Cinderella stamps

When is a stamp not a stamp?

When it's a cinderella stamp it seems.

I've been curious about this category of stamps on eBay. My newest interest is art stamps, as well as architecture, myth and music stamps, so I have been getting quite familiar with how eBay organizes stamps. I finally satisfied my curiosity about the 'cinderella stamps' category I kept seeing. Here's what I discovered.

In philately, a cinderella stamp is "virtually anything resembling a postage stamp, but not issued for postal purposes by a government postal administration".

This beauty was a charity stamp for TB (tuberculosis)

In addition to stamps issued by non-recognised countries or governments, cinderella stamps include advertising stamps, charity stamps (eg. Christmas or Easter seals), commemorative stamps, purely decorative stamps, hotel stamps, local stamps, poster stamps, propaganda stamps, railway stamps, revenue stamps, telegraph stamps, and any other stamp created solely for amusement (such as labels or stickers).

While cinderella stamps tend to mimic official postage stamps, they may lack a country name (often replaced by the organization or cause) or a denomination. Sometimes a fictitious country or denomination may be used.

Following are a few examples, courtesy of WikiCommons (click to enlarge for details, especially entertaining of the mad cow stamp amuses you):