silverquill

Interesting thoughts, and I certainly sympathize with you to a point. Not all categories are ever discussed in the forums before being submitted to peer review. Sometimes the category management team, AKA officers, will modify a category based on comments made in peer review. Many people will vote and comment in peer review who never post in the forums. Yes, there are some categories that I think would be better if they were changed. This ideas can be shared in the forum or via private message. As long as the discussion is civil and respectful, I think this is healthy. I have made changes to categories I lead based on each of these types of feedback, or we have made them as a management team. And, I have seen other categories modified in this way. So, yes, I do think we should be open to suggestions and ideas. I do, however, think that anything like a second peer review, or other process by which a category leader/team should be forced to make a change would really not be productive and would run counter to the spirit of Waymarking. I suppose that one could also argue that obstinately refusing to adopt changes that seem desired by the majority also goes against the best Waymarking spirit and practice, I think the option of overriding the choices of the individual or small group would be even more deleterious. So, as much as I would like to change some categories, and grit my teeth, I respect the right to set the requirements as the management deems fit. In a case such as dedicated trees, I think your approach of making a suggestion to the team leader is good. But, he may not see it your way, and that's his privilege. I suppose we could have another category for trees dedicated to groups, events, or other occasions other than a single individual. This approach has worked in other case when a category has been too restrictive and the management did not want to broaden the scope of the category.

I have a sticker, and may have a spare, but the pin is cool, so I'll be getting one!

Just a few more comments -- In regard to photos: I wish the default view showed and additional strip of five photos. Because it doesn't, I seldom upload more than five, except in cases where I really need to. And, yes, it doesn't hurt to mention in the comment box that there are additional photos. I don't see the point in declining a waymark because a different default photo is required/desired. When reviewing a waymark it is easy and quick to change that. I have only a few categories where I specify a certain type of photo -- and it this is ignored most of the time, so I'd be declining a lot of waymarks. This sounds like a broken record, but it is incumbent upon the reviewer to state exactly why a waymark is being declined! Sometimes I've missed something as a reviewer, and it's easy for the person to point out my mistake. Usually, if there is something missing or something that needs to be changed, that is done cordially, and we have a new waymark. What is annoying are waymarks that are resubmitted without change or comment, or are accompanied by argumentative or hostile remarks. This latter rarely happens! Yes, we should know up front what the requirements are in any particular category. It is not unreasonable to expect category descriptions and posting instructions to reflect the basic requirements. On the other hand, it is impossible to cover every eventuality in a description, and if the request for a change or additional information is reasonable, then that shouldn't be a problem. Sometimes these situations have helped me refine a category description. Most of all, let us assume good will for all, and approach these differences with civility worthy of our hobby.

Just an additional point about searching. Perhaps adding city/state/country in the waymark title is not necessary for a search, it is VERY useful when browsing. Scroll down through a category, and see if you can easily tell where a waymark is located if this information is missing. But, each category management group is free to set whatever requirements they deem appropriate. When I choose to submit to a waymark to any particular category, I either follow all of the requirements, and requests from the management team, or I don't post. Seems simple enough to me.

You're all crazy! I NEVER go out of my way to get a waymark. If I can't walk across the street or park and shoot, I don't bother. I never walk more that 1/0th of mile for a geocache, either!

Oh, I'm not going away, just cutting down on some of my management commitments, that's all. I want to be fair to those who post waymarks and not have long waiting periods for them. Yes, Bruce, a traveling job can be good for Waymarking. I did not take my GPSr with me when I went to our managers meeting on Long Island, and regretted it! Really cool stuff around Port Jefferson. The ferry ride from New London, CT, was fun too. Since I'm regional manager for New England, most of my travel will be regional. But, there is an annual "Celebration of Success" trip every year to a foreign country, so there will be some new international locations. When I worked for International Student Exchange several years ago, I went to Quito, Ecuador. Pre-Waymarking days, unfortunately. Next month the qualifying people are going to Rome, but I came on board too late for that one. Anyway, things should settle down, and there will be some slow months, so I'll get back into a good rhythm. This first month has been crazy. I may post some specific categories where help is needed. I'm officer in some where there are only three, and I'd like to drop some of them, for instance.

