mustakorppi

It’s not now. I didn’t make my point particularly well there, what I meant to say is that if archived caches were presented differently, the culture around them would also change, e.g. by more people viewing them as fair game. Considering that these caches by definition have no one to look after them, and that a lot of the cachers interested in archived caches are probably desperate for more finds, it seems reasonable to expect that all the ugliest parts of caching culture would soon flourish in that scene. I could be wrong of course. Locally we do have an easy way to search for archived caches and there aren’t any significant problems.

I agree with a lot that you said here. I sometimes go find archived caches where I know/suspect the container is present. I’m on a find streak so if a nearby cache I haven’t found is archived, of course I’m interested. I usually remove the container while I’m at it, and make it clear in my log if I did. Despite my use case, I think it’s probably overall a good thing that archived caches aren’t in the app, and that they require a certain amount of effort to locate otherwise. This way there’s less chance for newbies to get confused, and there’s less peer pressure to leave the abandoned containers in place for stat hunters. These caches aren’t meant to be findable (in the field) at all, and certainly not to continue to be findable. dprovan was spot on in their comment about two purposes of search.

I guess I can answer this myself then. @Max and 99 has their finds hidden and has opted out from 3rd party access. Filtering a search with Found by Max and 99 returns 1251 caches. Which is a weird number but I can sort by Last Found date, so it works fine if I wanted to stalk their most recent movements. Logs not accessible via 3rd party tools. @icaunais has their finds hidden but allows 3rd party access. 6447 finds are still accessible via search, and logs can be downloaded with party tools using the API. If this is the intended functionality, I would suggest adding language to reflect that in the privacy controls (so as not to lull anyone with an actual stalker problem into false sense of security).

Does hiding finds also apply to the “found by” and “not found by” search filters? What about the API? E.g. will challenge checkers work for users whose finds are hidden by privacy controls?

That would be the math, but would anyone actually care about how many thousandths of an FP they're going to earn when selecting which caches to go for? I think the op's suggestion would be mostly meaningless for these caches (as it's intended to be). While I don't think there are any serious negatives to the suggestion, I can think of multiple other things I'd rather Groundspeak devs spend their time on rather than find ways to help FP magnets get even more FP.

The new of look of forum front page is definitely an improvement. Good job. Not sure how two threads about a mega in Canada in 2015 came to be pinned in General geocaching, but I don't think they should be.

What about Bugcrowd testing sandbox?

A multi (or a mystery, or Wherigo or letterbox hybrid) can have any number of intermediate physical waypoints, and there isn't really a good way for a finder to mark those (nothing at all on the website, and no distinction for physical waypoints on the app). On the other hand, having all this stuff easily visible on a map would make brute-forcing the location of your new cache easier too...

I was totally expecting a White Day souvenir.

I have no question that the system presented above could produce a more accurate rating. But the reason I don't need or want ratings has got nothing to do with their lack of accuracy.

That number includes Russia (pop. 145 million) which averaged around 2 events per month in 2019-2021.

You literally quoted text explaining how you can write a review for AL at home on your computer. I’m not saying you should, just that you can if you want to and it’s not particularly hard.

At home with a glass of wine if you prefer. You don’t have to write a review in the field upon completion. If you don’t, simply go to the ALs reviews later and you’ll see a ”Rate and review” link right at the top. Or if you’ve already written a review, you’ll see a pen icon which takes you to edit your review/rating.

I mean, you guys could connect a bluetooth keyboard to the phone for logging. Or write the log on a tablet, or on your computer with the app running in an emulator… But I think the idea is not to write much at all.

Well you can't edit a log with the (official) app. Or post a log for different date than the current one. Or paste full coordinates into solved coordinates. Or enter solved coordinates for a letterbox/Wherigo at all. Or use the geocaching.com checker... But yeah. I see the blue button on a log screen on my iPhone or my ipad (both iOS 15.3.1). The "Submit log entry button" on the Edit log screen is also affected. Maybe every button that has the old school grey color when viewed on a computer?

Ok I give up. Where?

My take is, when I hide a cache I don't ask to receive "reviews" and I don't expect or want the cache to be graded. I also don't really see anyone asking for a grade and review system to replace logs and favorite points. I don't see why ALs would be different. I believe AL creators in general don't want to read honest reviews and grades of their ALs. They might enjoy being praised but let's be frank, most AL's aren't "an amazingly scenic and historic tour featuring unknown gems. " I understand that honest reviews and grades might be helpful for finders. But if I have to decide who I'd rather keep happy, well finders can get used to disappointment. For now I'm content not to participate, and tap past the grade/review screen.

GC3V6RR requires finding caches near the hockey rinks of teams in Liiga (the highest level ice hockey league in Finland), the final container is hidden in hockey gear. The theme for GC34R85 is the Winter War, and it was originally hidden at a WWII era AA-gun. I'm not sure if there's anything of interest at the new location. (Challenge is just a find streak of physical cache for the same duration as the war, and including a 50 day streak with the same cache type.) The task of GC31ZZ4 and GC2CMZK is to find caches hidden at railway stations (cache name must include the words "railway station" or the Finnish equivalent), both are hidden along railway tracks (or where tracks used to be). Aside from the simple "size large cache challenge is a size large cache" kind of themes, the current challenge rules make themed challenges more difficult to create maybe? A lot of the new challenges in the area are just meaningless stat combos.

GC7KC3X Requires finding (among other things) T5 boat attribute caches or T5 climbing gear required caches. The cache itself is on a locally famous "challenge island" with other D5/T5 challenges, and is itself a T5 boat required & climbing gear required. I like the idea of the challenge island, and hope to visit one day. Preferably with someone who has climbing gear On the other hand, when I'm farther from home I'd mostly just prefer to get the "reward" for filling achallenge without too much extra fuss. Many high T activities aren't really safe to do alone, require special equipment, or simply a significant time commitment... stuff that isn't necessarily a problem if you're specifically only out to find caches, but can be really awkward to do as a side activity while travelling. So you know, hopefully the CO can find some other aspect of their chosen theme to present on the challenge cache than "these places sure are hard to get to".

Project-GC Challenges reminded me about "Geocaching territory". It's visually appealing and satisfying to work on (up to a point I suppose ). Should be right up there with normal stats, not hidden away in a checker for a challenge that wasn't approved.

Onepooja, I want to say that the communication in this thread, as well as the response to the reported bugs, have been excellent. I have criticized Groundspeak for both before, so credit where credit’s due.

I don't think any of my profile stats are particularly meaningful for me. The stats I currently like to improve are counties with a FTF and counties with a find. For me the finds in counties map (on the right) reminds me of the fun I've had bikepacking (the counties along the eastern border and west coast I've never even been to with a car.) And serves as motivation to do more. The FTF stats represent the social and fun aspect of geocaching. There's no serious attempt to complete that map (or the FTF calendar or FTF d/t grid...) but it's fun to follow anyway. This kind of FTF stats are also the only stats that appeal to my competitive side. Not so much focus on raw numbers, more skill required.

Most coordinate checkers are API partners I think? This is still a terrible idea as a matter of principle, but now the single largest category of caches targeted will be jigidi puzzles so there’s my silver lining.

It’s on greasyfork. It currently doesn’t do anything with the old shortdescription and related website portions of the cache page. I’m currently on a skiing trip so no support from me until the end of next week, but feel free to modify it as you see fit.

My solution was to create a simple userscript that overrides the event listener that does the click hijacking, and adds the target="_blank" attribute to every link in user-provided cache content. No more need to worry about where the link is going to open. The latter part will be useful even when this current silliness goes away.