Exhibiting Digitally (2)

Wobbe Vegter, South African Philatelist

(continuation of the article Exhibiting Digitally Part 1)

Having your own website also means frequent updating and maintenance of the site. I used to have a dial-up facility (I’m based in South Africa) with a phone subscription with a fixed-cost-unlimited-time-call after hours which enabled me to spend hours of dial-up time at minimal cost provided I did it all after 7 pm or during the weekends. It was a financially acceptable but slow and time-consuming system and I soon realized that a more speedy ADSL line was required. I got that installed some time later.

What have I added or changed since then?
• I’ve redesigned my home page a few times so my website is featured on page one when one googles for “computer stamps”.
• In the first version I carried a few links to other sites on my home page. I’ve now removed these links to a separate page where they should have been in the first place.
• I became curious to know how much traffic would come to my site, so I’ve added a counter to track the number of visitors. I only count the number of visitors on my home page although one can also track the number of hits per individual page. That looked like too much admin to me so I went for home page visitors only. To date I get about 50 to 80 visitors per month with a higher volume when I’ve done substantial changes to my exhibit(s). Obviously I should have included this feature from day one but I never thought of it. The feature itself was installed at no extra cost.
• I’ve added a few other computer-related club exhibits to my website.
• I’ve added a digital copy of every article I wrote about my topic (including when/where it was published). This includes a list of about forty – and growing – personalities involved in the development of the computer: my private list of Cyber Heroes.

Philately and the Internet

• My own exhibit has since grown from 75 pages to 128 pages and this has been reflected on the website as well. My fellow computer-collectors requested if it was possible to show both new and previous version(s) of my exhibit. To accommodate them I introduced a special “trap-door” feature so they could always go back to a previous version to compare individual pages.
• The first digital version was about 20Mb in size. The current website runs to about 140Mb. One needs to keep substantial growth in mind when calculating the cost of hosting a site.
• On request I’ve added a page with a short biography of myself. Access is by clicking on my name on the home page.
• Also on request, I’ve added a date on the home page to show when I last modified the site.
• I’ve added a log of when I applied which modification to my website. One can access this log by clicking on the Date Last Modified on the home page.
• I’ve added a list of awards – my own Palmares – for my “From Abacus to Internet” exhibit. Awards for the website itself I’ve included on the home page.

Conclusion
It has been a satisfying journey. My website has been operating since 2002 and it’s receiving an increasing number of hits. Since then I’ve made numerous changes and additions to the site as could be expected. Although it takes time to keep a site like this up to date, it gives one a digital visibility which was impossible twenty years ago. I’ve met many new people (electronically) all over the world and through all these contacts I’ve managed to improve my exhibit and philatelic knowledge. I would certainly recommend any computer-literate exhibitor to set up his own website and digitally share his exhibit with the world.

Lastly, I now have a vehicle to digitally publish this article as well.

Web Sites Promote Growth

Thomas Fortunato, Philatelic Communicator

Organizations that lack a Web presence are out of tune with society today, and quite honestly, missing the boat. Those that don’t have a Web site either have no one in their group who can build one, or simply don’t want to advertise their organization. Into which of these two categories does your organization fall?

American Philatelic Society

The Web is how most people gain information about their community and world. It has always been seen as a special interest tool, where advocates of everything under the sun turn to promote their interests. Philately is no different. Think about it: How does your organization currently promote itself, and how effective has that strategy been? Do you take out newspaper ads? How about radio or TV ads? What about large billboards? Unless your treasury is super loaded, you won’t be able to afford these.

It is possible to host a Web page completely free of charge. Hosting a site without advertising is almost as inexpensive and can start as low as $5 per month, which would include your own Web domain name, such as www.citystampclub.org.

Federation of New York Philatelic Societies

Real people use the Web! Stamp collectors, especially younger ones under the age of 60, are Web savvy. If they want to find a club in their area, they simply do a Google search (www.google.com) and type in “stamp club” and their city name to see who is around. Try it yourself now and bring the results to your board or officers.

You may find references to your organization, including where it meets, elsewhere on the Web, but why should potential new members have to go anywhere except your club’s official Web site to get accurate, up-to-date information about your meetings, events, etc.?

Rochester Philatelic Association

To survive, organizations need to be utilizing every possible resource to promote themselves. A Web site should be in that mix, especially if you have a volunteer capable of running it for you.

Not that long ago you had to write code to produce your own Web page or one for your stamp club. Thankfully those days are gone. If you are comfortable sending e-mails and simple Web surfing, you have all the skill it takes to get a Web page up and running.