Hi! The debate over commercial categories is been going on since day-one. McDonald's was one of the first categories created by Groundspeak, and in fact contains the very first waymark. This was long before Waymarking.com was opened up to user-created categories and the whole peer review process. And, preferences shift over time, and at this point there is less support within the Waymarking community for new commercial categories. That is just a fact. People I respect are on both sides of the issue. Personally, I think there is a place for them. Although they may seem like litter on the Waymarking landscape, and can see no reason why people who enjoy them shouldn't have them. We are all free to waymark in our own way. So, if someone wants to waymark a McDonlads, it doen't bother me. At least McDonald's is global, and so are many others such as 7-Eleven and Subway. I was surprised to find my favorite coffee and doughnut chain from New England, Dunkin Donuts, ubiquitous in Korea. Anyway, back to your ice machines. I understand your interest in them, and my problem is not that they are "commercial," but that I really don't see the point in Waymarking them. I don't think such a category would pass the "interesting or useful" criterion. There may not be enough of these to warrant a category, either. Do these exist in many countries? Are they permanent, or might they be moved or removed? If your goal is to find out how many there are, creating a Waymarking category will not give you the answer. The number and distribution of people who would waymark them is not adequate for that, or for any other category, really. At most, it would be a curiosity. This is not meant to discourage you from creating a category, by any means. Keep thinking; keep exploring and more ideas will come to you, and I'm sure one of them will strike a responsive chord.

Truthfully, I have great doubts about this proposal. 1). As the previous discussion indicates, an adequate description of what would qualify for a waymark is very difficult. Bogs, ponds, depressions, swamps, wetlands, marshes, fens, etc. all lack precise definitions. Setting some sort of size is problematic because of the diverse nature of what is proposed, and because there are usually very irregular boundaries that may be indefinite. A pond would need a minimum and a maximum size. What dimensions would be used? Circumference, surface area? The other factor is that size is very difficult to measure for these natural features. 2). In some places these features would be so ubiquitous as to be meaningless. The area encompassed by the town where I live, for instance, is more than 50% ponds, bogs and wetlands of some sort. Worldwide these features would be in the hundreds of thousands, I would think. 3). Most ponds may be named, but not marked, while I suspect most bogs are not named. Perhaps they are on detailed topographic maps. One still has the problem of where to record coordinates since it is not a precise point. If you think these problems can be satisfied, then perhaps it might be worth pursuing. I'm just trying to point out some of the issues that need to be faced.

Thanks for sticking with it, Dave! You've discovered the joy of Waymarking - and its frustrations. With over a thousand categories, each with its sometimes idiosyncratic requirements and thousands of reviewers of various temperaments, guiding a waymark through to final acceptance can be a challenge. We've all had waymarks declined. I've reviewed a few thousand waymarks since I've been around, and have to decline waymarks from time to time. I do try to be specific in my comments so that the waymarker knows what needs to be changed or added. Usually we work it out, no matter which end of the decline I happen to be on. Your investment in creating good quality waymarks is worth it. This enriches us all. All I can say is, "Keep on visiting and posting waymarks!"

Sadly, it is time to prune back my Waymarking activity again. My five years in Korea actually allowed me a lot of discretionary time which I invested in Waymarking - both creating my own waymarks, creating categories, and reviewing thousands of waymarks. But, my retirement in the U.S. was short-lived. A month ago I began a new job, working with international exchange students and host families. This is a dream job in many ways, but as manager for the six-state New England region I am much busier than I thought, and am on the road quite a bit. I suppose that the threats and vicious name-calling directed my way over the past months also dampens my enthusiasm. I will be dropping out as officer in many categories, and am willing to pass leadership of some categories to others who may be interested in this volunteer aspect of Waymarking. So, let me know if you're interested. In some cases just adding a few more active officers will be sufficient. I need to do this to be fair to others. I apologize to you who have had long waits for waymark reviews in categories where I am an officer. Even though I've tried to provide coverage, sometimes it has just not been there. Just maybe I'll squeeze in time to post a few of my pending waymarks. I think things will slow down a bit in the winter, but I could be mistaken.

