

There was a small lull in the 1970’s, but from the 1980’s the company increased by an extra 5 billion letters per decade, with a whopping 20 billion letters sent in 2004t

Due to social influence there has been a gradual slump and the current amount of letters being delivered per year stands at around 16.6billion

The table below shows the steady rise of stamps over a 150 years time span.

Historic U.S. Postage Stamp Prices	Cost of a Stamp
January 22, 2012	$0.45
May 11, 2009	0.44
May 14, 2007	0.41
June 30, 2002	0.37
July 1, 2001	0.34
January 10, 1999	0.33
January 1, 1995	0.32
February 3, 1991	0.29
April 3, 1988	0.25
February 17, 1985	0.22
November 1, 1981	0.20
March 29, 1978	0.15
December 31, 1975	0.13
March 2, 1974	0.10
May 16, 1971	0.08
January 7, 1968	0.05
August 1, 1958	0.04
July 6, 1932	0.03
July 1, 1885	0.02
March 3, 1863	0.06 (.03 per half ounce)

Opinions

I asked 20 people 3 questions about their opinions about stamps and whether or not they will be replaced by modern technology.

The question were:

1.) Do you think stamps will ever be outdated?

2.) Will stamps be replaced by modern technology?

3.) Do you ever use stamps for anything apart from letters?

I won't post all the opinions as most of them are very dull and short. The best opinions i got were as follows.

“I think stamps are here to stay for the foreseeable future, they are useful in our existing postal system, however I don't doubt that one day a new, much more efficient technique will be used and they will be replaced with something much more up to date”

“I think they are to there to stay because people from arround the globe use it and even in countries where getting a more updated and modern technology system would be much more difficult.”

“I think one day they won't be used anymore, and will probably be done instead with some kind of technology which is a shame because they identify different parts of the word and there's so many unique ones”

“it's an efficient method of paying for deliveries and proving that they have been payed because it's just there. If they had some other system the would probably have to check an online database and it would be tedious and time consuming”

“It's a shame because they're representative of cultural events and historical figures.”

“A lot more companies are using Franking machine, which is a lot more efficient and practical.”

“technology is always creating ways to make our lives easier, and it's only a matter of time before stamps will be replaced with something more convenient”

"You could mention how alot of people and companies, or people who heavily reply on sending letters, use franking instead of stamps because it's more efficient and cheaper. I don't know how stamps can be used in other ways though"

"I think one day they won't be used anymore, and will probably be done instead with some kind of technology which is a shame because they identify different parts of the word and there's so many unique ones. I only use them for letters"

"I don't think stamps will be outdated, it's an efficient method of paying for deliveries and proving that they have been payed because it's just there. If they had some other system the would probably have to check an online database and it would be tedious and time consuming. And no I only use them for sending things, they;re too expensive to do anything else with!"

"I'm sure it's only a matter of time before, an app comes along which does the whole process for you without the need for a stamp"

Words

Again i asked a bunch of people what was the first word that came into their heads when they heard the word stamps. Some of these words were:

Collection

letters

royal mail

boring

royal

red

monarch
Queen

wavy

head