tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post6204820777752872079..comments2023-10-06T13:49:59.091-04:00Comments on Filling Spaces: Counting SpacesBobhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/04111329068221289436noreply@blogger.comBlogger14125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-19755621360930860672012-06-17T15:15:50.103-04:002012-06-17T15:15:50.103-04:00Drew, I'm currently doing some research on the...Drew, I'm currently doing some research on the first edition of the Blue which presumably represents as close to Scott's original intentions as possible. If I don't become sidetracked I'll post something about this in the next few days. I suspect you are quite correct on several points.Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04111329068221289436noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-11959662523579075092012-06-16T22:48:21.753-04:002012-06-16T22:48:21.753-04:00That strikes me as a bit of an odd way to design a...That strikes me as a bit of an odd way to design an album. I would not ignore any data I had access to, including most frequently-collected stamps as Scott claims to have done. But I'd also make my decisions on what the stamps cost the collector – information that is in their own catalogue, after all , and not just what I saw in collections I purchased. In other words, I'd use common sense and the data I had on hand. <br /><br />That is, if we were trying to be consistent and inclusive. But I don’t think Scott was trying to be either consistent or inclusive. They were trying to produce a product for sale to Americans of the nineteen-teens and ‘twenties. <br /><br />In 1915 (or so), could Scott have lacked the confidence that it really knew which stamps were less expensive? Was that what made them consult collections they were purchasing to make decisions about which stamps to include in their albums? That can’t make any sense. After all, they produced the catalogues which showed which stamps were less expensive! Al they had to do was use their own catalogues. <br /><br />An additional factor that must have played an important role was their concern about the cost of the album. In every Big Blue album, Scott says that it’s for “a representative collection” for “varieties ordinarily found in most collections.” Being a responsible stamp-valuing organization, Scott could have used its own catalogue valuations to choose which stamps to include. But they don’t even claim to have done this. <br /><br />The Scott catalogue contains many stamps that are very affordable but which are not in the albums—thousands perhaps. Were these stamps much more expensive in 1915? It’s hard to believe they were.<br /><br />Scott clearly needed to keep the size of the albums manageable and less expensive. So they needed some rationale for excluding stamps. Maybe they thought that by defining Big Blue albums as for “cheaper stamps,” they’d be denigrating the collectors who bought the albums? Maybe “representative collection” just sounded better? <br /><br />Omitting so many very affordable stamps may have been due to an editorial effort to cut down number of pages by omitting a few stamps here and a few there. They had their own catalogues to consult, yet they don’t seem to have done that much, so I think exclusions were done in a fairly arbitrary way to meet a page limit. “Find a few hundred more spaces to cut from the album so it’s not quite so long,” may have been the businesslike approach. And which stamps could you most easily justify omitting? Here, popularity of countries may have played a role, avoiding cutting Germany, Britain and the U.S. (it’s a U.S. album sold to German and British ancestry buyers in the U.S.), but cut Azerbaijan and other countries aggressively to keep the number of pages down. <br /><br />I'm sure Scott intended their approach to be logical, but it also had to be businesslike. The album is a product. The combination of these factors led to many partial sets and the exclusion of thousands of common stamps. Since they do not appear to have used their own catalogue valuations, we have to look for other reasons for hundreds of exclusions of otherwise common stamps. I think the explanation comes from their need to cut pages by cutting stamps from less popular countries while claiming that what the album includes is based on “popularity,” not cheapness.DrewMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08082601555760640397noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-65932835407927984982012-06-15T11:50:48.179-04:002012-06-15T11:50:48.179-04:00I looked at a list of what Scott was selling using...I looked at a list of what Scott was selling using a pdf of the 1916 Catalog. (The first Blue came out in 1914.) There aren't really enough listings for individual stamps to determine a pattern, and the majority of the packets are regional rather than single country. Scott does say in one of its adverts in this Catalog that the stamps chosen for the Blue are based on the frequency of inclusion in a "large number of general collections" they have purchased. I'll try to expand on this in a day or two in a new blog post.Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04111329068221289436noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-46733481667267145622012-06-13T14:26:52.550-04:002012-06-13T14:26:52.550-04:00In response to John's comment about Scott tyin...In response to John's comment about Scott tying its stamp sales to the layout of its albums, it's an interesting suggestion. This assumes, of course, that Scott's stamp sales at the time the pages in Big Blue were first laid out were pretty standardized -- that they had certain stamps, but not others. Wasn't that in the late 1920s (can't recall the first year of the Big Blue Junior album)? If so, what stamps were widely sold and bought during that decade? If it was sales of Seebecks, Central America, etc., maybe Scott did reflect its own stamp sales in page layout? I'd never thought much about the connection. <br /><br />Of course, if Scott's stock of stamps for sale were constantly changing -- which I'd think they might have been -- page layout wouldn't be tied to stamp sales. Nevertheless, Scott DID know what stamps were generally available in the market, perhaps more than almost anyone else. Would their page layout people not have known this? An interesting new element here.<br /><br />As for Bob's teaser about Scott's "editorial practices," I'd love to find out more. I wonder if the stamp media -- does it still exist apart from Linn's? -- hasn't delved into this? Or maybe they have and there are long lost research articles on this very subject? Where's the Great Database of stamp collecting articles we need to look this up? Somebody made these decisions at some point. They must have had reasons. And presumably this was written down somehow. We can see the results in the album itself, but why these choices were made is an interesting question. Well, to me, anyway especially since they're so idiosyncratic.DrewMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08082601555760640397noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-7756848799713876272012-06-12T20:09:00.988-04:002012-06-12T20:09:00.988-04:00Drew, I think I'm slowly getting a handle on s...Drew, I think I'm slowly getting a handle on some editorial practices in the Blue that help explain why some stamps are usually there and others aren't, and eventually I'll try to post these. But the bottom line is the album is all over the place. For example, Nicaragua gets great coverage (at least until the last issues) but some other Latin American countries aren't done justice at all.Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04111329068221289436noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-85662642563507939122012-06-12T20:03:06.837-04:002012-06-12T20:03:06.837-04:00John, it had never occurred to me that there might...John, it had never occurred to me that there might be a relationship between the stamps that Scott had for sale and what was in their albums. Unfortunately, I don't know how one could pursue this.Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04111329068221289436noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-63100987750239357222012-06-12T14:53:22.979-04:002012-06-12T14:53:22.979-04:00Since Scott sold stamps, in addition to publishing...Since Scott sold stamps, in addition to publishing albums, I assume thier choices in laying out the album were closely related to the stamps they sold on approval and in packets. I think they must have sold A LOT of Central American BOB stamps.Johnhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/13451325013622393269noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-16279904375553147502012-06-12T01:03:48.162-04:002012-06-12T01:03:48.162-04:00Poor Azerbaijain. Wonder what Scott's editors...Poor Azerbaijain. Wonder what Scott's editors of yesteryear had against it? Is there any accounting for why some countries get such heavy coverage and others don't? Is it the usual Europe-first mentality? <br /><br />A related question which I think has been asked before is why such spotty coverage of less expensive stamps in many countries? Is it even possible that the stamps left out by Scott's editors were once more expensive to acquire? Seems pretty unlikely, doesn't it? So why were they omitted? <br /><br />If we had the tape recordings and no 18-minute gaps in them of Scott's editors discussing their choices for inclusion and omission, it would be very interesting. Do you think somewhere at some time Scott kept minutes, notes, or other written rationale for why inclusion decisions were made? Would these choices have been made with the advent of the Scott "Junior" International which would make them c. 1930 or so? Isn't that the basis of the current International albums? <br /><br />I suppose Scott cannot very well redesign pages now in any economical way to include long-omitted stamps from sets, etc.? So, the bottom line even with all the weighing of numbers and wondering is that the album exists as it exists, and if we wish to use it these are the stamps we will collect. I guess.DrewMhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/08082601555760640397noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-89758194565147292072012-06-06T18:04:59.854-04:002012-06-06T18:04:59.854-04:00Regarding the blank pages, here's how they loo...Regarding the blank pages, here's how they look in the 1997 edition:<br />US Souvenir Sheets: missing in the '97.