I love these. I agree about trying the Mosaic category. Is the building on the National Register of Historic Places? Maybe this is a new category idea. . . .

This sounds reasonable to me. People sometimes forget that volunteer reviewers often put in many hours reviewing waymarks. This is giving the extra effort that makes our hobby great. I've often worked with waymarkers to help them improve and enhance their waymarks. This is almost invariably received gratefully. I'm not going to let the naysayers discourage me. We can be proud of what Waymarking has become and of what it promises for the future. This collaborative element was built in from the beginning and is very much apart of the Terms of Service. Yet another example of this is the procedure for submitting and completing the so-called uncategorized waymarks. I think we need to have more ways to encourage collaboration instead of discourage it. Thanks for your great service!

Yes, I agree. I've never seen one in my travels. That is why I would like to see a waymark category for these! A category would focus on these and help people find them or look for new ones. Let me know if you need help setting this up.

Oh, I quite agree! I am slowing down only for other reasons - moving back to the U.S., then to another town -- and starting a new job that is taking a lot of time at the beginning and will keep me on the road quite a bit. Very excited about working with international exchange students again. Thanks for being a guiding light along the way, Bruce!

And thank you, Bryan, for all of your support and encouragement along the way! I'm proud to have been a part of this great hobby, too. This is just a mile-stone on the way to bigger and greater things. Might be interesting to have some stats on our first half-million ....

Well, it has NOT been controversial until now! I have reviewed far more waymarks than anyone in the world so I speak from some degree of experience. Here is my practice: I NEVER edit actual content of a waymark. I DO edit for format or minor corrections in spelling, punctuation, etc. but this is almost always confined to the waymark title. If a waymark needs any changes beyond that, I will either decline it with a clear explanation of the problem that needs to be fixed, or accept it with suggestions for improvement or point out an error that needs to be corrected. When I do make a change, I usually, but not always, make a note of this in my comments. Something like, "Thanks for this good waymark. I have just made a change in the format of the waymark title." Or "Just changing the default photo." To my recollection, in the many thousands of waymarks which I have reviewed over the last five plus years, only ONE person has ever objected to these minor changes. Draw your own conclusions. I must say that with very few exceptions people are very cooperative when suggestions are made to improve a waymark, or when a request is made to change or add something. Waymarking is designed to be a collaborative effort. That is why officers can edit a waymark and why there is a whole system in place for others to submit changes to a waymark which are then reviewed by an officer. Most of these that I get are for minor things such as spelling, coordinate fixes, or adding a region. Occasionally there is a more substantive change, and that becomes more problematic since it is often difficult to verify the validity of the requested changes. If in doubt, I defer to the original waymark. An important part of a waymark is the photo gallery. It is part of what we review. If someone visits a waymark and adds a photo to the gallery, as is required by many categories, then the content of the waymark has been changed! Even the log entries themselves could be considered additions to the waymark. Indeed, they may contain more information or suggested changes. This is encouraged and is an integral part of the Waymarking experience. Is there the potential for abuse with this system? Of course there is. But, that potential exists on many levels. Certainly officers have the ability to make unwarranted changes, but so do individual waymarkers. Once a waymark is accepted, the creator can make ANY changes. Add content, delete content, change formatting -- really anything. This could result in waymarks that no longer comply with a category's requirements -- or even worse. This is one of the reasons for having the lock feature, which I have used only a handful of times. So, this open-ended collaborative approach to Waymarking is built-in by design. With our half-million waymarks, I think we have seen very little, if any, abuse of the system. In my view, objections at this point are misguided and run counter to the spirit of Waymarking that has been at the heart of what we do since the beginning. I have always tried to be fair and judicious as an officer and reviewer, and have worked hard to resolve disputes when they arise amicably and with civility. I will not comment publicly to the related thread, but will be glad to discuss the issue with anyone in private. Oh, and thanks to the officers who have caught my mistakes and made the changes for me. It has saved us BOTH a lot of time!

