[Rating "found" Caches]

I'd started a similar topic somewhere else and someone sent me here... so let me put in my 2 cents worth...

 

First off… Yes, ratings can be subjective, but the current rating system is subjective anyway, isn't it? It’s based on only ONE person’s opinion, and it seems that some people don’t seem to follow the guidelines set up by geocaching.com. Isn't a 1/1 supposed to be handicapped accessible? Well, I can’t tell you the number of times we’ve gone to a 1/1 that was NOT! If people who went to the cache were able to rate the terrain you’d end up with a much more balanced rating. Same thing goes for difficulty.

 

So, what I’m suggesting is that people who log have the opportunity to rate the cache on the same criteria as the person who hid the cache… difficulty and terrain… and that everyone’s ratings are averaged in to give a more accurate representation.

 

But the other part I’d like to see rated is creativity and/or beauty. Sooo many caches are over-looked because they’re off the beaten path, or might be a little more difficult to get to. But if they’re rated for their creativity or beauty, people might find that they’re worthwhile.

 

Yes, you can learn different people’s styles and avoid doing their caches, but that doesn’t work too well when you’re in a strange area.

 

I personally don’t have time to read the profiles of EVERYONE on geocaching.com, and we don't generally read the logs because we're afraid of getting too much info that will take the challenge out of finding the cache. We may scan them quickly to see if there are a lot of purple faces, but that's it.

 

As for the contents of the cache… is that really the point of this hobby? Not for us, and I daresay not for most. For us the point is getting out into Nature, getting a little exercise, seeing beautiful sites, and visiting places that we’d probably never know were there!!!

 

OK… so what I envision is something really quite simple… as you log your find you click on a number (1-5 like the current system) for 3 categories: difficulty - terrain - creativity/beauty. You can only rate it once and you can only rate it if you log a find. The cache-owner does NOT know your rating, so they can NOT alter it. As someone else said, it would only be rated by people who are interested in doing the puzzle caches, or the micro caches, or the hiking caches, so you'd get a more balanced rating.

 

Just MHO

[Cache Ratings]

We've been caching for over 2 years and have 574 finds toour credit, so we're not exactly newbies. We've cached in many different states and areas. We LOVE caching to the point that some of our family think we're obsessed. If it weren't for work and kids we'd probably do it every day. But we do have 1 complaint... inaccurate ratings. Especially when you travel to different areas, you'll find that people rate them SOOOO much differently! We understand that different people are gonna have different ideas of difficultly/terrain, but as we've been discussing it we think we've come up with a possible solution. Not sure how difficult it would be to implement, but we do think it would help with the rating system.

 

So, here's our idea... allow cachers to rate the cache along with their logs, and then factor these ratings in as they accumulate. As I said, it might be difficult to implement (technologically speaking), but I think it would really help to get a more accurate rating system. I'd also like to see an additional category added in addition to difficulty and terrain... creativity/beauty. This part should only be rated by the loggers, and based solely on their enjoyment of the cache itself. We've been to so many caches that we absolutely loved due to their creativity or their gorgeous location, but were rarely visited because they're either off the beaten path or their difficulty/terrain is high. We feel that if people were able to know in advance that they would be rewarded for their effort they may be more inclined to do these caches.

 

So... anyone have any other ideas about this? Do you think it would work, or would it end up just being an exercise in futility?

[Any 2004 Cache Finds Yet ??]

Well.... we left Roch., NY at 10:00 am heading for Syr...... did 9 caches and were home by 7:30 pm. All in all a pretty productive day. Of course, they were all relatively easy ones (we're closing in on 400 and are going for quantity as opposed to quality right now... lol), but a log is a log. We also traded TB's.... 3 for 3. Twice we ran across logs of other people that we'd missed by just an hour, so there must have been a lot of people out hunting yesterday.

 

Happy New Year & Happy Caching!! See ya on the trails.