larry739

You know your a Geocoin addict when... your grenade can full of geocoins is too heavy for you to lift by yourself.

GAWD, Joni! You could be a hand model!

You know you are a geocoin addict when people you don't even know meet you in the woods and say, "Aren't you that geocoin guy?"

So is that brown thing a toadstool?

I vow to keep releasing geocoins for as long as I cache. I set them free just about every cache I visit. I have no idea how many have been taken and are missing. I do not care. If they bring some joy to the taker that is fine by me. It is Karmic.

Thanks tsun for starting a very interesting thread. In a recent discussion about the fact that data media like magnetic tape and DVDs and floppy disks are really not that durable we concluded that books have a place and stone tablet is still the longest lasting medium. But it seems that these metal struck geocoins may outlast us all. Whether they are in an abandoned coffee cup in the woods, a private collection or someone's sock drawer they will survive. Future finders will see them and experience that joy you discovered the first time you found a geocoin. They are a long term commentary about our times and our passion. They are not just a momento of the the moment. So make your contribution to the legacy as an artist, collector or contributor. How best do you want to be remembered?

Something like this could be done. It would require a good starter collection, a publicly accessible place to exhibit them, and a curator who has the time and interest to really do a good job on it. I have a pretty good starter collection, but no place and no time right now. Maybe in a few years when I retire... Seems like many of the old timers who really have the larger collections have some real cash tied up in them and probably do not want to just give them away. If this were a bona fide 501c3 corporation with a board of directors and good oversight and accounting it could actually be set up as a tax deduction when people contribute their geocoins. That way they could get a tax writeoff against their income tax. If the coin being donated has truly appreciated then the write off might approach their initial investiment. I suppose ebay or some other documentable market value would have to be used to value the contributions. Along with the "Donated by..." Or "In this display cabinet is the XYZ collection..." it might provide people with the needed financial and emotional return to make it easy for them to donate their geocoins. We are seeing people sell their collections by the piece or lot right now to get some money back. I think it has to be painful to do that. A really well run nonprofit could actually broker coins and use the proceeds to buy collections. Actually my personal involvement with geocoins is sort of like that but instead of building a nonprofit museum I am releasing geocoins into the wild with the goal of breaking even or losing money at the end of each year so I do not have to claim any hobby income on my income taxes. I do this by buying 5 selling three, releasing one, and keeping one in a big grenade can. To work right this would need to be a true 501c3 NP with a bonafide Board who makes all the decisions. It could work though and now is the time to really get started with it before the number of geocoins gets beyond the ability of the organization to accumulate or catalog. So who has the time and the place?

yes. I get many emails about the movement of the coins. It is the source of endless enjoyment. It can get out of hand if I am not around a computer for a couple of days.

I'd be reeeeeal happy to help you "go through" your coins If you started Nov 2005 - then you would have some of the earlier coins. The real "explosion" of coins happened around June/July of the summer of 2005 - with things getting super-heated in early 2006 (to the best of my recollection anyhow) If you had any older coins prior to Nov 2005 - then you might have some very cool ones indeed. Opps - of course, there are many modern cool coins too. You just might have some "rare" early coins. and of course, if there are any of those ugly ol' thangs cluttering up the garage, i would be more than happy to take them off your hands. rsg Come on over and play. I have folks come by from time to time and we lug the ole ammo can into the family room and dump them all on the carpet. It drives my wife crazy. There must be over 1500 geocoins in there plus all kinds of signature items. It takes many hours to sort through and look at them all. Much wine and beer is consumed in the process. Last time someone came over we were at it for four hours before they had to take the little one home. I don't think I have any of the really really rare stuff like you guys do. But they are pretty to look at. Think of rolling around on a bed of geocoins.

The economy is going down the tubes so will extraneous spending. If geocaching continues to hang around then eventually the economy will turn around and people will want some of those older geocoins. I think it may be like your 401K. All these folks selling all their coins off cheap right now probably need the money pretty bad, but those who ride it out will have a better return later on their investment or their kids will. I agree with AG, just buy the ones you really want not every one that is made.

Put me down for some too. I loooooove penguins, baked not roasted. Just kidding.

