Hurricane Luke
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Posts posted by Hurricane Luke
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Out of my 130 active hides, ONLY 3 are PMO. These also happen to be what I consider my best 3. 2 of them are electronic puzzles. So why are they PMO? I couldn't care less about the Audit logs. I'm not really concerned about cache maggots seeking my caches out.
What I do care about is getting a good log from someone who has completed the cache after I have invested my $, my time, and my effort into creating them. Now I'm not saying that only PM's can write interesting and thoughtful logs, but there is (in my area anyway) a clear correlation between non-PM's and "TFTC" logs, which irritate me to no end.
I also like to be able to control the user-experience of my caches as much as possible. This is much easier to do when I don't have to worry about non-PM's unintentionally damaging something at one of these PMO caches I own. Again, I am not saying that only PM's can handle caches appropriately - but yes, in the past, there has been a clear correlation between a lack of respect for caches and non-PM's.
I evaluated the evidence around me, and determined that there is, however inherently unknown, a lower probability of something negative occurring to a PMO cache compared to a non-PMO cache.
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Don't hide caches that won't get favorite points!
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status.geocaching.com seems to confirm it.
Geocaching Email Notifications.
Impaired.
Oh dear. This service is moving slow. We know. We're on it. Your friendly Geocaching.com engineers are moving fast to get you back up to full geocaching speed.
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I havent gone out to find a cache yet,im enjoying reading these forums...i have to say,you are all mad. 60 year old potter fans,argueing over names from the books and geeks admitting to being geeks commenting on how they've read every book...people complaining about 'how someone actually went out to BUY a cache'....do you not think its a waste of life? Writing on a piece of paper and putting it into a rock?
Well, at least I have my spelling & grammar!
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My question would be "how can you move a cache more than 161 meters and claim it is the same caching experience?" It isn't. The question answers itself. Time for a new listing.
Okay - but what you've just said doesn't actually reflect the guidelines, and it isn't always true either. What happens if you've got a cache on a 10 mile hike and you want to move it 200 metres?
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How do reviewers decide whether an already in place cache be moved more than 160 metres at request of the user or whether it should be archived and a new one placed? Section 6.11 "Major change" says:
If you need to change the coordinates beyond 0.1 miles (528 feet or 161 m), or change the type of cache, please contact your local reviewer. The reviewer will check the changes for adherence to the current guidelines and notify you when the changes have been made, or suggest that a new cache listing should be submitted. Please be sure to follow any instructions the reviewer may send you.Along with Section 6.9 "Editing your cache coordinates":
In some circumstances, it may be appropriate to archive the original cache, and submit the moved cache as a new listing. Your reviewer will advise you if this is the case.Well, that's a bit ambiguous. What are these circumstances? What is the qualifying difference between justifying a long-distance move & justifying an archival of a cache? Ideas?
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Whilst echoing the above comments, I've got just one additional note: before you consider setting your caches to PMO, it's worth noting the system isn't bulletproof and there are ways to view a PMO cache if you aren't a PM, and also to avoid being included on the audit log.
Methinks if Groundspeak were to allow people to see who was watching a particular cache, fewer people would use the 'watch' feature, making it less effective. Catch 22!
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We love hiding. 128 caches here. No archives either. We maintain everything as soon as a issue appears. But we truly are for the quality rather than the quantity, honest. No stupid micro caches in awful spots - every time we place a cache we ask ourselves: "Would we enjoy finding a cache here?" if it's a scenic spot, or "Would we enjoy finding this cache?" If it's a puzzle.
People we do what they enjoy most. We enjoy finding also, but hiding is our forte...
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While I've used PMO occasionally to ensure a valuable cache is 'safer' - there are ways to skirt the audit log so you do not appear on it. There's not really much point in an idea like this.
I respect your opinion to which you are entitled but your post does not help with the proposal.
Au contraire. If there's a flaw in an initial system (audit logs), any idea arguing for an extension of said system needs a discussion of what is wrong with the system in the first place, and how such flaw could affect the outcome of a new idea.
Since there already multiple ways one can avoid appearing on an audit log, my belief is that if one were to extend the audit log feature TO ALL caches, more people would probably start looking for ways to avoid the audit log, making such methods more popular, thus making the audit log even more useless than it is now. Implementing such an idea will only make a broken system more brokener (wait, that's not a word is it!).