The thing I dislike most about reviewing waymarks is declining one! I don't like to disappoint someone. I don't like to make people mad. I don't like the time it takes from other things. Unless the reason is very simple, like incorrect coordinates, then it does take some time to explain what the deficiency is. Often I try suggest ways to improve the waymark or bring it up to standard. And I try to be flexible. If there is a missing photo, and the place is 1000 miles away, I understand. I sometimes quote the relevant portion of the category description and instructions, but never say just, "Read it!" I must say that the vast majority of people are cooperative and try to make the changes. Only rarely do I have someone flatly refuse to make a requested change just because they don't want to. It happens, though. And, sometimes people kindly point out that I was in error to decline the waymark. To err is human. I do recall having a waymark declined with that same comment, "read the instructions." I submitted it three or four times, each one coming back with the same comment, until by luck, I guess, I got it right. I don't really black list the category, but . . . well, there are others that are more fun.

As with BruceS and fi67, I include this on nearly all my waymarks and require it for nearly all the categories where I am leader. There are a few exceptions, of course. We must always have some flexibility. I have a few legacy categories that I lead that I need to update. For categories where the sites may not always be in a city or town, perhaps historical markers, then it doesn't make much sense to require it. Other geographic identification can often be substituted, however. In the U.S., counties or major park, or just "near. . ." All U.S. sites are within a state. Appropriate geographical designations can be used for each country. Other categories that come to mind those such as Mountain Summits, many of the trail categories, rivers, beaches, waterfalls and other natural sites. I'm sure there are others. So, there is no uniform waymark naming format that can be adopted as required for ALL categories. There have been many good reasons given already for the inclusion of this information, and I concur with them all. When I review a waymark and this information is lacking, I will often add it as a simple matter of minor editing of format of a title, or I might add a comma or dash. I've had only one person over the years and thousands of waymarks object to this. We cannot look to Groundspeak to make or enforce any of these standards, nor should they do so. We are to be a self-regulating community. The result, as we all know, is a ramshackle group of over 1000 categories with their differing requirements and approaches. So, if the Firestation category leaders want to enforce a bizarre naming format, then that is their right. When I choose to submit a waymark to a category, I must conform to their requirements. If I'm asked to change something, I either do it, whether or not it makes sense to me, or I withdraw the waymark. Larry Wilson - Carver, MA (for a few more days, anyway)

Exactly! When working from the approval queue a new one pops up at the top of the list. I may continue down the line and come back to it, but then I have to skip over it every time, so I'll review it first and then go on. If the review is too rapid, it does make me wonder if anyone actually looked at and read the waymark, though. That's not so say that I always read every word and look at every photo--depends.

I think your conclusions make a lot of sense. Back in the early days, there were heated discussion about logging a visit to one's own waymark, esp. before it was actually approved. Some threatened not to approve a new waymark if that happened. The only reason I might log a visit is to add some personal, subjective information that really does not belong in the waymark itself, which should always be kept subjective. Besides, it does mess up my stats which I want to reflect logging waymarks of others, not my own. Category Confusion! Yes, it is a mess, isn't it? I've watched it unroll with some amazement, with little organization, with not consistency whatsoever - a ramshackle landscape that we call Waymarking. Just keep poking around, find categories that interest you, visit some, create a few and soon you'll feel right at home in our messy home.

