Dinoprophet

Actually it has to do with the idea that many people don't see the harm in things if it is something they agree with but they might be more against things they do not agree with. A cross is not just a symbol for a religion the same as a swastika is not just a symbol of a political party. Neither symbol is universally accepted as a symbol of 'good'. To you a cross might bring to mind Jesus and Christianity whereas to someone else it might bring to mind fire and the KKK. Personally I might not have an issue with a cross in a cache but I might with a swastika in a cache. But since they both are legitimate symbols of both 'good' and 'evil' I don't think either should be used as swag. It is not 'fair' to allow one religious symbol but not another. But your argument applies to everything, not just religious items. You could leave a rainbow pin in a cache, and someone could start a thread about gay propaganda not being appropriate. A General Lee Matchbox car could be construed as racist. An American flag could enrage an anti-war activist. Conversely, you might leave something with non-religious intent that could be misconstrued as religious -- seashells, for instance. This "gotcha" argument comes up in all of these threads. As far as I know, it hasn't changed anyone's mind, and items of all religions continue to be considered fine. Some of the most popular sig items around here are prayer flags and dreamcatchers.

I'm pretty sure you know why that's different. It again has nothing to do with religion. It has to do with the popular, non-religious meaning of the symbol. It would be incredibly naive for a person to put that symbol in a cache, unexplained, and not expect the wrong reaction.

a hiding place, especially one in the ground, for ammunition, food, treasures, etc.: She hid her jewelry in a little cache in the cellar. anything so hidden: The enemy never found our cache of food. Alaska and Northern Canada . a small shed elevated on poles above the reach of animals and used for storing food, equipment, etc. Don't see anything about catching there. Did you hear a whirring sound while you were typing this? Or a whooshing perhaps? Anyway, Brian is mistaken. It's not "catch", it's "cachet", which means "prestige", which you gain by finding one and lose by logging a DNF.

Anything advocating hate and/or destruction does not belong. It's no longer a question of religious items at that point.

Agreed. People often complained, in fact, about finding toys. Initially, geocaching was rather swag-driven. Seeing what people left was part of the game. People loved large containers that held many and/or large items. People traveled long distances to see swag from the original cache. Swag led to sig items and coins and pathtags. Now, those things are traded outside of caches, and caches are often not caches at all but containers just big enough for a log. To be fair, I don't think it's shallow to teach children the ethos of trading even or trading up. I have kids; they like making trades; I don't think they're part of why our society is becoming so materialistic. Yes. It's more like recycling/reusing than getting rewarded.

I'd agree but, so far the Favorites feature has yet to be brought into play with PQs so there's not an efficient way to filter by Fav points and there's also not a attribute for tennis shoe in the woods or dead dear carcasses that I'm aware of. (An extreme example, I admit.) You need not link the faves and PQs to use these two great tools to give you a more satisfying geocaching experience. Also, you need not define every single thing in the world that you do not enjoy to come up with things that you do enjoy. I don't think these alone will ever be useful in finding virtuals you like. You can find virtuals or you can ignore them all. But if you dislike, say, virts that are historical markers, I don't see how PQs and Favorites help you.

I've only hidden seven in nine years, and two of them were in the same area. GCJ0GG - N42...Something Something Something: This came from imagining what a "reverse multi" would be like. In each stage, there was a photo showing my GPS track from the next to the current one. Using the track and the terrain as clues, you found the next stage. It was well received, despite some flaws in execution, like a high disappearance rate and initially mixing up two of the containers. Plus I like how the listing page came out. GC9319 - Higher Education: In the early days of geocaching, it didn't often occur to people to think in three dimensions. Being at the right latitude and longitude doesn't necessarily mean you're at the right elevation. The engineering building on Oakland University's campus is H-shaped, so the ground floor is mostly outside, and the top floor is open (pictures of the roof on the cache page). That meant you could be at the coordinates on the ground when in fact the cache was at the same coordinates on the roof. I gave subtle hints in the description. Also well-received. I was recently going to post the spot in Toz's Best Kept Secrets Waymarking category, but I understand the roof doors are usually locked these days. GCCF01 - Beside the Point: I'm proud of this one because there's not a lot of tough hiking in my area, and at the time, this park was fairly remote and unmarked. The cache was on the side of a steep hill (a towering 1090', mountainous for southern Michigan), on top of which is an old foundation (pictures on the page and in the Among the Ruins thread). I didn't mention the foundation, leaving it as a surprise. I archived it when the state parks got iffy about geocaching, then I revived it when they formed an official policy. Still, not many people braved the hike. These days, the park has been carpetbombed with caches, including a third cache at the spot -- someone else's -- and yet, the area still doesn't get a lot of traffic. A P&G just outside the park has almost as many finds in 4 months as some over a year old in the park. Sad, because it's a fantastic hiking area, and to me that's key to geocaching.

