The curious tale of Bhutan's playable record postage stamps (2015)

101 ohjeez 10 5/21/2025, 6:45:18 PM thevinylfactory.com ↗

Comments (10)

efitz · 10m ago
In the 70s and early 80s you might get a record like this made of flimsy plastic as a toy in a cereal box, or as a happy meal toy, etc. never heard of postage stamps but seems like a similar use case.
gerdesj · 7h ago
"Issued in 1972 in a set of seven, the stamps are miniature, one-sided, 33 1⁄3 rpm vinyl records playable on a standard turntable. You peeled off the backing paper and stuck them on an envelope or postcard. Content includes Bhutanese folk songs and histories of the country in English and Dzongkha, the local language. "

I work in IT. I used to be a philatelist (can you stop?). How on earth did I never think of this.

It makes those bloody awful business card CDs (off of the 90s n noughties) look pretty naff.

Barking mad and quite beautiful. Love it!

xattt · 5h ago
Given the timelines and lead times for production, I assume this was conceptualized on a mid-1960s acid trip.
NaOH · 9h ago
Previous discussion:

The curious tale of Bhutan's playable record postage stamps (2015) - https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22896682 - April 2020 (30 comments)

alwa · 1h ago
In case you’re curious how they sound:

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=H0DXyCiKbDI

dtgriscom · 4h ago
Does anyone know how large these stamps are? (I didn't see any dimensions in the article.)
taneliv · 30m ago
I don't own any, but https://www.megaministore.com/stamps/asia/bhutan-stamps/bhut... lists the sizes as 69mm and 100mm. I suppose that would be the diameter, not radius. Either way, pretty big, I'd say.
Rediscover · 6h ago
Interesting! Now I'm wondering if Leighton or Feynman was aware of these stamps (my ddg/google-fu is bad today).
FridayoLeary · 6h ago
I find it fascinating that something so inherently worthless like stamps can sell for such large sums. Old fashioned NFT's?

These stamps however are very cool. And the prices are actually reasonable.

eCa · 1h ago
> inherently worthless

There are many things that different people places different value on. The things I don’t place value on aren’t inherently worthless.