dprovan

Thank you for explaining my analogy so perfectly. My job here is done.

I'll have to take your word for it.

Correct. And more to the point, the OP shouldn't be asking what the purpose of the attribute is, since he clearly understands that: he should be asking why COs in his area don't maintain it correctly. And I mean literally asking the COs since that could actually make a difference, as opposed to complaining on the forums to people all over the world, most of whom already recognize this problem. Maybe I'm misremembering, but I thought the NM attribute didn't have an observable effect on the health score. The NM *log* has a little effect, but even that wasn't as big a factor people expected.

I'm all for valid logs, and I certainly encourage a CO to delete challenge finds that don't meet the criteria. But the question here is, what if, for whatever reason, they don't? The argument I keep seeing here is, "Well, they should." I agree they should, but they *don't*. Now what? I think what a lot of people miss is that the choice is then between archiving the cache -- so now your year, arm, and leg were all sacrificed without any point whatsoever -- or keeping the cache active even though there are non-qualifying finds diluting your pride. I firmly prefer the latter, but if you really want to throw arms, legs, and years away for nothing, you can continue to advocate for the former.

Nope, sorry, that's exactly what I mean. It checks your statistics *now*. That's wrong, objectively wrong. It's just exactly as wrong as a smoke detector that goes off because someone burnt their popcorn. That doesn't mean the checker is broken or invalid or shouldn't do that. It just means that the building shouldn't be evacuated when we all understand it isn't burning down. I'm not sure how we can come to an agreement about this. Yes, the checker is doing exactly what it was told to do, so, yes, in that sense it is "right". It's just coming to a conclusion any human can see is wrong about whether the challenge's criteria were met when the cache was found.

Thanks for explaining. I haven't deleted a log in a long time, and I don't remember what it was like last time I did. Anyway, so sending an explicit message means a small, extra step. Not sure how that takes you back it being your responsibility to convince them to delete their log, and then arguing with them if they don't. You still can just delete the log. I think it's nice to send them an explanation along with the text of their deleted log because it's such a minor effort -- so minor, the UI should do it for you -- but, as I said before, if you think that's too much work, go ahead and forget that step with my blessing. The important thing is to just delete the log and not look for drama about it. As the bruce0 has been saying, the checker was put in play here to eliminate drama, so don't ignore the results of the checker in order to allow drama. I don't consider that the CO's problem when it comes to explaining the deletion. On the other hand, newbies learn by being taught, so I'd applaud a CO mentoring someone ignorant about challenge caches if they didn't seem to understand. That's not so much being a good challenge cache owner as being a good geocacher. Just as an aside, I won't question whether lots of people are signing up without visiting the website, but I don't really think that's relevant. New geocachers that use the website can be just as ignorant about challenge caches as those that don't. Challenge caches are just something newbies have to learn about. I see no point in looking down our noses at the group that uses an app instead of a web page.

Well, except it wasn't cool to be a nerd back in 2000. Only people that already accepted that they were nerds were willing to act like nerds. But, actually, for the first 10 years or so, I think it was mostly outdoor enthusiasts that did geocaching, so that wasn't your traditional nerds. It didn't technically make sense, but I think niraD was just picking on you. I think we all understood what you were saying even though it came out organically illogical...well, actually it's tautological, which is actually the epitome of logical, since we're all nerds here.

To be honest, I was thinking the CO might have died, which would make it an insurmountable burden. Anyway, the challenge sounds super cool. If I were you, I'd be so glad the CO kept it active instead of archiving it because, for whatever reasons, they weren't up to rejecting unqualified finds. I, too, would definitely add a comment in the log lamenting that people that don't qualify -- which I wouldn't hesitate to name -- are being allowed to log it, but beyond that, I wouldn't really care. I'm not saying the CO is correct to allow the finds, I just don't think it matters to those that do qualify.

Aussies! They do the damnedest things! Who can understand them? I would have just deleted the log right away, explained why, and left it to them to change my mind. (Frankly, explaining why is optional in a case like this, although it's a nice touch because you can include the text of the log which, if I'm remembering correctly, would otherwise be lost when the log was deleted.) Shouldn't require any time at all unless they actually present something resembling an explanation. I encourage COs to be sympathetic, but only when there's something to be sympathetic with. Obviously I don't mind you doing whatever you want to do, but in my opinion, you yourself made this a problem by asking instead of just acting.

He bothered so you could enjoy the challenge. Have you talked to the CO? This seems more like someone not available to check qualifications rather than willfully ignoring finds so ridiculously unqualified that they're obviously mistakes. This example is so wrong I can't imagine it being someone that's intentionally trying to slip one past the CO.

Exactly. I'm saying that the checker can be wrong. Sure. So the CO can always fall back to "the checker says you didn't qualify" if he's not satisfied with the evidence, and he'll be fully supported by GS. No drama. I'm only saying he shouldn't do that even when the explanation is satisfactory. OK, but nothing I'm saying should make you think I'd support lazy cachers getting away that kind of nonsense. I assume anyone reasonable agrees with that, so I don't consider it important in the context of giving reasonable leeway. We can have another thread where we all bash lazy cachers and lazy COs that enable them.

Are you familiar with the phrase "dog in the manger"?

