BlueRajah
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Posts posted by BlueRajah
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I would echo the saturation. People look for the easy grabs. Those are ones that are known locally, or highlighted in papers, parks etc. Those are mostly gone. Combine that with people that want you to just take a picture, and did not actually gather info at the site, or never got permission from someone. Sadly those caches end up not getting published.
An example... There are lots of Yellowstone Geyser caches. Now to do one you need to find something unique to teach, that is much harder than the first couple.
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Ladies' Gold: USA
Ladies' Silver: Canada
Ladies' Bronze: Finland
Mens' Gold: Sweden
Mens' Silver: Russia
Mens' Bronze: USA
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I've just been noticing some pretty ridiculous earthcaches and wondering how they *ever* got published in the first place. There have been (and still are, to some extent) significant inconsistencies with how the guidelines are enforced when earthcaches are reviewed and published.
That is true. Before 2008ish All caches were reviewed by one person (if I recall). As time rolled on Geoaware added GeoawareHQ. They are both GSA employees and did this as part of their job. By late 2009 this became very unwieldy and they asked a group of 4-5 to come and help out. When I started reviewing EarthCaches there were hundreds of caches to go through, I would guess at ties there were actually 400-500 with more coming every day. We spent a year chipping away at that number, and that was with a larger group of people working on it. Some were so overwhelmed they gave up on reviewing because of the work involved.
There were a few issues. Originally everyone submitted the info on the EarthCache website. Geoaware (and later GeoawareHQ)checked it and then created the cache page and published it, then they adopted it out to the cache owner. There were literally creating hundreds of cache pages, reviewing them all, and they also had to do their work they got paid for. During this period some things slipped through the cracks. At this time some guidelines were still kind of gray. We also see that many cache pages have been changed by the cache owner post publication.
Then as the Geoaware team was brought in, there were many variations on what was acceptable as topics, or logging tasks. There is training involved, and getting people on the same page. Not to mention guidelines that have been updated to make the cachers, cache owners, and the reviewers life easier. The Geoaware team over time has expanded to include a number of people and we discuss a lot of information. At this point there is usually a consensus when we look at caches on what should be done.
PS. The reason I mentioned the photo requirement as that has been the big one that seems to come up when we change the guidelines.
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Closing the topic. This is not a partner with Groundspeak, please go to their forums to deal with issues with their program or help.
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Most things were grandfathered with new editions.
Photo requirements were not.
It depends the photo requirement:
"Requiring a photograph of the geocacher as proof that they were at the EarthCache site is not permitted.
However, photographic tasks will be considered if they relate specifically to the Earth Science lesson."
Source: EarthCache Logging Requirements
In 99% of the EarthCaches the photo requirement in not specifically related to Earth Science. It is just to have a photo. In over three years of reviewing EarthCaches I don't think have published one with a photo requirement.
(We will try to answer again.. as I apparently cannot read the difference between "reply" and "edit"
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Most things were grandfathered with new editions.
Photo requirements were not.
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For example, we have a "review queue" page that we visit to see what new caches have been submitted for review. Each reviewer can filter that list so they just see the new caches in the region(s) that they cover.
So reviewers don't receive an email each time a cache is submitted to an area that they cover?
Did they used to?
I am approaching 5 years of reviewing and I have never seen emails for new listings. Having the Review queue rather than an email system lets me call Keystone and say. "I will be out in the wilderness away from the internet tubes, can you cover for me?" He can then just look at my queue and help out while I am gone.
I am getting 5-10 a day now, summer is far higher I would guess 2x-3x the average. Some are detailed emails requiring detailed responses, most are "i fixed my cache, can you check one more time". Like Keystone I deal with land managers more this time of year as the mountain roads are under many feet of snow, so they start looking at the non urgent stuff they put off all summer.
It will vary from reviewer to reviewer. New reviewers get less, as most go to the one they are familiar with. Is there one reviewer in your state? or 5? Summer or Winter? Sunday or Tuesday? So many variables.
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winter or summer?
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http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showtopic=318852
Pointing to the other thread. and closing this one.
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I just had a request to have this thread locked. As the answer was given.
Hope everyone has fun at your events, or goes out caching that today or this weekend.
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The 2nd event I am sure of, as I had all the nickel coins in my backpack to give to volunteers after they had completed most of their volunteer time. Plus we gave them to people completing a special interview about Earthcaching, speakers, some supporters of the program, etc.
The gold ones were the ones that were on sale.
The first year coins I just did not keep track of what was for what.
I did find that the Pewter (middle) is defiantly the volunteer coin. I found a few pictures from volunteers that stated that their coins were volunteer coins.
Of the first event there were 500 made for the first 500 that signed up (or paid for them?). I was right on the cusp of that number so I don't know where if mine was part of that first 500 or not.
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merged two identical threads.
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1st event had three options
One was nickel with the black edge ring. The cutaway of the earth on the front had Yellow and orange glitter. (Volunteer?)
One was pewter looking with no paint on the outside ring. The cutaway colors on the earth was not glitter. (I think this was the one given to the first 500 that registered.)
One had the gold with the red ring. (Was the one up for sale at the event)
2nd event had two options as well.
