Repetition day

[Lhyz]

@Mariannin

I know this will be a discrimination, but.
The one thing that’s not mentioned and that I was thinking about that postcrossers in the frequent countries should automatically have the button “send to your own country” permanently ticked.

I undestand where you are comming from but, you said it as well, it will be discriminatory to make it mandatory just for some countries. They already get a lot of negativity by simply existing, because they are the most frequent countries and some people don’t cut down dissapointment from “Ah, I got [common country] AGAIN”.

And also this:

@S_Tuulia

This is discussed in some other threads.
It could perhaps make the situation worse. More cards travelling fast, more free slots, more cards to this frequent country.

@S_Tuulia

So, would choosing “not to my own country” actually help more?

I know that for some people in the USA (that country is the one I’ve heard about the most) actually like the “Own country” option because they have postcard-specific value for stamps, it is waaay cheaper and they also try to “get all 50 states”, since some are more common than others. And, over all, while that could be a solution, I’m trying to think and gather ideas that will make people want to join, instead of choosing solutions that, yeah, they would work, but they need to be implemented as mandatory things for people from certain countries to do.
After all, this is a hobby, I wouldn’t want to make people “pay” for the country they are living on.

Also, I cannot quote everyone who’s been talking about “Own country” option, but it is something that doesn’t really make a difference if there are not a lot of users from your own country.
I’ve been a year in Postcrossing and during the year I’ve lived in two not-rare-but-not-frequent countries: Norway and Spain.
So, far. I received 1 postcard from while I was in Norway. Didn’t send one from and I have yet to receive or send a postcard to Spain. It will be way cheaper to send to my own country and I have the option ON but it is to no help.

@ravishing

To be honest, I’m not thrilled with this idea. I occasionally use the repeated option but most of the time I don’t use it because I find it boring to get the same countries all the time. I have nothing against these countries, don’t misunderstand. Of course, people are always different but I prefer to have variety. If Postcorssing starts demanding that you have to use the repeated option, I think many users will stop this hobby. If the rule is only for one day, many don’t necessarily want to participate in it.

I also prefer sending to as many different countries as possible.
But, I don’t know if it is just me, lately I feel like I am in PC with my “Repeated countries” option ON (I don’t, I double checked).
All I have lately to send is , and
And for receiving, it is the same three +
It feels a little bit ridiculous, this has been going for some time. While I undestand that now I get - in proportion - more addresses to Russia because my country has not banned sending mail there, it looks like those are the only ones I’m sending to.
My country can not send to 81 territories, true. But most of them are on the Rare group for PC. And there are 248 territories in PC, that’s still 167! I don’t know what’s going on.

That’s how all this started. I spent some time in the forum reading about other people’s comments in repetition, diversity in sending-receiving, and trying to find some kind of way to, while not decreasing the chance to get a common country, increase the chance to get a less common one while at it.
To me, if this trend of sending to , and continues, I will just try to turn on Repeated countries and test a bit @HookedonPostcards theory by myself.

@HookedonPostcards

I recently started to check the repetition tab to hold for about 2 weeks each month. Whether it is coincidence, or not, I am finding that I am getting more cards from different countries than before during the “non-repetition” weeks. It has made for some interesting variety.

That is why I thought about suggesting making something that could make a lot of people try the Repeated countries option. It is a way not to put the “problem” or “guilt” in the most frequent countries, because it is nobody’s individual responsability to be “many people” in PC. While making it an activity that is nicer because a lot of people are doing it at the same time + everyone still gets a chance to decide if they want to join or not.

[S_Tuulia]

@S_Tuulia

So, would choosing “not to my own country” actually help more?

I have to add that I am not suggesting this to be mandatory. Just thinking that it would help maybe more than sending in one’s own country.

I have had repeated countries on for long, now I have 48 travelling, 1 to China, all the rest to Germany and USA I would be curious to see how it would look like after one day everyone taking repeated countries

@ravishing

If Postcorssing starts demanding that you have to use the repeated option, I think many users will stop this hobby.

