Postcrossing - Austria / II. Republic of Austria 2016 - 80 Euro Cent

Each postcard from a foreign country brings a piece of the big wide world into our mailbox. That's what Paulo Magalhães from Portugal thought and founded the platform "Postcrossing" in 2005. Austrian Post is now dedicating a special stamp to the endearing project that brings together postcard and stamp friends from all over the world. From the very beginning, the platform's goal was to connect people around the globe with real postcards - not electronic ones - regardless of their place of residence, age, gender, skin color or belief. Over the years, the little idea has developed into a successful project that has also received praise in the media and now has around 600,000 members in more than 200 countries. More than 30 million postcards have been shipped worldwide through the Postcrossing platform, which has added up to a whopping 171 billion kilometers - and with each passing hour, more are coming. There are also around 2,500 people in Austria who use this free service and have already sent more than 200,000 postcards to all participating countries. Even remote regions like Nepal, Papua New Guinea or the Solomon Islands are involved in postcrossing, and the Vatican also has some members. The system is simple: registered members are randomly assigned a postal address of another member by the platform and send a postcard to this address, in return they receive a postcard from another member. The more cards you send, the more you get. This makes every trip to the mailbox an exciting event: where will the next card come from? From Europe? From overseas? Maybe from a small island you have never heard of? One thing is certain - and the community agrees on that: a postcard is simply more personal and tangible than an electronic message via social media channels!