True, but I think the temptation to do that will be rather low if the virtuals do not count for the find/hide count of physical caches. Cezanne Agreed. I'm not sure at this point whether we're still discussing the old stuff, the revealed new stuff, or the hypothetical new stuff. In any case, I believe *some* criteria beyond "here are coordinates, doesn't matter what's there" are necessary.

I keep asking and no one ventures an answer... why should virts be evaluated any differently than physical caches? What standard should a virt adhere to that a micro LPC doesn't have to? I and a few others have ventured an answer. But let me put it this way: if virts had the exact same guidelines as physicals, why would anyone hide a physical? In fact, wouldn't it make the whole thing simpler if we just did away with containers? As you are well aware virts are meant to go where physical caches cannot. As I am pretty sure you are aware my question has to do with location and 'wow' factor evaluation... we don't judge those things for physical caches so why for virts? And "exact same guidelines" are your words, I never said that. I just said that the virt should be evaluated for worthiness like any physical cache... in other words, not. This is geocaching, therefore the presence of a physical cache makes a spot worthy. That's the evaluation. If there's not a physical cache, then something else has to make it worthy. Without the 'wow' criteria, you could theoretically do a power trail of virts every 528 feet on the shoulder of every public road in the world. BTW, I'm afraid my tone may be reading more terse than I intended. I'm not trying to be confrontational, just disagreeing.

I keep asking and no one ventures an answer... why should virts be evaluated any differently than physical caches? What standard should a virt adhere to that a micro LPC doesn't have to? I and a few others have ventured an answer. But let me put it this way: if virts had the exact same guidelines as physicals, why would anyone hide a physical? In fact, wouldn't it make the whole thing simpler if we just did away with containers?

Would it all be okay if he kept it listed on another site? That's why we're told not to remove archived caches that aren't ours, after all.

What guideline states a CO must delete any logs a reviewer from another area thinks are bogus? Is it not my right as a cache owner to decide what logs I feel might be bogus? If someone logs "Greetings from Sweden. I solved your puzzle so I am claiming a find" as the CO don't I make the determination if I feel the log should stay? If they did not sign the log I have grounds to delete the find, but no guideline requires me to do so because the guideline is based on my determination of what is bogus. Otherwise there would be a clear standard given. It was mentioned that the CO did not respond to e-mails sent from other cachers. The CO is not required to respond to other cachers. People have asked for hints to my cache. Some of those requests I have not responded to. That is not grounds to archive my cache. The only guideline the CO may have violated was not logging on the site. Which is a very vague guideline since it is easily possible to maintain a cache of any type without logging onto the website. I can easily go a check my cache everyday to see if there are problems with it. If I know from physical inspection that my cache is fine, and if I know from e-mail notifications that people are finding and enjoying my cache and I don't feel the logs are bogus why would I need to log onto the page other then to satisfy this vague guideline? And I would hope if a reviewer had an issue with it I would have more then 24 hours to satisfy their concerns. That is not correct. Virtuals and webcams alone have this additional and very specific requirement:

If they don't count as a find then they will be as dead as whatmarks. I thought it was all about the cool and educational places that virtuals brought people to? At least that is the argument I hear so often. If you saw some of the ones rejected you might not say that. The people who like virtuals and are clamoring for their return are essentially seeing the cream of the crop in the remaining grandfathered virts. I don't think the idea of virtuals would be nearly as popular if when people get there the "surprise" object is often something like a fence post, discarded tire, dirty sock or a rotting animal carcass. How is this different than any other cache in such a place? Not that I am for such bad locations, but if it's okay for physical caches it should be okay for virts. It's the difference between looking at a lamppost in a parking lot and having to find a container on that lamppost.

The rational the reviewer used to archive the cache in question (the CO had not been on the website) would be true for all the CO's caches. Yet no action was taken on those other caches. The reviewer knows, by their own posting that the CO has not been on the website. So the reviewer knows that the same problem for this cache which causes it to need archiving also is true for all the CO's caches. The reviewer is well aware yet singles out the virtual cache. Are you asking the reviewers to be consistent and archive the owner's remaining 13 virtuals? From the ones I've looked at, they've archived BOTH regular and virtuals by this CO when and only when someone has posted a N/M. I also see several logs stating that the provided email address is no longer valid. Virtuals require direct owner contact, so yeah, there's a different standard for virts. And you're right, that standard isn't being applied to 13 virtuals.