And it's not Groundspeaks' fault either, since they can't possibly detect if a cache is viewed offline.
If it came to a vote, I would say 'no', and draft a proposal to go in the opposite direction and abolish the audit log altogether.
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While I've used PMO occasionally to ensure a valuable cache is 'safer' - there are ways to skirt the audit log so you do not appear on it. There's not really much point in an idea like this.
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So is 'regular' to be deprecated in a future release? I always thought having a 'baseline' size was important, as it allowed new geocachers to see what's 'expected' of them when they hide a cache.
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No thanks. That's unnecessarily complicated. Ease of use is key. If you don't have enough favorite points - maybe you need to be more selective.
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You already have the ability. It's called a log.
+1. And you can already like a cache. It's called a favorite point.
Dislikes, to me anyway, introduce negativity. Negativity is never a good thing. And if there really is something badly wrong with a geocache, you can post a log notifying the owner, a NM or NA, or contact a reviewer. Everything has a semantic value. Keep it as is.
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I don't mean to be harsh, but I've always thought the idea of awarding multiple favorites points to a cache is AWFUL. The binary system we have at the moment (yes, it gets a favorite point, or no, it doesn't) is fantastic because of its simplicity, and ease-of-use - there's no worrying about which people gave a particular cache more than a single point, how many caches you can favorite with the number of given points you currently have, etc.
THIS is how Apple became such a successful company - by keeping things simple & clean and eliminating distractions. Groundspeak has got it spot on here, leave it as it is.
Changing that would require a number of back end changes along with UI changes, and anyway, my interpretation of favorites is that they're not subjective, instead they're an absolute method of measuring a caches' quality. It's either in your top 10% or it isn't.
Please - no changes to the favorites system in any way!
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Our rule for placing traditionals - if you wouldn't want to live there, don't place a cache there!
Great principle to work with!
It's a bit off topic, but I have to disagree.
My favorite caches are off in the woods, sometime requiring a difficult hike to get to. I don't think I would want to live there. But I suppose what is meant is that the cache is in some "nice" location that at least I might want to visit even if there wasn't a cache there.
I've had to look for some caches that were hidden in some very nice residential neighborhoods. Frankly it's not always the most comfortable place to be searching with the neighbor washing his car in his driveway or mowing his lawn.
I will say that I didn't mind the cache outside the Playboy Mansion, but another group that looked for it a night reported issues with security wanting to know what they were doing in the bushes with flashlights.
Seems like placing caches only where you would want to live is not a particularly good way to pick a location.
You're analyzing it way too much... my initial comment/joke was only meant to apply to the OP's topic.
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Our rule for placing traditionals - if you wouldn't want to live there, don't place a cache there!
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We like our favorite points!
Our caches generally tend to be off on trails, and we've recently been working on a few clever ideas which should hopefully accrue 10+ each. Here's the specifics (I also love statistics & numbers!):
Currently, we own 127 caches (no archived caches as well!). We currently have 274 favorite points, making an average of 2.16 favs/cache. These 127 caches have had a total of 2949 finds, which gives an avg. of 10.76 finds per favorite.
Out of these 127 caches, 100 have at least a single point awarded to them.
The most favorite points awarded to a single cache of ours outright is "A-maze-ing Views" (
GC2HRWE) with 13 points to 42 logs. One of our most clever puzzles, "Invisible Worlds" (
GC2WHX0) has 7 points to 10 logs. Likewise, one of our caches is hidden in the outback at one of the most beautiful places imaginable, "White Rock" (GC2P2FA) also has 7 points to 10 logs.Our most favorited multi is shared between two caches with 7 favorites, "Round The Bays" (
GC39RP7) & "Hutt River Confluence Trail" (GC2JWY9), with 16 & 20 logs respectively. Another beautiful spot on a hike, "High Point 656" (
GC32N3J) has 6 points to 9 logs. Our one Earthcache (more to come!), in one of the remotest locations imaginable around here, "Honeycomb Rocks" (
GC3A8H2) has 2 points to 3 premium logs. In total, 18 of our caches have 5 favorite points or more.
We're pretty keen on good descriptions along with photos, so check some of ours out and see what you think!
Cheers,
Luke.