<br />India Convention States: one blank page in the '97, with headings for six states.<br />India Feudatory States: three pages with spaces for nine states (included in my count).<br />Italy Offices in the Turkish Empire: one page with seven spaces (included in my count).<br />Italy Aegean Islands Occupation Stamps: one blank page with headings for 12 islands.<br /><br />Joetrptjoehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17441531041140019043noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-23272633529362614782012-06-06T14:06:50.032-04:002012-06-06T14:06:50.032-04:00This comment has been removed by the author.trptjoehttps://www.blogger.com/profile/17441531041140019043noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-10323567136704954412012-06-06T12:57:06.617-04:002012-06-06T12:57:06.617-04:00Scott is between a rock and a hard place with the ...Scott is between a rock and a hard place with the Classic Catalog. If you don't really care about the price increases per stamp, there is really no reason to periodically buy a new one. Even a 1943 Scott catalog purchased off ebay would be as good to identify stamps in the Big Blue or Big Brown.<br /><br />Their technique is to add "new" stuff, like the Brazil Varig semi-official airmails that they have spent 70 or more years saying was "beyond the reach of the catalog." <br /><br />There is a limit to how much stuff they have left to list. I would assume eventually their coverage would parallel SG or Michel or Minkus.<br /><br />BillBill Gradyhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/00873620612567939138noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-71858903553041821692012-06-06T10:42:51.284-04:002012-06-06T10:42:51.284-04:00Kiejo, vis-a-vis differences in catalog coverage: ...Kiejo, vis-a-vis differences in catalog coverage: I never really thought much until recently about the influence that catalogs have on our collecting habits, and why the decision to demote stamps that had major numbers to minor numbers can meet with so much resistance. I wonder if the Scott Classic Catalog, say, were to suddenly include postal stationary for the world what impact that would have. <br /><br />But more to your original point, I think it would be very interesting to do an analysis of the top 10 countries using Scott, SG, and Michel for everything, and then the leading catalogs for individual countries as applicable.Bobhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/04111329068221289436noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-26409269992719234442012-06-06T00:55:51.341-04:002012-06-06T00:55:51.341-04:00Damn, I love these posts about statistics...
Ser...Damn, I love these posts about statistics... <br /><br />Seriously speaking I find the tidbits about top10 countries (in Scott + BigBlue) very interesting as I can compare it with numbers I have for Michel catalogue. Without going into details, I'll simply say the differences appear somewhat large. It's amazing how differently editors of stamp catalogues can look at the same stamps (I think Jim's blog post about classic British stamps was just a tip-of-iceberg example of this).Keijohttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06857650471706004438noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-3749098825907573686.post-85143742715585505682012-06-05T00:18:35.026-04:002012-06-05T00:18:35.026-04:00Bob
As far if I am counting accurately the number...Bob<br /><br />As far if I am counting accurately the number of major stamp descriptions for a country in the Scott Classic, I would say it is ball- Parkish. ;-)<br /><br />I count once, and no doubt there is some error.<br /><br />Joe has done everyone a great favor by counting all the stamp spaces in the '97 Big Blue. I know for a fact that his numbers are quite accurate indeed.<br /><br />His '97 count should be very close to the '69 count.<br /><br />I must say I am becoming more impressed with Big Blue 's general ability to keep expensive stamps out of the catalogue. BB seems to have taken a good deal of criticism recently for the stamps that should be, but are not in the album. I'm of course partially responsible for that. ;-). But we need to give BB it's due- nothing will kill a collecting interest quicker than a lot of "required" expensive stamps.<br /><br />It is a hobby after all. ;-)Jimhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/02024632082262694589noreply@blogger.com