Sometimes collecting autographs can be a depressing hobby.
You work so hard for so long writing the perfect letter to your favourite
celebrity only for something to ruin it for you. Many times over the years I’ve
written to celebs only for them to switch to “fan mail services” which is just
a nice way of saying “I can’t be bothered reading your letters anymore, here
have a copy of my autograph”.
These services have always got my back up mainly because the celebrity clients that use them try to make out we are idiots. I have mentioned this before a few months ago and I won’t go into specifics but what I will say is this, if you get a letter from Studio Fan Mail there is a 99% chance your letter never made it to the celeb.
Then of course there are the other factors that can ruin it for you like spamming. Writing to celebs via a movie set or concert venue is a popular way to get the more difficult people. It’s a risk/reward type of situation and when you are rewarded sometimes it pays off big time. These via venue addresses are not out there for public display, oh sure if you look hard enough on the internet they are there but they have to be for other reasons. But that initial joy you get from first finding the right address and then sending off the letter can be destroyed when you discover someone has posted that same address for everyone to find. I’ve always been of the belief if you do the hard work to find the address then you should be rewarded for your effort. But when it’s out there for everyone, it gets hammered until it gets to a point where they no longer reply, ruining it for everyone. Of course it doesn’t always happen, but most of the time it does.
Then there are those other times, rarer than the ones previous stated but they are the ones that hurt the most; when someone who enjoys fan mail or always replies to fan mail stops because something has caused them too. Today one of my favourite actresses Stana Katic had the respect to come online and say due to a security issue she could no longer accept fan mail. And to add to that she would not use a “fan mail service” because fans deserve the real thing.
In this case I’m lucky, I got Stana’s autograph in 2010 and its framed sitting on my desk but i know plenty who were still waiting to hear from her. I don’t know what the issue was but there are those fans that walk a very fine line and I just hope they haven’t crossed it. Full credit to Stana though for respecting the fans enough to come out and say directly that she will no longer be replying. So many would simply stop and move on but she is so much classier than that. I just wish other celebrities would just take the same time and effort to save their fans the pain so future collectors don’t feel the same pain I have.
These services have always got my back up mainly because the celebrity clients that use them try to make out we are idiots. I have mentioned this before a few months ago and I won’t go into specifics but what I will say is this, if you get a letter from Studio Fan Mail there is a 99% chance your letter never made it to the celeb.
Then of course there are the other factors that can ruin it for you like spamming. Writing to celebs via a movie set or concert venue is a popular way to get the more difficult people. It’s a risk/reward type of situation and when you are rewarded sometimes it pays off big time. These via venue addresses are not out there for public display, oh sure if you look hard enough on the internet they are there but they have to be for other reasons. But that initial joy you get from first finding the right address and then sending off the letter can be destroyed when you discover someone has posted that same address for everyone to find. I’ve always been of the belief if you do the hard work to find the address then you should be rewarded for your effort. But when it’s out there for everyone, it gets hammered until it gets to a point where they no longer reply, ruining it for everyone. Of course it doesn’t always happen, but most of the time it does.
Then there are those other times, rarer than the ones previous stated but they are the ones that hurt the most; when someone who enjoys fan mail or always replies to fan mail stops because something has caused them too. Today one of my favourite actresses Stana Katic had the respect to come online and say due to a security issue she could no longer accept fan mail. And to add to that she would not use a “fan mail service” because fans deserve the real thing.
In this case I’m lucky, I got Stana’s autograph in 2010 and its framed sitting on my desk but i know plenty who were still waiting to hear from her. I don’t know what the issue was but there are those fans that walk a very fine line and I just hope they haven’t crossed it. Full credit to Stana though for respecting the fans enough to come out and say directly that she will no longer be replying. So many would simply stop and move on but she is so much classier than that. I just wish other celebrities would just take the same time and effort to save their fans the pain so future collectors don’t feel the same pain I have.
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