This is a great point!! So many people have posted comments along the lines of "pony up, cheapskates", or "pay it to support the website". And of course the infamous "I make all my caches PMO to reward people for supporting the website" in these threads over the years. Killing or not, they're doing fine, and I don't get the warm fuzzies over my $30, any more than I do plonking $30 down at Wal-Mart. That's my biggest issue is that you're some how not supporting the "cause" if you don't buy a membership. Never mind how many people buy trackables from ground speak? Or how many people buy swag? Or forget the fact that I paid how much for the phone app? Nevermind that they have advertising supporting them. I'm quite sure the geiko deal was not out of the goodness of their hearts or any of the corporate pairings they've had as of late. I'm just sick of people guilting non-premium members and doing the "cup of coffee" talk when people don't buy a membership. They're offering a service for that money. Right now I'm willing to pay for the service but I won't be forever for sure because I don't use many aspects of the paid services. But I will likely continue to buy travel bugs and the occasional branded item. It's not a cause to me. I'm not here to support the cause. I'm here to purchase a service or items. Simple as that. I don't know, people just roll with the $30 to support the website talk, and don't think about the other stuff. Well, they can all think about this. It's been mentioned in this thread, and I just mentioned it in a similar thread in "The Hunt, the unusual" last week. They gots $1.50 (or more) cut of every single solitary Geocoin ever manufactured I won't get ridiculous and say a quarter billion dollars or anything but I think that makes 100,000 or so people paying $30 a year chump change. Coins, advertising, and let's not forget partnering with Garmin, which has seen fit to design, manufacture, and market more than one new device specifically for geocaching. They may not be making a killing, but I imagine at least a few people are living quite comfortably thanks to this site. And rightly so, it's a good business.

I love it! Biking a few miles to log what would otherwise be a bunch of park and grabs is the only kind of "power caching" I enjoy. Somehow it makes many caches that I'd normally ignore worthwhile. People say it jokingly but it's really true: any cache can be a long hike (or ride), it just depends on where you start.

I apparently didn't post any of my own pictures, but here is the gallery for Avenue of Flags, a virtual in Ft Custer National Cemetery.

A still-active cemetery near me with stones at least as old as Michigan's statehood. Most of it is normal-looking, but you'll find some mostly-buried stones peaking through the grass. This cache is there. Another nearby cemetery, almost as old. The stones are in sad shape -- some are reinforced by metal, some pieced back together with concrete, and some half missing. This cache is there. Not a cemetery exactly, but an odd find on the way to a cache

Well there isn't any "no trespassing" signs... ha ha ha. It's like the old saying "It's only illegal if you get caught". Not cool. Cachers have a reasonable expectation that your cache doesn't require them to break a law. I found one in a drain many, many years ago, and yeah, it was awesome. One of my favorites. It has been archived for years, and what you see on the page is exactly how it was originally listed. I'm all for it IF AND ONLY IF it's legal and reasonably safe (I know safety can never be fully guaranteed anywhere).

DY-no-prof-et. Not DEE-no.

"Organized Geocaching" is in fact where you'll find the Singles thread that I linked, my point being that there is an implied "Straight" in there. So yeah, maybe this should follow suit.

Sexual orienteering wouldn't be too off-topic, would it? Is that what they mean by a "score event"? By the way, someone might want to tell these folks to knock off the non-geocaching stuff.

Three interesting points: 1. Jeremy used to decide the direction of geocaching by taking polls in the forum. 2. Jeremy was no better at estimating the time to implement something in the past that he is now. 3. I've often pointed out that when I started Geocaching there was already a moratorium on new Locationless caches. Well, it's true; that moratorium had been in place for two whole days. Personally, I like that thread because I see my opinion of locationless was the same as it is now -- it was a cool concept that was too different from geocaching to be played here, and a separate site for it would be great. It took a few years before Waymarking got to where I thought it should be, but I've been using it happily for three years now.

Here is an old thread foreshadowing Waymarking, by the way. I don't offer it up as proof of anything or to bolster any argument. I just find it to be an interesting retrospective.

If you'll go back and read the OP for this thread, you will see that it is a discussion of WM as a replacement for virtuals. Waymarking may be a fine replacement for locationless caches, but unfortunately that is not the topic we are discussing. I just reread it. His question was: He only mentioned virts as a way of explaining away one theory (site design). Also, the subject is "Waymarking vs. Geocaching", not "Waymarking vs. Virtuals". And as the conversation has turned toward whether Waymarking.com has met its intent, determining what that intent was seems apropos.