Lazy postcards?

I 've recieved my first card with a printed message on it a few weeks ago. And in the first moment you think “oh, what’s that”? But here at PC you learn not to judge a person too early. Beyond the registration you see the profile of the sender and there are cases, other wrote about it before, that the sender hasn’t the ability to handwrite a message on the card. That’s the moment I think to myself, how lucky this person is to carry on with this hobby, even with some help by printer or other people.

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Every now and then I get a card with a printed message.
Almost all of them had their (good) reasons why to do this (health issues, really absolutely illegible handwriting, etc.) and almost all also had personal and nice messages. For some people it is the only way to get in touch with other people and just because for this reason I would never make any comments about a printed message.
And because there were also unpersonal and bothering handwritten messages.

Messages with “check out my shop” I do simply ignore.

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I got just very few of such cards, maybe ten out of more than 5500.

As someone who is new to this (a little over a year) the times I am least sure what to send it when I get someone who has sent and received 1000 or more cards and I just wonder what I could add to that. But then I usually remind myself that people who really are postcard collectors and want something rare can find each other on the forum.

Actually, another surprise for me was people wanting cards from the place they’re sent. I can see the reasoning; it’s just not the way I think. And it’s not a problem for me as I’ve got a couple of good local sources, but I know it can be for other people.

It actually took me a few months to start using stickers or washi. Years ago, I had a friend whose husband worked for the post office and his rule of thumb was that other than address labels, you shouldn’t put anything sticky on mail. Once I started getting tons of postcards including ones from overseas with 3-d stickers, I relaxed a bit.

And for people who do want something specific–like the temperature or they don’t want stickers or washi (because some card collectors don’t) or they don’t want them sent in envelopes, phrasing it in a positive way–"I’d really appreciate it if you could write the date and temperature-- is much more likely to get you what you want, at least from me. I have wound across a few profiles that are just filled with dos and don’ts and I get rather, “stop bossing me!”

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I’m wondering whether anyone who has gotten a postcard that said “please check my online shop” ever checked the sender’s online shop. It seems a tremendously inefficient way to attract traffic to an online shop and maybe there’s something personal about the sender there, after all. What if someone wrote, “Please check out my blog?”

Well, I have received a few ones with generic printed messages and once even got a (self-) printed card that had the message directly printed on the card (so all the sender needed to do was adding the ID, address and stamps). Those are not my favourites to be honest, but well… the next card will be nicer again. I don’t have the impression it’s very common!

I don’t mind printed texts in general, but prefer if they relate to my profile, the specific card or similar (so they don’t feel generic). But I don’t think about it too long. Sometimes I come across profiles I cannot connect to and if I don’t have anything to tell about that card, I will write a somewhat generic message, too.

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OMG, this post had a lot of responses.

I may need to do some clarifications here:

-In the original post im referring to printed text in postcards, not the address, it is fine to print an address it if you don’t know russian, chinese, or even a language that uses the latin alphabet.

-For the people that say it’s uncommon, I have received about 6 or 7 postcards like that out of 69 on the official postcrossing, that’s a 10% of them.

-Out of all the printed postcards that I got, only one was from a man that didn’t speak english but could write, the rest of the postcards were from relatively young senders who could speak and write english based on their profiles, a lot of them sending loads of cards the same days. I am fine with people who cant write or speak english sending me postcards because they don’t have any other alternative, but not with people who use postcrossing as a “send 20 effortless postcards” “Receive 20 good postcards”

-I am not mad at anyone here, people can send what they want, but I feel like the whole purpose of sending postcards to people is ruined when people do this, the whole magic of receiving a postcard “just for you” kinda disappears, this happened to me with my first postcard from Romania, I was more than excited to see it on my mailbox and all it just said was: Please check my philately blog www.randomname.blogpost.com. If everybody did this the magic of postcrossing would be gone.

-People have no obligation to send postcards with washi, stickers, tea, or anything extra and it is totally fine when they don’t do it.

-Postcrossing joins people together and it is a nice project, however, focusing on collecting postcards only isn’t the aim of it.

-I am ok with people sending me anything if it relates to the back of the card, I actually got a card from Germany with the triumph arch, it would be great if they told me why they sent it but instead all I can read is: Happy postcrossing from xxxxx!

Postcrossing is a great place, but if everyone did this printing and sending thing like a machine all of the magic would be gone, this took me quite long to write so I hope it is clear what im trying to say.

Ah, one last thing

Super happy that there is more people in this forum that speak different languages, thanks Dinkysparkle for teaching us your knowledge in caveman :smiling_face_with_three_hearts:

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But maybe what you consider to be the magic of Postcrossing isn’t what everyone else sees as the magic of it?

Any time we have expectations of what we should get in life, we risk disappointment.

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Postcrossing was created for the purpose of joining people and sharing postcards and stories.

Having expectations isn’t bad when they are realistic.