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While admittedly we have only a handful caches we think of as truly 'quality hides', we do try and put an effort into placing caches at spots we would favorite, nothing less than that - whether they be placed on trails, at viewpoints, geologically or historically interesting spots.
And we have definite experience on this matter, with nearly 127 hides ATM, with the latest just published an hour ago and awaiting an FTF.
You wouldn't believe how disheartening it is to receive "TFTC" despite the fact you've placed a good cache, spent a good few days prior mapping out the location and area, waiting quarter of an hour averaging coordinates, snapping photos (you won't find a single cache listing of ours without a photo!
), and then spending anywhere from an hour to a day writing up drafts, researching information and slowly building an essay-length description of your cache - all to get "TFTC" on a log. Ridiculous. We wrote 2000 words for the description. And you can't manage more than 4 characters, and maybe an additional punctuation symbol? Give us a break.
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... my initial thought was to make it a multicache that starts outside the library, people answer a bunch of questions ... to determine the dewey decimal number of a book ...
While this all sounds great, the local reviewer has recently told me:
Please remember that you'll need to have GPS coordinates as part of this one: perhaps a starting point with the dewey decimal # of the book in it, and an approximate distance (or similar clue).Seems to me you and the reviewer are saying exactly the same thing.
I fail to see what the problem is here
Nope. Not the same at all. It's the method in which the cache is determined that makes all the difference - the reviewers suggestion implies that finding the book is done through a GPS offset, whilst my original idea was to make finders actually look for the Dewey Decimal # manually, which in my opinion is more library-like and more authentic. Small details matter immensely.
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Hi all,
I have received permission to place a geocache in a local library from the library manager, and now the goal is implementation to get it created - my initial thought was to make it a multicache that starts outside the library, people answer a bunch of questions to obtain the coordinates for a library computer which they then go to, and there they do a few more calculations to determine the dewey decimal number of a book (I was thinking of using "The Joy of Geocaching" perhaps?
), and have the cache hidden inside the book (a la Andy Dufresne hiding the rock hammer in the bible in Shawshank Redemption). It would be appropriately marked as reference, but still have all the barcodes on it, and maybe even a stealthily placed international geocaching logo. A second copy would also be purchased and donated to the library. While this all sounds great, the local reviewer has recently told me:
Please remember that you'll need to have GPS coordinates as part of this one: perhaps a starting point with the dewey decimal # of the book in it, and an approximate distance (or similar clue).Okay - that sort of puts a stopper in my plan! (Let me just say before I finish, The reviewer in question here is fantastic - he's helped me out of dozens of issues previously. This isn't me having a rant about how there's too many rules, etc etc. In fact I can almost agree with him that GPS coordinates are always integral to a cache). But, I am still pretty keen on having the final of the cache INSIDE the library, INSIDE the book; and not just as a stage of the cache.
So - my question becomes... Can anyone think of a guideline-acceptable, clever, scheming way to have the final of the cache inside a book, and yet still make the use of the dewey decimal system as part of the multicache?
Let's see what ideas are generated!
Cheers,
Luke.
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It's actually the date the listing was created. Before it gets reviewed - I generally change it to the date the cache was hidden, although I know some people change it to the date it was published.
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Hi Jri,
Thanks for that! Having the NZTopo50 maps is really neat - well, it was really neat! Geocaching has re-broken the map system by adding Google Maps back in... is there any chance you could recreate 'Google Maps Enhancements' to deal with the new mapping system?
Cheers,
Luke.
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Naming a geocache on an island...
in General geocaching topics
Posted
Hi all,
We are planning a to place a large geocache on an island that would only be accessible by a short kayak. We usually don't have trouble naming caches, because they tend to be pretty 'matter of fact' names - but we want something a bit more clever this time round. Our only other island cache got named 'Island, Lake, Island, Ocean', but we are truly out of ideas for this one and we want to see what others can think up.
The island itself is actually part of a fragmented reef at a place called 'Castlepoint' on the eastern coastline of New Zealand. You can see it in the image below - it's the closest piece of rock on the inward shaped 'arch' in roughly the top-left of the picture. It looks like it's connected to the rest of the arch but there's actually a ~15 metre gap where swells come in that's extremely dangerous, so the only method of access is by kayaking across the bay. Any ideas? Thanks.