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Are you tired of sleaze-ball dealers that rip off your grandmother? Then join the civilized world of stamp collecting.  Since making the switch I enjoy my hobby more, make more money, and have lost weight all due to the nice stamp collectors that treat each other with respect, and always encourage and educate the naive for the good of the hobby.  So I will be selling off my silver hoard of VG Walkers that I bought for $2000 last year on the Coin Vault, just as soon as I finish slabbing them all.  All serious offers over $4000 will be considered.  Come over to stamps and feel better, live longer, and find true happiness, all from a little piece of paper! -K Guess you never heard of that flame war of a few years ago in rec.collecting.stamps that so far has made anything here look very mild in comparison. It was the ugliest thing I have ever seen in a usenet hobby newsgroup.   I don't think that coin and stamp collectors are all that much different except in one area: Stamp collectors seem to have much less fear in naming dealers they feel are crooks. There is a very interesting stamp website where people post their experiences with bad Ebay sellers etc., very detailed and very interesting. They don't pull many punches.  With coins there is a cautious be careful or you could get sued attitude.  Stamp collectors seem to throw caution to the wind. Whether that is good or bad I'll let others decide. I rather like stamps but have never gotten to the point of getting serious about collecting them.  I always try to use commemmorative stamps rather than the same old ones most people use.  I like variety.

Then join the civilized world of stamp collecting.  Since making the switch I enjoy ... Thanks for the humor! I also feel that for several reasons, philatelics is perhaps more civilized than numismatics.  My experience with an active stamp dealer was being in a coin shop with both counters.  As the coin counter were some of the typical coin guys.  At the stamp counter was a distinguished older women, grey hair pulled back, suit, you know the type. Ayn Rand was the goddess of gold, but she collected stamps, not coins, and she once rhapsodized about stamp collecting for Minkus. You have the nations like Monaco, Chad, and the United States that depend on the sale of dubious stamps for immediate income.  The best I can think of was the stainless steel Literacy stamps from Nepal, a nation without steel mills and with a population too illerate to really need a mail system.  On the other hand, you have Estonia, a little nation so darned literate that the people there counterfeited stamps in preference to counterfeiting money.  So, stamp collecting is what you make it to be for yourself. Myself, I like postcards and covers.  I like to see that a stamp has been used and know how it served its purpose. My other hobby is aviation.  Airmail covers can be overly plentiful, but I look for true firsts and earliests, the C-1 stamps of nations that really have airports for instance.  I also like First Flight Covers, and have gotten in Space Flight covers.  My favorite there is a SECRET US SPY SATELLITE cancelled cover from Cape Canaveral

when my nephew was 7 I tried to get him interested in coin collecting with the SQ program in 1999 but all he was interested in was stamps so I buy him all kinds of stamps. I did get my niece into coin collecting when she was 5, now she's 11 and  says to her grandpa if Eddie dies I get his coins right. My father looks at me and grins well you got her into coin collecting : ) What is it about collecting coins that brings out the greedy I got to have it mentality : )

Thanks for the humor! I also feel that for several reasons, philatelics is perhaps more civilized than numismatics.... Philatelics is also FAR FAR less of an investment than numismatics