Ah, yes, all too true. I think this is true of many broad groups of categories. Veterans memorials come to mind, as well as public art. But, even if I were to start from scratch, I'm not sure I would know what to do. I suppose I contributed to the problem since I created the first several denomination specific categories. It seemed like a good idea at the time. Yet, broader divisions would have their own problems, too. One way to handle large categories, though, is to make use of variables. So, one might have a category for Protestant Churches, with a variable field for denomination. But, I don't see a way to roll this back either. As to the non-Roman Catholic churches, could these fit logically into a category of their own? Well, fi67 may be correct about the trend in peer review. But, I think this is another illustration of why we shouldn't vote based on our personal preferences. If a group of people want to create and manage a category for another denomination, then do we have the right to deny them just because we don't like churches, or because we think we have too many church categories?

Hey! Well, thanks for the mini-tour of historic Charlestown on our recent visit. This is a great place for a major event. So, if my daughter is still in Springfield, I'll have a good excuse to show up at this event. Seriously, we need to work on having a Waymarking component to it. Are the stickers really being discontinued?

Trying to catch up on the forums. Yes, I have written about this in the past, so have we lost access to our old forums? I don't see them anymore. If Groundspeak has deleted them, then I think that is a mistake. Are they really that hard up for storage space? Don't see the reason for it. I do think there are flaws in the whole process for creating new categories. We have categories that are created by one person with two sock-puppet accounts as officers, or other non-participating accts as officers. The single and only requirement for participation is paying Groundspeak for a premium membership, so it is all for sale. This carries over into the peer review voting. I've seen some votes where nearly half of those voting had zero waymarks. Presumably these were geocaching friends recruited by the category creator to stuff the ballot box and get his category approved. I don't know of a way of preventing such abuses. (I suppose the same thing could happen if someone were intent on voting down a category.) My main theme is that active participants should be the ones regulating the hobby, not just someone who has bought the privilege. I would like to see a minimum experience requirement set for someone to be able to create a group and category, be an officer or vote in peer review. I don't know that there is a way to do that, even if Groundspeak were inclined to do so, which they are not. Their philosophy is, the less interference the better. I agree with that to a point, but it does make things messy. It is true that I think the category criteria should be rewritten, but not eliminated. We need to have some sort of guidelines. The criteria have served us well, but no longer fit the current needs and directions of Waymarking, in my opinion. The "global" criterion is one that I think needs some serious work. We have at least a third of our categories that are limited to a single country or region, for instance. I think we also need to make room for smaller, niche categories. Is a "wow factor" really necessary for a good category? Obviously peer review will remain a subjective thing. Thanks for reposting BQ's excellent essay on this issue. The question is not, "Do I personally like this category?" Even if it seems boring to me, if a group is interested enough to create and manage a category, then who am I to rain on their parade? I look at other factors such as how well the category is defined, what the posting requirements are, clarity of the writing, objective criteria for waymark approval, and just overall sensibility. While what we have is not perfect, peer review is better than no review, and there have been improvements. I think it is good that vote comments can be made visible to other voters, for instance, and that the officers can see all comments at the end of the vote. This is a good feedback mechanism. Still, this does not mean that we shouldn't discuss these issues and try to make them better. We'd have to come to Groundspeak with some concrete proposals, but since we are just individuals sharing a forum, there is no real mechanism for doing so.

There are only a few reasons why I'd deny a previously approved waymark, and maybe none at all after five years. The waymark would have to be totally inappropriate for the category in order for me to decline it. Even if it lacked some requirement, I'd like just leave it, or if I thought it was critical, I might contact the waymark creator and ask for corrections or additions, but I wouldn't just decline it. So, maybe do the tweaking if you can and send it back with a big sigh.

GT.US has it perfectly! Just the answer I would have posted. That should keep everyone happy. An alternative is to change the category to allow more than one waymark per location as long as they are, say, more than .10 mile apart and are give a definite location such as a blind/hide, trail head, etc. Of course that would mean having edit privileges, or getting cooperation from the group leader. Still, the solution above is the most sensible approach at this point. Mark the old one as "legacy" or whatever and adding an explanatory note, then accepting the new one, also adding an explanatory note, and maybe a link to the legacy waymark. Thanks for bringing this to the forum. These things crop up from time to time, and I think the discussion is good.