In many points I agree, but from my experience I can say it is hard to keep all hundred slots busy, for every day some ocf your cards will be registered and there is also a rest life besides Postcrossing and you also have to register the incoming cards, which takes also a lot of time if one reads the card and replies to the content. And cards and postage must be paid. Last year I sent about 900 cards and card+postage may add up to US$ 2, so that is about US$ 1,800.
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But that would neither reduce the postage nor would it improve the postal service nor would it make postcards available. In my opinion these external factors do have a massive effect on postcrossing and need to be taken into consideration.
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The main key reason for the decline is the increase in average travel time for postcards.
And the increase in average travel time is due to the fact that the game is globalizing and more and more participants from countries scattered on the map are included in it.
But there will be more postcards in Postcrossing.
Whatās more, most beginners quit Postcrossing when they reach 30-40 postcards. Because they are interested in playing, not waiting. Why not give them that opportunity by adjusting the free slots rule?
And Iāll add that more than half of the TOP-100 play at the limit of 100 slots.
And the founders of Postcrossing know this very well.
In general, there are a lot of postcrossers who play at the limit of the number of their slots.
Taking into account the fact that the free slots rule has not changed for about 10 years, and Postcrossing has spread noticeably during this time, the waiting time for such players has increased.
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How can your graph consider the points I mentioned?
We do not manage the price of mail services and cannot influence it in any way.
But the postage factor doesnāt matter to those who play to the limit of their slots.
And as I wrote above, there are quite a lot of such Postcrossers.
Even among the TOP-100 there are more than half of them.
If the Postcrossing founders give such postcrossers the opportunity to send and receive more, they will gladly do it.
I see no point in arguing with each other.
Iām not hot or cold because Postcrossing is stagnating.
I think this should motivate the founders of the game to do something.
They own the full range of data and can do any analytics.
For the first time, I raised the question of the need to adjust the rules of the slot about 5 years ago, back on the old forum.
To be honest, I donāt understand why this hasnāt been done yet, if it will bring unconditional benefits to Postcrossing, postcrossers and additional profits for mail services.
It is probably more exciting to look at a falling trend than a growing one 
My move is to give a hint. What happens next is not my responsibility.
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Until it does. I have 100 slots at my disposal and used to have all of them filled. Not anymore and not for a long time. And never again, with the postage being what it is - travelling time of the postcards is irrelevant to me. And I bet I am not the only one who made such a decision.
There is one situation I can imagine where I would once again have all my slots filled - if the website were closing and this was the last time I could send Postcrossing cards. Letās hope it doesnāt come to that anytime soon.
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Extrapolate your special case to all is a common misconception in such discussions.
For those who have reached the limit of their 100 slots, the postage in absolute terms can be significant, yes.
But for those who play at the limit of their 50 slots, they are at least half as much.
And those who play at the limit of their 10 slots - 10 times lower.
And as you understand, the second and third kind of Postcrossers in the game are much more than the first.
If you take a close look at this chart, you will see that I am NOT suggesting that the 100 slot cap be removed.
I suggested changing the slot rule with priority at the beginning and middle.
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I like to explore Postcrossing as a system (mass phenomenon), find correlations of its factors, identify triggers of influence in it and give feedback on this in the form of an explanation of the reasons and recommendations for improvement.
I have a lot of experience in optimizing the work of similar systems.
In my profile, I quite openly wrote this:
āWhat I love most about Postcrossing is the next million countdowns where we have to guess when the registered postcards number will reach the next millionth level. Join us!ā
I think itās great that postcrossing provides so many other interesting reasons to participate besides sending and receiving postcards
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I am not. Thatās why I only said āI betā. I have no way to verify it. I only know of a few other examples, which also doesnāt mean there are many others. Still, the postage question is relevant but you continue to insist it isnāt. I just proved you wrong - it is important for at least one person.
However, we would only know the answer to āhow relevant it isā if an experiment was made or at least a questionnaire filled with answers from the majority of Postcrossers, so that we could have some sort of data.
I just donāt share your optimistic view that changing the slot rule for users with less slots would bring the change you think it would. But, as we donāt have the data to compare, we can only speculate on which of the reasons mentioned in the discussion is the most important in the decline of the number of postcards being sent.
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Even if 3/4 of those who play at the limit of their slots will not send more like you, and 1/4 of the participants will take advantage of the new opportunity and send more, then I will be right.
And it is an impossible phenomenon that everyone who plays at the limit of their slots, especially those who have NOT reached 100, have given up such an opportunity.
Therefore, my correctness is undeniable. I apologize for my indiscretion
Questionnaires are a waste of time in my opinion.
The founders of the game have all the data that can be analyzed and draw conclusions.
Even if the growth in the number of cards in the game is 10%, this will already be a huge progress.
It seems to me that we are breaking a lance in vain.
Because we donāt make decisions.
And without the political will of the founders of Postcrossing, all this is just empty talk.
That is why I did not return to this conversation for about 5 years.
And, frankly, Iām not interested in arguing on this topic for at least another 5 years
Just in case, I repeat here the new slot rule in the form of a table (corresponds to the orange curve), which will give a significant increase in registration of postcards and compensate for the stagnation of Postcrossing.
It will also bring more joy and courage to beginners and mid-way postcrossers who play to their limits.
