Talk:Festiniog Railway Letter Service

Citation needed

Well yes, I had already provided some references in the first days of writing the article, and yet more are sought so swiftly (and indeed two more have now been provided) and I (the only editor involved) am accused of POV which I would dispute whilst being quite amiable to varying the details of the article.

Is it a POV to state the obvious that the GPO/Post Office/Royal Mail absolute monopoly of the UK letter post service, which has finally ended within this last year, was, as has been stated many times, a revenue protection exercise? Then how can common knowledge be a POV?

Were I to say that the UK as a whole will be the loser, indeed has already become the loser, as a result of the abolition of that post office monopoly, that would be a point of view - yet one which I actually believe to be true!

A citation is sought for the statement "The Ffestiniog Railway Letter Service is an officially authorised facility for posting letters, and also delivering letters to intended recipients, without the use of the United Kingdom G.P.O. Royal Mail Service." The article itself effectively describes how this is so. Firstly the official nature comes from the 1891 and 1974 agreements. Secondly, when a railway letter is handed in (posted) at a station and later handed (delivered) to the intended recipient at the the destination station, the entire process from beginning to end takes place without GPO involvement and at no cost to the post office. The price of this avoidance of the GPO monopoly was the affixing of the appropriate first class letter postage stamp on the letter in question. The stamp itself is not a post office service only evidence of prepayment for such service. To argue that the railway company by acting as the (unpaid) agent of the GPO in cancelling the postage stamp (as it is required to do) was 'a use of post office facilities' would surely be special pleading! NoelWalley 20:43, 28 September 2006 (UTC)

What struck me about the the references was that, except for the Oakley material, it originated with the operating society, and was thus somewhat self-serving.

To say that the Royal Mail monopoly is a "revenue protection exercise" is indeed the expression of a point of view. It is certainly a conceivable inference, but for those of us outside the UK it is anything but common knowledge. It is equally conceivable that maintaining such a monopoly is important to protect reasonably priced service to small communities. Nevertheless, such broader questions would probably be better discussed in a more general article, and not in an an article about a minor local service.

I think that your interpretation and description of the word "delivered" is misleading. While it has a certain technical correctness it is unlikely that the service would benefit more than a few local individuals, and the occasional unwitting tourist looking for a souvenir. The delivery of the material to the postmaster at the receiving station for forwarding does not fit the usual understanding of "delivered". An individual residing anywhere in the service area of this railway should still be able to post an ordinary business letter with the Royal Mail.

This quaint English custom of the Railway Letter Service definitely deserves an article where the generalities could be discussed. This would leave articles such as this one free to deal with more specific issues. Eclecticology 01:14, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

If someone writes a definitive article on the 'quaint custom' of the UK Railway Letter Service, it will not be me, then it will appropriate to limit this article to more specific issues. NoelWalley 07:43, 29 September 2006 (UTC)

Rename

Per Keith's pointing it out on commons, it was Festiniog Railway Letter Service at the time, not Ff. Anyone feel like moving this article? -mattbuck (Talk) 12:32, 7 September 2008 (UTC)

Yes I have done - at last! --Keith 21:44, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

Images

I nominated commons:File:FRL-4H.jpg for deletion, though it was not being used, and I was informed that there are other similar images which should also be deleted because the GB stamp on the covers is covered by crown copyright for 50-years. You should likely move at least one image back to this wiki and make a fair-use claim with a completed fair-use rationale which would be acceptable of complying with all 10 non-free content criteria unless you can find a cover used before 1960 which would likely be freely licence depending on the rest of the cover. ww2censor (talk) 20:36, 24 June 2010 (UTC)

As the volunteer that looks after this organisations web presence, I have removed the images. The Wikipedia copyright requirements do not allow the arrangement they had been used under. As such, they have been removed. This has taken place before removal from Wikimedia, as such would leave the article untidy, with missing images. Some images exist on its own site --Keith 15:04, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

It is obviously your decision to remove images from the article but you have advise on what you can do to keep one, or even more, of these images. I have another question. Does the organistion or the artist own the copyright to the FRLS labels? The article is not unitdy, just devoid of images. The prose informs readers very well about the topic. ww2censor (talk) 15:24, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

Ownership is vested in the FR Company. To understand why would require a long winded response detailing the history and development of the FRLS. Please buy my book! I said the article "would look untidy" if the markers for the missing images were left in. --Keith 15:47, 25 June 2010 (UTC)

Just a head up; the images have not yet been deleted (and may not be for some time giving you the chance to move one to this wiki) and there is a bot User:ImageRemovalBot that removes deleted image code in article, so you did not need to do that yet, but the choice is yours. If the copyright is owned by the FR Co, then that is good and avoids any other possible copyright issue. ww2censor (talk) 16:11, 25 June 2010 (UTC)