New: See Collectors' Inventory Notes on Item List

As collectors looking to exchange, trade or just look around, browsing collections of other fellow collectors- you need to look at the exact details of the items, look at the collection itself. Now this has been made easier with the help of Personal Inventory Notes. You can now see the notes made by collectors when browsing their lists.

The new information that appears is the public notes made by the collector of the quantity, condition and any additional free text notes they have added about the item in their collection. Simply go to a collectors page, look at their list and you will notice that new information now appears along the item details, marked in a separated colored box.

Previously, public inventory notes where only available on the single item pages of the catalog, together with all collectors that have this particular item. Now you can also see it on collectors' individual list.

Come take a look, browse some collections, and let us know what you think :)

Bogus Requests From Msnbot/Bing Crawler Resulting in Error 404

Apologies to the collectors on Colnect, this post is a technical post not related to collecting and collectibles.

Recently, we've started seeing a lot of bogus requests from msnbot. These were requests to URLs that never existed on our website and were filling up our error logs. Internet searches have led to nothing which is the reason for this blog post.

Suggested solution: disable msnbot on your robots.txt file and submit a ticket to their support. While it did take them some time to respond, they finally did and the issue has been resolved. We've then removed the block on our robots.txt and for over a week now, everything seems fine.

When asked about the reasons for these problem, the support team provided NO EXPLANATION as to what might have caused the problem:

"Thank you for patiently waiting. The product group have resolved this request but no additional information was provided."

"We are sorry to inform you that we cannot provide any information regarding this. We hope you understand."

Which leads us to believe the reason is a bug in msnbot or an attack on msnbot which messed up URLs between websites.

Here are a few such bogus requests:
[27-Dec-2013 03:48:51 GMT+0] REQUEST[/content/dam/aba/global/global_nav_logo.png] REFERER[]
USER[0] AGENT[msnbot-media/1.1 (+http://search.msn.com/msnbot.htm)] ADDR[65.55.215.33]
[27-Dec-2013 03:49:36 GMT+0]
REQUEST[/bin/dashboard/default-avatar-unknown.png] REFERER[]
USER[0] AGENT[msnbot-media/1.1 (+http://search.msn.com/msnbot.htm)] ADDR[65.55.215.39]
[27-Dec-2013 02:50:38 GMT+0] REQUEST[/enclosure.jpg] REFERER[]
USER[0] AGENT[msnbot-media/1.1 (+http://search.msn.com/msnbot.htm)] ADDR[199.30.20.57]
[27-Dec-2013 02:53:48 GMT+0]
REQUEST[/user_data/packages/ginichi/img/common/btn_en.jpg] REFERER[]
USER[0] AGENT[msnbot-media/1.1 (+http://search.msn.com/msnbot.htm)] ADDR[65.55.215.71]
[27-Dec-2013 02:54:14 GMT+0]
REQUEST[/DesktopModules/CATALooKStore/MakeThumbImage.aspx?fileticket=ikazmqBNAjM%3d&PORTALID=0&W=120&H=120] REFERER[]
USER[0] AGENT[msnbot-media/1.1 (+http://search.msn.com/msnbot.htm)] ADDR[199.30.16.47]
[27-Dec-2013 03:33:21 GMT+0]
REQUEST[/upload/save_image/category/c1177.jpg] REFERER[]
USER[0] AGENT[msnbot-media/1.1 (+http://search.msn.com/msnbot.htm)] ADDR[65.55.215.74]
[27-Dec-2013 03:49:20 GMT+0]
REQUEST[/wvc-1365778711/wordansfiles/images/2013/4/12/186393/186393_340.jpg] REFERER[]
USER[0] AGENT[msnbot-media/1.1 (+http://search.msn.com/msnbot.htm)] ADDR[199.30.16.30]
[27-Dec-2013 03:52:45 GMT+0]
REQUEST[/core/media/media.nl?id=343820&c=337772&h=2fd9dd88833b005b614a] REFERER[]
USER[0] AGENT[msnbot-media/1.1 (+http://search.msn.com/msnbot.htm)] ADDR[199.30.16.14]

Paper Clips Collectors Welcome to Colnect

First in a batch  of new categories joining the Colnect catalogs is Paper Clips. These sweet, shiny and sometimes colorful devices will be gracing the Colnect pages from now on. We are calling all collectors of Paper Clips to come, take a look, let us know what you think, and help the catalog grow :)

Axion Paper Clip, newly added on the Colnect catalog

We wish the new category coordinator, Bruun Visser [Bruun01], good luck with his new role and thank him for the efforts to create this catalog for the benefit of all collectors.

