Stamp Collecting

One of my hobby to past the time is stamp collecting.
Actually it was not really my hobby to begin with, but I fall in love with those square paper with tiny pictures of all kind of things.
I start to collect stamps about 10 years ago, when the Indonesian economic crisis is hitting our business community very badly. Strangely enough, at the same, the economic crisis was actually creating an opportunity for people with the hobby of collecting. All kind of collecting hobby actually, be it stamps, painting or old stuffs.
Stamp collecting hobby or more widely known as philathelic hobby was booming at that time. People are buying stamps, a lot of new collectors appeared and buying stamps like crazy. I was one of them.

Fortunately I came to my senses and start to see the real picture behind the stamp collecting or philately. Philately is a hobby and at the same time it is also an investment. Due to the nature of the material, it is a longterm investment. When people are collecting stamps, most of the time they are doing it for the material gain. The problem is that most of these people are doing it without really understanding the nature of the small square paper and how their value is growing with time.
I've seen during the first 2 years of my hobby people who are trying to ride the booming market by selling their so called "collection". Most of these are worthless, simply because they do not maintain and take case of their collection. Another matter is they have no idea what they are collecting were just garbage.
There are certain rules that you have to follow if you want your collection worth something in the future. If you go against these rules, most likely you will be collecting garbage only.

The following are some of the guide lines that can be used to collect stamps and hopefully one day it will worth something.

1. The value of the stamps that you collect will go up based on the number of the stamps available in the market. Very seldom the price is going up because of the age of the stamps. A stamp issued in 1998 will be more expensive than the one issue in 1920 if there are lot of 1920 stamps and the 1998 issue was very scarce. So if you want to collect, go for the scarce items/stamps.
2. The condition of the stamps will dictate the value. The better the condition, the higher the value. A single unused stamp with the original gum still undisturbed will be have a higher value compare to the one which has been cancelled. There are occassion where the cancelled stamp is more valuable compare to the brand new one, but this is a rather special case.
3. Do not collect indiscriminately. If you want to collect stamps, try to go with a theme. You can collect stamps based on the country, the period, the picture on the stamps, the application or any specific subject. The important thing is to realize that your collection will never be complete, regardless whatever you are doing and how much money you spend to buy the stamps.
4. Keep the collection in a well ventilated (preferably dry environment) so that it doesn't get damaged. For your information, stamps are very prone to humidity. A high humidity will damage the stamps if they are exposed to it over a long period of time. A careful consideration of where you will keep your collection is very important. You don't want to start collecting all the valuable stamps only to find out later that all your collections are worthless due to prolong humidity exposure.

The above rules are just some of the basic rules that you need to follow if you want to embark on stamp collection or philately. Once you enter the philatelic world, then you will know more about it and able to just for yourself on how to go about doing it.