AmayaTom

Isn't that now gone too???? No, it's just left the US, but lives on elsewhere - for example: http://www.geocaching.com/geocache/GC57V0R_gps-maze-europe-germany

That matched what I've been told by a Groundspeak founder, with specifics still undecided (so there is no more to know, yet). Also sounds like the global parties may remain on 3rd weekend of August, dubbed International Geocaching Day/Weekend. The demise of the Block Party will also impact our (WSGA's) Going APE mega-event, since the two events made up the destination weekend here in the Pacific Northwest. So, this could be the last year of the APE event in its current incarnation, as well. (Although no decisions have been made yet.) In short, it's 2015 or never if you want to attend the current Block Party (and get the icon) and the Going APE mega as they now exist. If the rumblings are true that there will be more International flavour (flavor if you're in the US ) to whatever comes next, I think it is quite a bold move by Groundspeak and one that has to be applauded as it will allow much larger chunks of the international community to be involved and that has to be a good thing (even though the Block Party and the Going Ape were impressive events). I await more news with interest!

Has anybody heard any rumblings about what will replace this? The only thing I have heard in passing is that they will be spread out around the world - lots of satellite "block parties" as it were (I guess in mid-August) - giving more cachers a chance to get involved. Has anybody heard anything more concrete?

I just tried to update the info in what has now become the "Bio" box, and the entry box it now so small (and OK, I have a lot of data in there ), that when you have a significant amount of data in it, you can't see enough of the data to work out where you are in the data. I had to giveup attempting to edit it. Could we have the "Bio" box made a lot bigger please? I appreciate this is probably work in progress, so just wanted to feed back a usability issue with it. Many thanks! A.

I logged an attended via GSAK, but got no souvenir. Following the advice above has fixed the problem for me too. Thanks.

How about GC41M5H, GC4FMZP, GC3Q4J9 and GC4KZQT I haven't seen a triple Jasmer yet (but stand to be corrected...)

I have found that if I select cache http://coord.info/GC3EEXH and then select View Larger Map, then zoom out about 4 times, all 100 or so caches in the ring disappear making it look like there are no caches in that area at all. I am used to seeing the map reduce the number of caches in an area as you zoom out so as to be able to fit them onto the screen better, but this appears to be a glitch that makes them all disappear...

Looks like the UK is bigger than I realised, when did Deci start to land grab

I have just used GSAK and the API to download 5500 caches. There was not a single error, and it only used up 5500 of my daily download credits. So perhaps the problem really is fixed. Perhaps somebody in GS really is listening. If so many thanks. But please, GS, will you remember that communication is a two way process. I can only assume this is fixed, it would be really nice to get some comms out of you so that we know what is really going on.

Ahh, yes, the C-word. My recent visits to the these forums (I rarely touch them as they frustrate more more than anything else due to the total lack of feedback from anybody that works for GS) have been to question: 1) - Why I now have to pay more for living in a geographical region that gets to play less of the game 2) - Now despite paying more I am now getting an inferior service to when I was paying less What I find particularly sad is that they actually had it working incredibly well before they broke it I think I'll go back to ignoring these forums again, they are utterly pointless if GS are just going to ignore them.

This problem is still occuring nearly a week after it was first posted on here, and just as badly. Do Groundspeak actually read these forums? Are we wasting our time posting anything on here?

This is the actual error which I have now reproduced: "Stored Search not found. Please run the full search again." As others say, this functionality has gone from very good to almost useless. I do hope it gets fixed soon.

I haven't always been so lucky. Sometimes when it errors it has told me it has forgotten what the search even was and that I will have to run it again. It doesn't of course "refund" the now wasted download credits.

Yes, I too and suffering from the timeout and other errors that are being reported above and have done for the last few days. Something has definitely degraded recently.

http://web.archive.org/web/20050829125729/http://www.geocaching.com/subscribe/

You'll find that the early caches like GCD, GC57 and especially GCF0 can be way of the mark when it comes to terrain/difficulty ratings (although I note that GCD has recently upped it's terrain rating, it was only a T2 when I found it - GC1W7KE gives you a good indication of the terrain you get going there - that cache page makes a good read). GCF0 is a terrain 1 (which means it can be done in a wheelchair ), it took me 5.5 hours to get up and down, although it would have been quite a bit quicker if I hadn't done it in a blizzard. The reason for this was that the ratings back in 2000 were not as defined as they are today and there was little to benchmark them against, so people just put almost random guesses against them. Most of the time hese old historical caches are left as they originally were, which I tend to agree with as it gives a bit of a window back to what things were like in the early days.

Dave, I have a lot of respect for what you do as a reviewer [apart from when you wander around in public in that skirt you have ], but on this subject you are way out of touch with he grass roots. When a company continues to show such contempt for their customers, they are on a slippery slope.

Americans get to play more of the game than we do anyway. Of the 18 cache icons you can get, only 14 of them are available outside of America. Therefore, as we only get to play 14/18's of the game here in the Rest of the World, we should only pay 14/18's of the price. Instead we are being asked to pay another $8.50 approx at current prices compared to what the Americans do. Which is approx 23/18's of the price. How does that work? People that can play all the game pay 18/18's of the price, and people that can only play 14/18's of the game have to pay 23/18's of the price. To use an Americanism "You do the math..." My own personal preference is to wait until a week or so before renewal time, download as much cache info as possible (i.e. PQs etc), and then cache on this old data for a month or so before renewing a month or two later, thereby effectively paying the same amount as I did before. Of course, if I have to get to 14/18's of the price, this will take a little longer Perhaps GS need to recruit a PR consultant?