Wing Paper Clip, Newly added on the Colnect catalog

This category is starting out with 2,390 Paper Clips and with your help it will grow soon to be more. Read here how to add Information to the Colnect catalogs.

Dutch Paper Clip, Newly added on the Colnect catalog

The category has started, like all categories on Colnect, at the imitative of enthusiastic collectors on the forum. You are welcome to read how it all came about on the Paper Clips forum thread.

Promo Paper Clip, newly added on the Colnect catalog

Your collectible category is not yet on Colnect? Would like to create a new collectible catalog? Read more on how to add More Collectibles, take the reigns and make your suggestion on the New Category Forum.

Wing Paper Clip, newly added on the Colnect catalog

Colnect 2013 was Fun - version 2014 is going to be so much more!

They say that the way you start a year, is the way it will be for the rest of it. If that saying has any truth to it, judging by the amount of activity and newly added improvements, it seems Colnect is getting ready for a blast of a year to come :)

Lottery Ticket "Happy New Year!"

So what did we have in this year of 2013?

This year must have gotten some good luck when we celebrated our catalogs reaching 1,111,111 collectibles, which is seven lucky numbers one. Since then almost 300,000 additional items have been published on the catalogs.

This year had many new categories joining, from Lottery Tickets to Medals, from Drink Labels to Video Games, and from a familiar game changing Functional Cards to a the sister catalog to Teabags - Tea Labels.

Drink Label "Kruger Pilsner", from the new catalog

The New Year 2014 is now expected to bring with it New Categories that were waiting in the wings to be launched. We will have the highly anticipated Sports Cards category, and also Paper Clips, Milk Cup Lids, Kids Meal Toys and Music CDs. Many more were already suggested and are sure to join in the upcoming year.

Functional Card "Happy New Year", from the new catalog

There could never be too many helpful features and additions. In everything having to do with collectors and Colnect, the more helpful tools is definitely the merrier. We've just now added some cool helpful hands to the Inventory Notes. That's not the only feature we've added though, we did much more throughout the year. We've opened up the Personal Customs lists to all, so you can put your collection any way you'd like. We parsed the seas and divided the collectibles into Continents. We've made it easy to find items through Face Value. We sped things up with Quick Filter options. We've diversified the catalogs with adding Variant support. We even put a looking glass right into the catalog and added a Zoom into the pictures.

Medal "Royal Military", from the new catalog

Each collectible category is unique and has it's own specific needs. Many categories got tweaked and improved, decorated and streamlined. You can see that on the Postcards category that finally had Theme Collectors give out a sigh of relief, Phonecards that has split in two, following much debate, and Hotel Key Cards that got a cool new Aggregation Feature added to it's catalog.

Our community kept reaching new heights, we have marked the occasion of having 56789 collectors on Colnect, and had the opportunity to thank the 666 contributors on Colnect making it a better place for collectors every day.

Tea Label "1 De Beste", on the new catalog

Finally, December ended on an especially heart warming note, when the wonderful Colnect Coordinators, were able to gift Free Premium Memberships to some 100 happy collectors.

Lottery Ticket "Happy New Year!", from the new catalog

Colnect has been preparing to welcome the New Year in style and festivities. It has been an eventful December, that will undoubtedly lead to an exciting January 2014, full of new features, new categories, more options and more collecting.

666 Contributors on Colnect - Making Colnect a Reality

The number 666 has been demonized quite a lot throughout history. However we can remember that it is also the sum of all the numbers on a roulette wheel and in that is Judaism 666 is the number which represents the creation of the world. For us on Colnect today this number represents the 666 contributors that make Colnect happen. These collectors, each with their time and collection, create extensive current collectible catalogs that are open to all and help translate Colnect to make it available in 62 languages.

The Colnect Contributors - the very beginning of the list :)

In March 2012 a 5 star system of contribution was introduced on Colnect and it seems it has been happily accepted by all Colnectors. The 5 star system allows Colnect to show it's acknowledgement of the help of the contributors and adds fun to the process.

Contributors on Colnect have helped it reach achievements such as cataloging over 1,111,111 collectible items. In the last month alone there have been over 20,000 collectible items added to the Colnect catalogs. 

Colnect started as a Phonecards database and since then has expanded to house 25 categories of collectible catalogs and growing, thanks to the good will and cooperation of collectors worldwide. Many new categories have been in the works for some time by dedicated collectors and many more are being suggested an discussed now on the New Categories forum.