I never expect the perfect postcard with decoration, washi, stickers and an image and text that I love
I also never expect to receive a card from a person that made a hundred of those without caring and still be happy and optimistic about it.

Negativity and disappointment is an important part of postcrossing, but not all of it, if we considered all cards good then we wouldn’t have favourite cards and we would be okay with anything, conformism isn’t my thing

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I agree, but not everyone is here to connect, some really use the platform to collect, and some do it both to connect while collecting. Postcrossing itself already gives offical statement about collecting here. We can’t control what other postcrossers are here for

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Op. Yes it happens but guess what? Its your postcard. If you dont want it throw it out.

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Thanks I would have never thought

What I don’t understand is how you know that? Maybe the person who sent that “lazy” card has some kind of illness and writing “happy postcrossing” took all day. Maybe they’re paralyzed and writing with a pen between their teeth. Maybe they just got fired. Maybe their child just died. Maybe they don’t care about messages and don’t realize that you do and since it’s their money paying for the card and the postage, they think they can do what they want.

I had a letter correspondent recently told me he’d rather I write by hand. He likes to see his correspondents’ handwriting. On the other hand, I type letters because chronic illness makes writing them by hand a chore. I’m not turning something I enjoy doing into a miserable experience because he expects me to meet a certain standard.

I personally don’t even expect all the official cards allocated to me to arrive. Some may not be mailed and there may or may not be a good reason. (Who knows how many cards were on someone’s desk in Ukraine, just waiting to be stamped, and Putin decided to drop a bomb on that desk.) Some may get lost in the mail. Some may arrive fifteen years from now. Some I may like, some I may not.

In fact, I can’t quite reconcile that negativity and disappointment are supposed to be an important part of Postcrossing. Believe me, if that had been in the mission statement, I wouldn’t have signed up.

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I am sorry for your bad experience, it is so different from mine! I never send printed messages, although some of my messages may be generic, if I cannot connect to the addressees. I love the little exchange between the persons more than the picture side.

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Here’s a picture. I censored my address, because privacy:

I’m sorry you’ve received so many. It sounds as though you got super unlucky. I hope you have none in your next 69 received postcards. My experience is that they’re really rare.

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As I said

Personally I wouln’t think that a person who sends so many postcards like that has any of the problems that you listed.

Anything can send what they want, but still, they shouldn’t be expecting me to be super happy and passionate about it.

As for how I know the senders don’t have a million dramas in their lifes: One of them is a Romanian philatelist with a blog, im sure he knows how to write, another one is a kid in school who can also write and my last example is the woman who advertised me her online shop, who uses her hands to create handmade crafts and still sends loads of postcards whenever she can.

If a person with broken hands, a dead child or any other heartbreaking problem sent me a printed postcard with a bit more than “enjoy goodbye” maybe I would feel like it isn’t a lazy postcard.

And don’t feel personally attacked if you print cards or you don’t, you got a valid reason for doing it.

Only last week i received a postcard with 3 generic sentences printed on a label. No greeting, no relation to the card the label was stuck on - so yes, I was underwhelmed.
In the same week, I also received a card advertising an online shop, and when I did not refer to it in the hurray mail, the sender dropped me another message through the system.
Underwhelmed here too.

However, I just look at the many nice cards with great messages I receive, and then the few that are not that great don’t really matter to me any more.

10% however really is a lot and I hope this has been just an unlucky streak for you - out of two thousand, I maybe received 20 printed ones and some of them gave either a good and valid explanation or the text was obviously in response to my profile and personal, in which cases I don’t mind the print. As other have said, good luck for the next 69!!

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Hey Nadja, I mainly refer to postcards with generic text here, it is fine as long as the text correlates with my profile, the card or the sender. Thanks for sharing

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I think I received only a few of those and it didn’t bother me too much as I believe “all is part of the game” (meaning it’s impossible to have only the good in life, so… I try to unearth some good even from the bad- sometimes it’s a nice stamp, sometimes the postcard is really nice even from a different country- and if all is bad I take it as a reminder that each postcard counts and I mustn’t take that for granted ever! The ones I send as well as the ones I receive)
So, my “Pollyanna thinking’s” are:
Maybe they really need their shop to survive, and it’s a desperate act.
Maybe they’re in a bad place in life and are struggling to send a card, but to receive one back would mean so much hope…
I try to picture all the bad that could excuse the behaviour and at the same time wishing the best to that person.
I remember once having received a postcard from a top user from their country. It was all printed, from the message to the address. When I checked their sent cards,all were the same. So, this person prints like 500 postcards front and back, adding a printed label when they ask the address… I admit I was sad and disappointed. But then…it was a beautiful postcard, a good descriptive message, beautiful stamp. At the end it was an “one of a kind” card and I even liked it​:sweat_smile: once you start looking at life with Pollyanna glasses…:wink:

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