One was the gold plating that was up for sale.
One was the black nickel that was given to volunteers and those interviewed about Earthcaching.
I traded my gold one for another volunteer black nickel and my wife did not buy another like I thought she did. So I am missing the regular one sold at the event. I also did not grab the one with the Red Ring.
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As this thread seems to be aggressive and is likely to get more people placed in time out, I am closing discussion at this time.
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Another note. Leave your personal attacks at the door. If you want to insult someone you may find yourself in a time out. You can hold a discussion, but I don't want to hand out any warnings or time outs, I dislike doing it.
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As of now, there is no souvenir.
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If one does happen to come about, we'll post about it in here and elsewhere.
A few of us tried to contact various people at Groundspeak about a souvenir and there has been no change from this post that GeoawareHQ posted a while ago. Don't count on it at this time. Sorry
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At first I didn't like caches being archived, for history purposes. But now I don't mind the idea so much. In this case I could see it really causing issues for reviewers, and potential publishers.
History purposes? These are unpublished and hidden, not active so no one would have a history of them other than the cache owner, and he can still see them.
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That doesn't address the increased workload on reviewers.
Then I misunderstood. How does non-submitted listing contribute to reviewer workload? If it's not been submitted yet then it shouldn't be a blocker for others that have.
When a reviewer goes to publish a cache, the unsubmitted/unpublished cache, and all their waypoints, can pop up as blocking the cache to be listed. Then the reviewer has to make a determination on if the cache is active, check every waypoint that is flagged in that area and sometimes contact all those cache onwers.
This may not be a problem in rural Utah where I review, however parks in the city, or popular locations may have many "started" caches/waypoints that were never published. This slows down reviewing considerably in some areas (Germany comes to mind).
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We aren't wanting to create pain for owners of legitimate listings, but simply pursuing a straight-forward solution for cleaning out out the scores of thousands of abandoned listings that have been steadily increasing reviewer workload.
Then settle coordinate conflicts by the date the listing was submitted, not the date it was opened.
They are not using any of the methods that you mention. Archival has nothing to do with the date it was opened or submitted. If you let your cache sit for over a year with no changes, reviewer notes, etc., that is when they are prone to get caught up in this sweep.
The vast majority of these were started by cache owners and ignored, or even submitted and denied. In some the owners went inactive. Using a time period where no one has made any edits to the cache page is a quick and simple way to see if someone is working on a page.
Note that some reviewers do this sweeps of inactive caches in their areas as well. Their sweeps do not use the same process as this automated archival, we look at every page one at a time.
Obviously caches that people are planning to use, but have not done anything on may get caught up in either method. The caches can be unarchived by contacting your reviewer.
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Do reviewers in general look over the cache description, looking for ALR's and stuff?
I can only speak for myself. I read the caches as I go through them. Obviously a new cacher placing a complex hide or challenge is going to have a more thorough review than the cacher that is placing traditional hide #455 on a power trail. I have some cachers that I have seen place problem caches again and again. They will get more scrutiny than someone else. I have published caches and gone "oh crap" and hurriedly retracted them as I see something that is wrong as the publish page refreshes. That is usually followed by an email from someone who had their notifications on, and can't find the cache page.
About archiving/retraction. Personally (speaking for me) If someone has found the cache, I tend to archive it, then lock it seems like people are still finding it. If the cache has not been found a retraction is better. That is just my opinion, and others have different thoughts on it. It is also not set in stone, and lets reviewer and the cache owner decide.
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Sometimes things are changed, and sometimes I just miss things up.
I know at one time I had two reviewing windows open. I published one and posted notes on the other. A few weeks later I got an email. I had published the cache that had multiple problems and posted the note on the cache that was. The owner of the good cache I put on hold was horribly lost and confused, and finally emailed me to wonder what the problem was. It took me a bit to realize what I had done and track down the other cache.
In short sometimes mistakes happen, and if it is in a busy time we may never know without an email from someone wondering what is happening.
I do not know what happened here (as I am not the reviewer), but sometimes things happen.
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My wife looked at me strangely when she came in with the package. I had told her that I was not going to buy any more until after christmas.
So many thanks for my receiving a coin. It made my day.
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I should go get some.. but I think my wife would be annoyed with a trip to seattle right now before the holidays.
EarthCache Statistics
in EarthCaches
Posted
My opinion on the fewer numbers...
The simple ones are gone. Everyone knows of the local landmarks. Nearly all of the locations highlighted by the local geology groups and rockbound groups have EarthCaches. So you can't pull up a simple website, get the answers then make a page. So in many areas (not all) you actually have to hunt for the information. If you are not a geologist you see something cool and go.. "huh, thats cool, I wish I know why it was like that" and you walk away.
In other words, in many areas much of the simple stuff is gone.
Second, the big drop in numbers was in January of 2011. That is when you had to actually have more than a photo. Well, you had to before that, but I think it hit home at that point. I have had a few people say that they don't want to go through the emails. They just wanted to look at the cache page. If there was no photo they deleted it. So it was a combination of not being able to come up with logging tasks, not wanting to police logs, and/or not wanting to deal with emails.
Some areas just need that person to start looking and putting in the footwork.