We would like to thank all the contributors and wish them good luck and fun collecting! As always, we'll be happy to hear what you think, in the comments and on the forum, what do you think of the 5 star system? What do you think of the current catalogs?

Would like to become a contributor on Colnect too? Go to our Contribution Guidelines page. See you there :)

56,789 Collectors now on Colnect!

It's always fun to see more and more collectors joining Colnect and participating in the community. Every day you can see more collectors from different countries swapping items, discussing collectible issues on the forums and suggesting useful new ideas, keeping the Colnect community vibrant, current and on it's toes.

In the last 3 months Colnect has reached 56,789 Collectors, an increase of  over 11 percent. That means over 6000 collectors have joined Colnect in the past 3 months, becoming members of the community and enriching it with their input, with their collections and their character.

"25 Rupees - Queen's Silver Jubilee" - Seychelles Coin, newly added on Colnect

It's truly beautiful and inspiring to see the cooperation between collectors on Colnect, from those who have been with Colnect since the beginning to brand new collectors. The more veteran Colnect collectors are happily reaching out to new ones with help and advice, creating new connections of collectible exchange and friendly relations, helping improve the catalogs and the website with their comments and remarks and more.

"Nissay" - Japanese Phonecard, newly added on Colnect

New items are constantly added to the Colnect catalogs, thanks to the wonderful contributors, editors and coordinators on Colnect. You can see some examples of them right here in this post. Some categories have reached new impressive achievements such as the Japanese Phonecards section that accumulated over 111,111 Japanese Phonecards, with much of it due to the dedicated work of the editor of Japanese Phonecards, Karl Heinz Degener [neizi].

"Peter Rabbit" - Japanese Phonecard, newly added on Colnect

There are also new categories that have been in the works for some time now. Those will be joining Colnect soon such as Sports Cards, CDs, Paper Clips and Milk cup lids. Many more great collectible category ideas are being suggested on and off the forums and we hope eventually we will be able to create a home for all of them.

A big thank you to all those devoted and enthusiastic collectors that are the beating heart of Colnect, both very active and very kind, from Coordinators, Editors, Translators and Contributors to all the Collectors on Colnect that swap, discuss, manage their collection and show much care and appreciation for Collecting.

"Famous Uruguayan Women - Nelly Goitino" - Uruguayan Stamp, newly added on Colnect

Would you like to know how you can contribute to the Colnect catalogs too? Have a look at our Catalog Contribution help page. Would like to suggest and create a new category you would like to see on Colnect? Post it on the New Categories forum.

"Vessel with flowers" - Japanese Phonecard, newly added on Colnect

50,505 Collectors Now Connect on Colnect

It's always satisfying to see the Colnect community grow and reach another new level and a brand new number. It seems we have reached the 5th level of expansion and the number seems to be a lucky one for Colnect. Many new features joined the site and many older ones were improved.

Proudly marking another milestone, the Colnect community now consists of 50,505 enthusiastic and devoted collectors. Those collectors together, by contributing, editing, commenting, exchanging, discussing and browsing, bring Colnect alive as an interactive, attentive and strengthening organism. On Colnect we only count real members who validated their email address and logged in to Colnect. You can also quickly reach Active Collectors in any category of your liking and see their Personal Collection.

Colnect, as always, works to make the experience of touring through Colnect as fun, easy and intuitive as possible. One important change was the improvements made to the browsing process of the catalogs, which included new comfortable Filter Options, the Quick Filter box and a Continent Division in the country lists.

The new "Zoom In" feature, now available on all Colnect catalogs

The catalogs benefited from new Variant Items support, new Face Value lists and an easy-on-the-eyes "Zoom into pictures" feature. The management tools were enriched with Custom Personal Lists becoming available to all members and the personal profile pages were made more understandable thanks to a useful "Auto-Translate" icon. See the new features and let us know what you think!

Colnect also opened it's gates and it's API, inviting more collectors to show their programming skills with innovative, useful and fun new ideas for tools for collectors.

Spanish lottery ticket, newly added on the Colnect catalog

As always, more interesting new collectible categories have joined our ranks since our last milestone, and are now displaying beautiful catalogs already. Those categories are Lottery Tickets, Medals, Functional Cards, Drink Labels and Video Games. More exciting new categories are right now in the works, go see the New Categories forum to find out which they are and see their progress.

Bulgarian medal, newly added on the Colnect catalog

We would like to thank all the inspiring and inspired collectors, who with their passion, kindness, dedication and sense of community, all this has came to be. Thank you! :)