George
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Post by George on Jul 11, 2011 10:46:55 GMT 10
I'm interested to know if anyone has heard of any micronations who have gone down the path of motor vehicle registration.
Earlier this year Atlantium acquired a second-hand commercial flat-bed truck, which is intended mainly to transport construction materials and equipment to the various building sites for monuments and tourist facilities around the Province of Aurora.
The vehicle was formerly registered in the Australian Capital Territory, but since being delivered to Aurora that registration has lapsed, and there is no intention of renewing it - so the vehicle can no longer be driven in Australia.
Aurora currently has a single unpaved roadway - the 1.5 kilometre-long Via Concordia, which bisects Aurora from south to north, close to our western border with Australia.
In August we will be adding a second 100+ metre-long roadway - the Via Capitolinum - which will extend from the Via Concordia, to the top of Capital Hill.
This is a prerequisite for being able to get construction materials for our planned major commemorative monument - the Capitoline Column - to the hilltop construction site.
The long and the short of all of this is that Atlantium will very shortly be formally registering our truck with our own motor vehicle registration authority, so that it can be driven exclusively on our roadways.
As a consequence we will be issuing our first-ever motor vehicle registration plates.
I am not aware of any micronation or ephemeral, self-declared polity which has previously done anything like this.
Even Hutt River - who almost certainly own a more substantial fleet of vehicles than any other micronation - register their vehicles in Western Australia, so they can be driven on Australian roads.
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Post by sogoln on Jul 11, 2011 21:01:26 GMT 10
Not beyond national stickers on the back of our cars.
In France, there are a lot of cars with GRD stickers, for the Présipauté of Groland, a famous TV non-sensic micronation here.
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Post by rogue ambassador on Jul 12, 2011 0:21:39 GMT 10
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Dagostinia
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Monarchy of Dagostinia
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Post by Dagostinia on Jul 12, 2011 2:22:28 GMT 10
I suppose my question would be, why bother? Other than the creativity that could be exhibited and the personal satisfaction...
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Post by sogoln on Jul 12, 2011 5:26:49 GMT 10
I forgot to mention that Seborga sells blue SB stickers.
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George
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Post by George on Jul 12, 2011 9:13:58 GMT 10
Why bother?
The same can be asked of micronations in general.
The answer depends on what you're trying to achieve by going to all the trouble and cost of establishing and maintaining a micronation in the first place.
In Atlantium's case it's about establishing a highly credible socially and politically progressive entity possessing broad public appeal leavened with a healthy dose of self-deprecating quirkiness - and a firm underpinning of healthy commercial potential.
I would argue that to a greater or lesser extent this is the formula that ALL successful micronations have embraced - consciously or not.
So, returning to the issue of motor vehicle registration plates, the answer is twofold:
Firstly, it's yet one more tangible symbol of of Atlantium's unique identity and "otherness" - which along with stamps, coins, flags, regalia, banknotes etc establish that it is something substantially more than an ephemeral web-based game or the mere unrealised fantasy of some disenchanted crank sitting in a darkened room behind a flickering monitor.
Secondly, there is an active worldwide community of number plate collectors who will buy any plates we choose to make commercially available - particularly because we will be able to demonstrate that at least one actual vehicle is being driven around within our real-world borders while bearing them.
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Dagostinia
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Monarchy of Dagostinia
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Post by Dagostinia on Jul 13, 2011 2:11:52 GMT 10
Secondly, there is an active worldwide community of number plate collectors who will buy any plates we choose to make commercially available - particularly because we will be able to demonstrate that at least one actual vehicle is being driven around within our real-world borders while bearing them. I guess I didn't realize there was a club for that. As one who prefers to find DIY solutions to most problems... Come to think of it, I've got more DIY solutions than I have problems... As I was saying, sharpie on cardboard is obviously not a great medium. But to create an official looking plate requires some thin sheet metal (no problem), a press (no problem) and a whole set of letters and numbers (possibly cost prohibitive). The other option which I've seen a lot of around here is painted plates, no press. I've not inspected the plates but I imagine it is a baked on paint and finish. Stencils and paint are pretty cheap.
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George
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Post by George on Jul 13, 2011 6:16:14 GMT 10
One can have "novelty" number plates manufactured in the US, UK and Australia for about US $30 apiece, in pressed metal or printed plastic, by the same people who make the real ones: www.sh-boomm.com.au/novelty.htm
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Dagostinia
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Monarchy of Dagostinia
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Post by Dagostinia on Jul 14, 2011 3:11:41 GMT 10
Outsourcing!? Dagostinia has a pretty strict policy of producing all of our own ephemera, hence my prior post. This way Dagostinians don't lose valuable jobs overseas.
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George
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Post by George on Jul 14, 2011 8:51:06 GMT 10
For the first couple of years of Atlantium's existence our postage stamps were all hand-drawn, hand-coloured, and hand perforated using an old typewriter: www.atlantium.org/stampshistoric.htmlWhile this was, in some ways, a personally fulfilling experience, it was also intensely time-intensive, somewhat tedious after the initial thrill wore off, and a terrible strain on my right index finger. These days the thought of using my handicraft skills to manufacture commercial quantities of any saleable item frankly fills me with dread. Best leave such things to the experts :-)
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Dagostinia
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Monarchy of Dagostinia
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Post by Dagostinia on Jul 15, 2011 2:06:20 GMT 10
Those historic issues are pretty dang cool. Kind of like the handful of architects out there who still draft by hand. But with the advent of Photoshop and all the other clone software it's pretty easy these days to create quality looking stamps. Dagostinia's (yet to be printed) first issue was created in about an hour with extensive online tutorial referral: postal.dagostinia.com(Link updated to reflect updated forwarding). The yet to be printed bit means that I haven't purchased new ink cartridges yet. I suppose that bit could be outsourced to the local Kinko's for now... The biggest difference between these and official postage is that Dagostinia's stamps have a straight cut with graphical perforations for effect. Less collectible? But in regards to vehicle plates, stencils and spray paint would be my first modus operandi.
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Post by sogoln on Jul 15, 2011 16:49:44 GMT 10
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George
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Head Honcho and Spangle of the Cosmos
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Post by George on Jul 17, 2011 7:29:22 GMT 10
Nice stamps Dagostinia. Have you explored printing them with www.yourstamps.biz/ ? They can produce 150 sheets on gummed, perforated paper for about USD $150 Cinderella stamp collectors don't consider personalised "real" postage stamps - as some micronations have produced - to be collectable. The releases of a micronation that produces it's own stamps in its own designs are, however, significantly more collectable. If they can be shown to have some actual postal function in the real world, they become more collectable again. The Cinderella Stamp Club (UK) is the main focus of collector interest, and they produce a quarterly journal. The Australian magazine Stamp News also has a dedicated cinderella stamps column; it was in fact where Atlantium first apeared in the public record, in 1984. There is a third twice-yearly magazine called Atalaya, from Sweden (published in English), which offers coverage to most new issues of this sort.
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Peter
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Post by Peter on Aug 1, 2011 6:17:14 GMT 10
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Peter
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Post by Peter on Oct 21, 2011 23:59:34 GMT 10
Ha, Sabotage had their lorry baptized. How bad-ass is that?
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Post by D. N. Vercáriâ on Oct 22, 2011 20:58:40 GMT 10
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