Mudfrog

Call me a hypocrite but I think invisible online logs are the bomb!

I've been in the habit of tethering just about all our hides, even those in dry areas. Trotline string isn't too conspicuous, is easy too work with, and lasts a long time. I have caches placed along a bayou that go under water from time to time and rarely have problems with them going anywhere.

I would, after reading the hide guidelines of course, start a cache submission. Type in text, punctuation marks, and spaces to see what works.

I agree, there may be more to the story here. On the other hand, it could be one sided as well. It wouldn't surprise me if the bolded is what's going on instead. Geocaching guidelines state simply that a person should sign the logbook. There's nothing in them stating that the signature has to be visible to the naked eye. I can see someone doing this to challenge a CO.

My reason for deletion wouldn't be because I thought a person was necessarily lying. My beef would be that someone came along and did something this goofy in the first place. A person should not have to buy and then carry a UV light with them to see signatures in a logbook.

Call me old fashioned but I still go along with the premise that if I place a cache, I maintain the cache. Part of my maintenance is to delete false logs. Before you say i'm taking this too serious, i'll say right up front that it's very rare that I've had to do this. I do check to see what's going on if I happen to be doing maintenance on my cache and notice or get a note from another finder stating a signature wasn't in the logbook. If I can't see your signature using normal means (my eyeballs) then your log gets deleted.

I'd consider this a reverse ALR because COs would now be required to do something extra to verify finds. Seriously, I hope this silliness doesn't become more common. It would be irritating to have to go back on my owned caches and add a line to their descriptions stating something like,,, "Make sure to use a standard writing utensil, mud, blood, whatever, for signing the physical logbook. Your log may be deleted if a signature is not readily detected in the logbook."

I actually thought of that as I was typing my previous reply. You're certainly right that a CO might delete a log just because he can. Honestly though, how often would it actually happen? I've been caching since 02 and in all that time, had one log deleted. That log, along with a few others that had legitimately found the same cache, was reinstated by Groundspeak.

The cheater got what he wanted, the souvenir. Doubt the deletion of his find matters to him since he knows there are tons more caches out there that he can falsely log. I don't do souvenirs myself but if I did, and had any say so, I'd have the programming set up so that the souvenir automatically went away if any of the needed cache find logs got deleted.

Half of the last 10 replies (Keystone's doesn't count) provide a good example of what Team Hugs made mention of in his reply. Just seems kinda funny that a person would complain about that but at the same time, prove the point exactly. Bottom line is that it would not have mattered how the awards were awarded. They could have been given to everyone and as we all know, there'd still be complaints. It's normal that we'll be disappointed and feel that we deserved better from time to time. Thing is, it's usually just better to suck it up and get over it. Btw, it still irks me that Briansnat got the Geocacher of the Year award back in 2008. It should have been me!

Yes, Groundspeak should have initially narrowed it down to people genuinely interested in placing a virtual cache. Then used the algorithm to generate the awards. While i'm not interested, there would no doubt be way over 4000 others that would.

I may be wrong but I thought the Garmin 64 had the ability to get cache information into it.

Kinda funny, as I was just on Amazon and spotted a store that made custom geocaching stamps. I was searching for containers when it came up so I have a feeling doing a search for something like "custom geocache stamp" would bring up more results.

Count me in for being irked over all this geocorniness.

Geowizz,, will it ever stop?

I was looking at some of the Treasurex trackable listings a few minutes ago. The first one I came to had this under it's description,,, Most people try to keep the number from being abused but not in this case. Oh well, the silliness begins!

That has always irritated me as well. It doesn't make sense that I cannot sort favorites from within the query results I just obtained. Would be nice if this bug/problem was addressed and fixed.

Yea that's it, a joke perpetrated a longgggg time ago. Go on about your business,, nothing to see here folks!

You didn't here this from me but, i received an invitation about three years ago to join a secret geocaching society. Didn't realize it then but it turns out it was for *******m membership. To be honest, I just didn't like the idea of being required to wear the membership hat when geocaching. One reason was that I didn't want people to feel I was somehow a better cacher than them when they saw the hat. The other reason, I just didn't think i'd look very cool wearing that green fez style hat with gpsrs sticking out the top of it. I still sometimes wonder if I made a mistake by not accepting that invitation.

Appreciate that! I'm always a bit wary of paying money to an internet business that I don't know much about. Yes, it was only $30 back then as well but you can bet it was something I had to think about before sending. There weren't that many caches back then but the few that I did find were very enjoyable. I was certainly happy to give something back for the fun I was having.

I agree! No matter the age, the cache needs to be maintained by its owner. There are of course, caches with awol owners that seem to stay in good shape. I'm ok with those but they need to go when a problem comes up that isn't taken care of by their owners. As an owner, I do have a couple of 2002 caches that I feel more attached to. The first one I found (I later adopted) and my first placed hide. I do tend to put more effort into keeping them going but it isn't because they are old. As with any other cache, they would need to go if I left the hobby and stopped maintaining them. Like you, I figure the main reason people want those older placed caches is because they help them to complete a challenge cache or fill in voids in their stats. No set number but i'd go with around the 15 year mark. A lot of it depends on how much of the original cache is still intact. To me, it's not the same cache when its hiding spot or container size has changed.

As a cache owner, I appreciate a NM on my cache when a person thinks there may be a problem with a cache of mine they visited. Another person coming along afterwards should feel free to log a NM as well if they feel the need. I encourage people to do this, especially since I know there are forgetful COs like me out there.

You're dealing with people here and as we all know, some have no morals or pride. Cheating, pretty much themselves, with geocache find count is a small thing but if you're like me, makes you wonder what more important things they cheat on. This has been happening within our hobby since the beginning and the easiest thing to do is not focus on it. Myself, I just roll my eyes when the bragging starts, especially when I know the bragging is coming from a person that I know has cheated fudged on their find count. Edited to add: As K13 pointed out, you can contact affected cache owners and then let them deal with it, if they even want to. I wouldn't do that unless I knew the cache owner and had an inkling they'd be interested to know. Of course, you can certainly delete the false logs on your own caches.

My goodness,, I guess it needs to be spelled out. Imo, and I would imagine I speak for most cache owners out there, you need to mind your own bee's wax when you don't have first hand knowledge of what might be going on with a cache. I guess it's not yet evident to you,,, Groundspeak has a device to do the busy body work. It's called the CHS.

Nonsense to you, not at all to me. I've had at least one negative personal experience with armchair NA logging. The logs that came in on one of my caches, DNFs mostly, made it sound like the cache may have been missing. To alleviate that goofy NA, I had to schedule a maintenance run, break out the kayak, and spend half a day on the water,. All this to find that the cache was right where it was supposed to be. Feel free to talk to me at an event, email me, message me, or even call if you have my number, to discuss negative sounding logs on one of my caches. But don't throw out a NM or NA from the comfort of your living room until after you've actually tried finding it.