Of course I agree challenged should be verified. I just deny that a change in rating unqualifies the find. I think the consensus in this thread is that a cache rating being changed after the cache was found does *not* unqualify the find. It's just a glitch in the checking procedure that makes it look like the challenge isn't satisfied even though it is. Are you saying that's wrong, and a legitimate find of a correctly rated cache shouldn't be accepted if CO changes the rating because something about the find changed? I'm having a hard time understanding that given that you're also suggesting an improved checking procedure that fixes the problem. Meh. The CO is free to be a hard a**. The seeker is free to forget about claiming the find if the CO is a hard a**. By the way, you've brought up challenge owners that are too lazy to care. That's a different issue.

Well, yes, but do challenge owner really take such a hard line about a missing 1.5/1.5? I would hope that most would accept the find with a reasonable explanation. I wouldn't be surprised if many just shrug their shoulders without an explanation since it's obvious what happened. Any challenge owner that insists of rejecting the find based on a minor, understandable rating doesn't really deserve to have their cache found, anyway. The problem with this is that the cache might really have been rated wrong when it was found, so when the rating is changed, it's because the challenge cache seeker doesn't really deserve the rating. One hopes this is another thing challenge owners would be sympathetic to, I just bring it up because it doesn't really solve the logical problems as neatly as it seems. Yes, documenting a rating change in an OM is a very good policy, and not just because of challenges. I think documenting rating changes is as important as documenting why the coordinates were changed.

Yeah, I agree with you about that. That's one one the reasons I didn't seriously think he was interested in newbies: he was just using them as an easy way to talk about the perceived unfairness of challenges that allow history even though the newbies themselves wouldn't notice it.

I suppose I could be wrong, but I took that as meaning he wanted to invent challenges that appealed to everyone equally, not challenges that would attract newbies specifically. After all, the things he's suggesting don't change the experience for newbies at all, they just make the challenges seem more fair to someone that hasn't already found thousands of caches.

No, his idea is for people to do the challenge consciously, not just claiming it based on finds made before the challenge even existed. I don't think he has any interest at all in appealing to beginners.

I see what you're saying, but I don't think this is an interesting approach. I think the only thing you're really interested in is that nothing done before the cache is published can be used to meet the challenge. The only other effect would be that someone only discovering the challenge years after it was published would not be able to use caches between the two times, but this seems to me just a childish "nah-nah, you didn't see my cache when it was published" type of concern. I'm actually fine with the idea of limiting the challenge to caches published after the challen, but it's really clear GS will never go for that. I'm a little confused because that parenthesis seems to intend to limit challenges to things that can be done in a month, but I see no reason to think the stated restriction will accomplish that. Indeed, I think it will be more common for caches that can't be accomplished in a month without a herculean effort, and I'm not particularly interested in promoting that. On the other end, sometimes I see a challenge and complete it right away, but other times I see it and start towards it but get distracted by other things, like life. So I'd be annoying if I was prevented from completing a challenge because I took too long. Some challenges I work on for years in the background. To me, this is the bottom line: you want to challenge people, but not really with a geocache. It strikes me that you're wedging in the idea of challenging geocachers into geocaching even when what you want to do doesn't really fit. I think you could accomplish the same thing by having a geocache that explains the challenge, but then have the list of people accomplishing the challenge just be a list in the geocache description not related to any kind of find log. Given what you're saying, the geocache itself might have nothing at all to do with the challenge expect insofar as it presents the challenge in a place geocachers will be able to find it and where -- optionally -- they can declare their completion of the challenge by finding the cache and logging a find. But they could also just log a note if they don't want to find the physical cache.

Bah. I think 90% recognize that's is an arbitrary choice and accept the choice GS made instead of being in the 10% that believe their preference is somehow magically more valid.

Your comment is so far from my original point and the original topic that I'm not sure how to react. I certainly didn't mean to imply anything negative about events or other types of caches.

A cache is what a new person thinks geocaching is all about: a hidden container with a log on it. Events are something people learn about later. And some geocachers -- but only some -- decide to attend events after they learn about them.

First, let's agree that events are not caches, so "newest caches" can't include events. But, then, let's consider what I think is the meat of your proposal: events are as important as caches, so the box should say "newest caches and pending events" and show the list you propose. OK, in that context, I see your point, but I'd still say that Newest Caches alone is more important and more what someone depending on the home page would want. So let's consider a third possibility: adding an "events" quick search next to the newest caches search. As much as I appreciate your arguments in favor of events, I'd have to say that, even so, I still consider events somewhat obscure, so I wouldn't think they were important enough for their own special search, although GS might be convinced otherwise. There's some validity in the moderator's responses, but in general I think they're making the same mistake as is common from GS employees and pseudo-employees: you're not saying that it would be useful to *you* to have events shown more readily -- that's what they're suggesting -- you're saying that you think it is important to other people: those not as familiar with geocaching and how to do geocaching searches as you are. TeamRabbitRun made this same point. I agree it's an important point, but, in the end, I personally don't think events are important enough to make this argument, although it would make perfect sense to me if GS where convinced by them.

I have a hard time believing geocaching's longterm survival depends on eliminating benchmarking. Other than that, I think your points are reasonable. I can't say I support the decision, but for the reasons you cite, I agree it's GS's decision to make.

I disagree. I think most people asking about moving caches from one account to another have never thought of alternative ways to look at it that make it an unnecessary chore without as much logic behind it as it seems. What business is this of yours, anyway? If he doesn't want my advice, that's up to him, not you.

What are you blabbering about? I've said over and over i don't care how he does it. Sheesh.