Maybe this could be advertised as fairness? At some point some members wrote how previously the addresses were given in a better way, one for one, and not in groups and they thought it was more fair than what now is done. (I don’t know if this is true.) So, if you want the next free address, it would be what it is, so repeated would be always on for everyone. Who knows, maybe not having repeated countries on has some affect on this when addresses are given multiple times (when for example German member is waiting for 10 cards, but ten members don’t want to send repeated, it will wait those who like repeated (or have enough other countries?), and the “non repeated” must be given address too, so they will get someone’s who is not waiting for a card, and/or it will be their extra/in advance card.

[Molletje]

@ravishing

If Postcorssing starts demanding that you have to use the repeated option, I think many users will stop this hobby.

@Molletje

But if we all send postcards to all countries again, everyone will have more variety again.

I think the problem of always the same countries is caused by the option of always different countries.
If you remove the option to get only different countries, everyone gets more variety again.

An example with random numbers to make it clearer.

Example:
You have 300 addresses in Germany that need to get a card.
And you have 100 postcrossers asking for addresses.
Then each postcrosser can send 3 cards to Germany.

But if 25 of them only want to send 1 to Germany
75 postcrossers have to send 275 cards to Germany.
That’s 3.66 cards per person.

If 50 postcrossers only want to send 1 card to Germany,
then the 50 others have to send 250 cards to Germany.
That’s 5 cards per person.

If 75 postcrossers only want to send 1 card to Germany
the 25 others have to send 225 cards to Germany.
That’s 9 cards per person.

[Molletje]

@meiadeleite

I’m afraid everyone is going to get A LOT of postcards sent today… There’s no way for Postcrossing to keep giving out addresses in these peak times, unless we do a little bit of magic and send some postcards in advance.

@meiadeleite
There has been discussion in several topics about the option to send cards to the same countries or different countries. You can choose that in your settings. On a day like today when many people send cards, is it possible to make it the same for everyone for 1 day that everyone get multiple addresses to the same countries. That the option to only select addresses from different countries is disabled for 1 day for everyone.

Or is that already happening on days like today?

The subject comes up in all kinds of topics and that people don’t like it that much. I understand the postcrossing situation well, but maybe we can help think along about possible solutions.

See also: More happy mailbox days with the official PC and Repetition day

[meiadeleite]

I moved this post back here, as it was off-topic where it was posted.

@Molletje

On a day like today when many people send cards, is it possible to make it the same for everyone for 1 day that everyone get multiple addresses to the same countries. That the option to only select addresses from different countries is disabled for 1 day for everyone.

This is already the case. The fact is, we just don’t have enough people that should receive postcards, compared to how many are sending them… This is true on any normal day by the way, but it is especially so on a day like today, where 70k+ postcards are sent. Postcrossing was not made for this, so we do a little magic, send postcards in advance, etc… but if we run out of addresses, all bets are off. We might not even be able to sort out an address for someone requesting it at all — let alone an address in an exotic country.

The algorithm will always try its best to give a different country if it can… but if it cannot, then whatever it can find is better than nothing. Repetitions will always automatically increase if we have less addresses available.

[Molletje]

Thank you for your answer. I understand.

@meiadeleite

This is already the case.

Good to read that today everyone gets multiple addresses in the same countries.
And that the option for sending to different countries does not apply today.

[WiscoFamily]

I have recently become active again and ill put in my experience today. I have the repeated countries box off and requested 17 addresses today. I ended up with:
Germany 7
USA 6
China 1
France 1
Slovakia 1
Taiwan 1

I have the send to my own country box on, that saves allot of postage these days and is fast, sometimes 3 days to arrive.

I have no idea if checking the repeated countries box would change anything.

[Mariannin]

My experience is similar.
I’m in a country that does not send to Russia.
So out of 16 cards, 8 went to Germany, 5 to US and 1 each to Finland, United Kingdom and Australia. I don’t have repeated countries on.