The New Slot Rule. Are you sure you want?
| The number of sent cards | New rule of slots |
|---|---|
| 0 | 0 |
| 0 | 5 |
| 5 | 6 |
| 15 | 7 |
| 25 | 8 |
| 35 | 9 |
| 50 | 10 |
| 100 | 14 |
| 150 | 17 |
| 200 | 20 |
| 250 | 22 |
| 300 | 24 |
| 350 | 26 |
| 400 | 28 |
| 450 | 30 |
| 500 | 32 |
| 600 | 35 |
| 700 | 38 |
| 800 | 41 |
| 900 | 43 |
| 1000 | 46 |
| 1200 | 50 |
| 1400 | 54 |
| 1600 | 58 |
| 1800 | 62 |
| 2000 | 65 |
| 2200 | 68 |
| 2400 | 71 |
| 2600 | 74 |
| 2800 | 77 |
| 3000 | 80 |
| 3500 | 87 |
| 4000 | 94 |
| 4500 | 100 |
| 5000 | 100 |
| 5500 | 100 |
| 6000 | 100 |
| 6500 | 100 |
| 7000 | 100 |
| 7500 | 100 |
| ā¦ | 100 |
The blue line is the current slot rule.
The orange line is the new slot rule I propose to replace the current one.
The horizontal axis is the number of postcards you sent in total.
The vertical axis is the number of slots (maximum postcard limit).
I hope that sooner or later the founders of Postcrossing will make a fundamental decision to correct the current rule.
My suggestion will save them a lot of time and is sure to give a reliable result.
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I couldnāt agree more! 
I have reached the 100 just some weeks ago. And I already know I will max them out only in December while there is Cards for Literacy.
The postage is one thing. But at least for me itās not the only.
Compared to other countries the postage in Germany is still on an affordable level. But life is not just postage. There are so many other essential things, where the costs has risen explosively in recent months. Things I have to have, whether I want it or not.
Imho there are way more factors who should be included in those statistics. But of course Iām aware it is just for fun and I would never expect that.
4 Likes
When I started with Postcrossing I got many cards from Finland and from the Netherlands. In the meantime the postage in both countries thas incteased massively and the number of cards from there to me has reduced very much, so there must be a correlation between raised postage and number of cards sent, unfortunately @greenskull rejects to see that and this makes his numbers questionable at least for me.
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I had two pen pals in the Netherlands and one in Finland. Both from NL where Postcrossers, too. Both of them stopped Postcrossing due to postage. One of them even pen palling because she always didnāt have a lot of money.
My Finnish pen pal also stopped writing letters and switched to Emails due to postage. Over the years I also lost some postcard pals I once met through Postcrossing. Only one of them simply lost interest, all of the others stopped because of the postage.
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And now in the general package of your postcards there are more and more addresses from Southeast Asia, there are a lot of American and Australian postcards.
Where your postcards from Germany go noticeably longer than to Norway and the Netherlands.
This is exactly what I wrote above. The average postcard travel time has increased due to the globalization of Postcrossing.
But the number of slots is the same. And now you wait longer than you send and receive.
This is the main factor of stagnation.
And it is treated only by correction of slot rule.
All participants have different levels of income.
And different countries have different postage price.
Where the postage for sending one postcard reaches 10 euros, Postcrossing will more likely to barely smolder.
And where the cost of sending is low, Postcrossing will flourish.
Is it logical?
But thatās not what weāre discussing here.
The fact is that the current slot rule is a internal strong restriction on the number of registered postcards. And this is much stronger than the external restriction on the high cost of postal services, where each postcrosser has the right to decide for themself in accordance with their income and capabilities.
Moreover, this is a very severe restriction for all postcrossers and those with low postal rates and those with high rates.
When the high cost of postage itself limits postcrossers with 60+ slot limits, why further restrict postcrossers with 20+ slot limits, whose costs are obviously three times lower?
Itās like sawing the branch youāre sitting on.
In the end, we have what we have. Namely, it observes the stagnation of Pocrossing, instead of its prosperity.
It is not necessary to consider their money for others. Everyone will count for themself.
It is necessary to give an opportunity to those for whom the interest of the game takes precedence over costs.
(A little off topic: Sometimes I think postage is just the āeasyā reason, and I know itās not always the true reason. Especially with letters if you write only few in a month. (But of course sometimes money is tight, but definitely not always.)
Part of the Finns disappearing from Postcrossing might be because of postage, but also the fact, when this was popular, many were in school/students and normal adult life still ahead, and hobbies like this are easily left. Often mail related hobbies are even thought not proper hobbies.
I really canāt think a person who couldnāt afford mailing a card in Finland.
I know people who easily afford eating lunch (bought lunch so itās about 10 Euros) five days a week, then bought coffee on top that, often cake, they have car, two cars, a house, bikes, boats, snow mobiles, motor bikes, hobbies for themselves, children, pets, a cottage. One this type of person told me, she doesnāt understand how I can afford buying stamps 
Itās often where you choose to put your money.
Every time stamp price goes up, someone says, I canāt afford anymore. So, previously they could, suddenly they donāt, itās not true mostly. Because they could send less.
Of course itās not so appealing anymore, when the roll of 100 stamps is over 200 Euros, so it can be the thought that makes one stop, not the actual cost.)
But if I understand the suggestion, the growth would come from the under 100 slot senders?
Previously I have thought, the slot amount is good. Now with much slower mail I actually think it might be a good idea to give more slots, and let them stay connected during the starting period and post starter period and maybe stay.
So, the more slots doesnāt make mail faster, or doesnāt give more money obviously, but if there is a possibility to send a card, when you can afford it, itās good. Especially in that phase when you already have āprovenā to send your cards.
This I agree too. And, we donāt know what they are planning
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I 
you!
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No, more than 90 per cent of my cards come from and go to Germany, Russia and USA. The number of cards to snd from all other countries have reduced massively. And at least Australua has also faced raised postages.
Please do not only focus on travel times, but regard all factors that influence Postcrossing, for otherwise you will not get the complete picture!
4 Likes