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Picture yourself on a stamp?
Stamps.com's offering is the first-ever service to let you create your own personalized postage.
August 10, 2004: 5:04 PM EDT

PhotoStamps converts personal digital photos into legal postage.  
PhotoStamps converts personal digital photos into legal postage.

NEW YORK (CNN/Money) - Want to get personal with your correspondence? Put your own face, or your new baby's face -- even shots from your crazy summer vacation -- on postage stamps.

Santa Monica, Calif.-based Stamps.com (STMP: Research, Estimates), a provider of Internet-based postage services, Tuesday announced a new service dubbed PhotoStamps that lets customers transform digital photos into customized stamps.

But is PhotoStamps legal postage?

Stamps.com has a license to sell U.S. postage.

And it says that PhotoStamps complies with all U.S. Postal Service (USPS) regulations so that you can use your PhotoStamps to send anything normally sent through the mail, including letters, postcards and packages.

Here's how it works.

By registering for the service, users can send images from a digital camera or camera phone over the Internet to Stamps.com. Choose the image you want and the value of postage, ranging from 23 cents to $3.85, and place the order online. The company then mails the finished sheets of stamps to you.

An order consists of a single sheet consisting of 20 PhotoStamps. The minimum order is one sheet.

"PhotoStamps are an ideal way for customers to express themselves with their mail," Stamps.com CEO, Ken McBride, said in a statement. "They are also an ideal tool for businesses that are looking for new ways to get their mail noticed or to create a customized identity."

Some types of pictures will not get a "stamp" of approval from the company's in-house editing team, McBride told CNN/Money.

"Employees will go through the photos to filter out those images that don't meet our guidelines," said McBride. "Some images that we deem objectionable would include nudity, images that are obscene or show violence, or are controversial in a political way."

The USPS could not immediately be reached for comment.  Top of page




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Market indexes are shown in real time, except for the DJIA, which is delayed by two minutes. All times are ET. Disclaimer LIBOR Warning: Neither BBA Enterprises Limited, nor the BBA LIBOR Contributor Banks, nor Reuters, can be held liable for any irregularity or inaccuracy of BBA LIBOR. Disclaimer. Morningstar: © 2012 Morningstar, Inc. All Rights Reserved. Disclaimer The Dow Jones IndexesSM are proprietary to and distributed by Dow Jones & Company, Inc. and have been licensed for use. All content of the Dow Jones IndexesSM © 2012 is proprietary to Dow Jones & Company, Inc. Chicago Mercantile Association. The market data is the property of Chicago Mercantile Exchange Inc. and its licensors. All rights reserved. FactSet Research Systems Inc. 2012. All rights reserved. Most stock quote data provided by BATS.