Apple's Steve Jobs To Be Featured On U.S. Postage Stamp

Apple founder Steve Jobs, a man who probably did as much as anyone to set in motion the slow but steady demise of snail mail, will be featured on a U.S. postage stamp, according to a document from the Citizens' Stamp Advisory Committee.

The Jobs collectible stamp is slated for release in 2015 and is currently in design development, The Washington Post reports, citing the CSAC document.

Also in the works for 2015: Johnny Carson and characters from The Peanuts comic strip.

Later this year, music icons Jimi Hendix and Janis Joplin, slain gay rights leader Harvey Milk and basketball legend Wilt Chamberlain are among those who will appear on collectible stamps.

Even so, Susan McGowan, the U.S. Postal Service's executive director for stamp services and corporate licensing, tells the Post that the subjects "are subject to change" at any time.

As NPR's April Fehling wrote in November, some of the committee's picks, which seem to be aimed at increasing revenue for the cash-strapped Postal Service, have been controversial.

The traditional guideline that persons appearing on stamps be Americans seems to be going by the wayside, John Hotchner, a former president of the American Philatelic Society, tells the Post.

When the USPS announced that Harry Potter would appear on a stamp, it invited criticism from Hotchner and others, who complained that the fictional boy wizard, is not American.

"It's foreign, and it's so blatantly commercial it's off the charts," Hotchner told the Post. "The Postal Service knows what will sell, but that's not what stamps ought to be about. Things that don't sell so well are part of the American story."

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