Would micro-swag keep them from being placed in boring, repetitive, obvious locations - to a degree far greater than larger caches? I'm thinking... no. I'm not a "micro hater". As a matter of fact, I happen to own the oldest existing micro in North America. I'm just "micro burned-out". There's only so many times you can drive towards a cache location, only to see a parking lot full of lamp posts, and not shake your head in disgust at some people total lack of imagination. Would that be GCK4CG ?

I just love to find discarded furniture along the roadside or in the woods, NOT! But when I do I will usually hade a cache in the cushion. Usually the furniture eventually gets muggled and the cache is left behind. There is a whole series of these I have put out along a deserted frontage road near here. It starts with GC1ADDQ

I got started on this over in the geocoin forum but thought I would post it here too for those who just do the geocaching stuff and do not mess with geocoins. My overriding philosophy is to acquire Positive Caching Karma. I have tried to place enough caches so that the number of finds on my caches is at least as great as the number of finds I have made on other people's caches. My Caching Karma is about 3.5. There have been 3.5 times as many finds on my caches by others as I have made on other people's caches. In the final cache accounting this is the number that means the most to me. Your caching karma is a measure of the joy you bring into the lives of others. What is your Caching Karma? It takes some work to calculate it, if you own many caches. Just divide the number of finds people have logged on your caches by the number of finds you have logged on other people's caches. If the result is over 1.0 then you have positive caching karma. I am curious to see what YOUR Caching Karma is. Should you deduct for DNFs or count micros less than 1?

haha I have no idea myself. But I keep putting them out. Have you heard about Caching Karma? My overriding philosophy is to acquire Positive Caching Karma. I have tried to place enough caches so that the number of finds on my caches is at least as great as the number of finds I have made on other people's caches. My PCK is over 3.5. There have been 3.5 times as many finds on my caches by others as I have made on other people's caches. The same kind of holds true with trackables. I have 1700 activated trackables I own, most of which are out in the wild. I have found or discovered 1153. So not even counting number of logs on my trackables, which would be over 20,000, my Trackable Karma is over 1.5. In the final cache accounting these are the only numbers that really mean anything. It's a measure of the joy you bring into the lives of others.

Yes, Sarah made this expression famous, but we actually have a cache named this in Kansas and it is a hoot. Check out the videos on youtube of people crossing the bridge to nowhere. More coming soon. GC1J5WC

I actually found one today while I was out that was a 4" diameter plywood circle with a photocopy of the original geocoin laminated on it. TB17WZG for a photo of it. In this case the original is in the owner's collection and he just released the proxy. It is much different than actually minting another coin just like the original or similar to it and engraving the numbers on it.

Has anyone ever thought about recycling tracking numbers on geocoins? I mean there are lots of them that go missing and are never found again. I mean like two or three years and definite lost situations that mean the coin was for sure lost and not just sitting in someone's knapsack. What if you minted some new coins with blank spots on them for the tracking numbers and then had them engraved with the old tracking number from the geocoin that was lost? Assuming it was the same or very very similar kind of coin, what difference would it make?

I kind of got into this late in the game for the really early coins. I think it was around Nov 2005. Anyway I still am not sure exactly what all I have since I just threw one in my big grenade can in the garage every time I got somethng unique. It takes two people to lift it now. I guess some day I need to go through it. This is a really good string and I appreciate all you old timers sharing what you know. I have learned more here than just about any forum post on geocoins I have seen. Speaking of which are there any other older strings any one knows of that might be worth looking at for history on the earlier geocoins?

i neber culd spill. -me

One of mine can be seen from the Control Tower at Forbes Field by the Air National Guard Police. They drove over and cut the lock off it to see what it was. Since it was not on the base property they left it alone. It is called Watch the Jets. GC1EGWE

What I recommend is that you buy as many as you can afford and then activate them and put them all into geocaches with little notes stating their mission and just watch the emails pour in as people find them and move them around. You will visit some very interesting places via your computer and you will meet some very interesting people on line. Of course eventually they will go missing, but when that happens just buy some more and repeat from the beginning. After awhile you won't really miss the ones that disappear.

Mine came today and they are beautiful. Great work!

I have Kansas sunshine coins cheap.

I used to put $1 bills in caches, but people just spent them. I used wheresgeorge stamps and wrote on them and everything. The geocoins and travel bugs seem to last a little longer.