As has been pointed out on the main forum, the price hike is only hitting non-Americans. Which isn't a fair way of doing things. Americans get to play more of the game than we do anyway. Of the 18 cache icons you can get, only 14 of them are available outside of America. Therefore, as we only get to play 14/18's of the game here in the UK/Europe/Rest of the World, we should only pay 14/18's of the price. Instead we are being asked to pay another $8.50 approx at current prices compared to what the Americans do. Which is approx 23/18's of the price. How does that work? People that can play all the game pay 18/18's of the price, and people that can only play 14/18's of the game have to pay 23/18's of the price. Worth pointing out that according to my own memory and of others on the forum, GS promised that whilst you renewed your membership, they would never raise the price. For people that auto-renewed with Paypal (which keeps them locked in to the old price), GS are asking people to cancel the agreement, without telling them that if they do, the price will go up when they renew the new way (very underhand). My own personal preference is to wait until a week or so before renewal time, download as much cache info as possible, and then cache on this old data for a month or so before renewing a month or two later, thereby effectively paying the same amount as I did before.

OK, I'm aware I have been pretty flamed for this post, but I will explain why I posted it and then leave this thread well alone. Very recently I was listening to a cacher talking to a moderator about a multi cache he wanted to place around his favourite local football (that will be soccer if you're American) teams stadium. It was explained to him that he couldn't mention the name of the stadium in his listing because it is named after the abbreviation of an American Credit Card Company (i.e. AMEX). It was also mentioned to him that should he have supported a team like Chelsea where their stadium name is based after their geographical location then he would have been able to mention the stadium name. I pointed out at this point I thought that guideline was a little silly (especially as football clubs are businesses too, but are OK to mention). I don't think the moderator particularly disagreed with that, but moderators are of course there to follow procedure which is exactly why that guidance was given. Anyhow cue a very short period later (and I mean a VERY short period later), I see I have just been awarded a souvenir which spuriously mentions a product that to my knowledge does not support GS in any way and has nothing to do with any event I have ever been to. It seems rather illogical that a cache based around a football stadium cannot even mention the stadium name.

You have managed to completely misunderstand me: >> I don't see any commercialization. Mentioning chocolate bars (or candy bars if you are American) is not commercialisation, as soon as you mention Hershey it is >> Which one of the 200 flash-mob Events associated with that souvenir bothers you? Where did that question come from? None of the events bothered me. I was saying that I had never seen any Hershey products in any event I had ever been to anywhere in the world, so to make a massively exaggerated claim that Hershey products turn up at most events is both needless and untrue. Unless of course Hersheys have started sponsoring GS and they have't told us about it. In which case I wouldn't have an issue. GS should be setting a good example. That is not the case here.

Perhaps GS are saving up money so that they can open up a new HQ in Europe so that Euro based cachers can get the HQ icon, BlockParty icon, GPS Adventures icon and Lost and Found icon without having to fly to the US. Or, if they aren't going to do this, perhaps we should pay a discount of 4/18's of the price US based cachers pay as we only get to look for 14/18's of the cache icons that US cachers can get?

I always thought that trying to commercialise anything related to caches and caching was a bit of a no-no, so I was a bit surprised when I got yesterdays souvenir: http://www.geocaching.com/souvenir/?guid=1b24bc7f-e9f4-4a96-9450-225f6c8de4a2 Especially the text that says: "activities like group photos, event meals (usually Hershey’s kisses)" That's somewhat surprising as Hersheys don't seem to sell much stuff outside of North America as their chocolate doesn't seem to appeal to European palates (at least) and I've never seen any of their stuff at a cache event.

I find this post rather sad. I visited HQ just over a year ago, and GS were bemoaning the poor quality of recent cache hides. At the same time they mentioned that the top three countries in terms of cache hiding were: US, Germany, Czech Rep (in that order) and that the quality of caches placed in the latter two were vastly superior to those placed in the US (lamppost caches anybody?). They wanted to understand how they could learn from these two countries as to how to improve cache hides in other countries. Now fast forward to the forums a year or so later. We find out that there was a feedback site that was busy requesting Virtuals and Webcam caches return. Not the answer GS wanted? Let's close it down then. Get lots of feedback from German and Czech cachers (mostly Czech I grant you) on a forum - the very people GS want to learn from, and what is the party line? Essentially, we're still not going to listen to you. For all those who criticise the +1ing going on, don't forget that neither Germany nor the Czech Rep have English as their mother tongue, so forum posters from these countries will find it much harder to argue as coherently as those of us that do. I should point out I am not from the US, nor from Germany, nor from Czech Rep, so have no axe to grind for any of them. If I had to classify the quality of recent hides in my own country, I would say it is probably akin with those in the US. Whilst there aren't lamppost skirts here to lift up and hide caches under, we do have a plague of nanos being hidden here. Give me a virtual/webcam any day over a nano or a lamppost cache.