bluesnote

The inconstancy in reviewing thus far is very frustrating. Their category is vague and the reviewers have been contradicting on what passes and what does not. This should have been discussed prior for it being approved, hence why I initially "denied" the category despite it passing peer review. They still seem to not have a clear consensus as to what should be accepted and what does not. For example: I submitted a waymark for the Hollywood Sign in California. It was approved quickly. It was "visited" by another officer in the category, but before that same officer denied the waymark stating that Hollywood is not a city. In the same sense, another waymark was approved for the "Maldives" when that technically is a country and not a city. Yet that waymark is still there, approved. Both examples were created for the same purpose. I feel the distinction between what is a city/neighborhood/country shouldn't matter as long as the purpose of the letters are the same. If so, we would have a ton of crossing categories in the abstract or silhouette categories. What does everyone else think?

In my local caching area, many of the veteran geocachers know about this "life hack". Heck, they've even told me they do this. When I do hide multis, I intentionally do not submit waymarks for a plaque (or item) that is part of my multi for several weeks. I assume after a while, people give up after seeing that nothing "useful" has been posted Waymarking. So after a few weeks, I do eventually submit them. But not right away. Kinda funny because this feature is what got me started into Waymarking in 2009/10.

You can go to the group details, click the waymark in question from the group activity, and "re-evaluate" it for review. You can send it to a group vote as well.

If only it was that simple. Most of the time, the only person who has access to edit the categories are the category leaders. Many of whom are inactive. So it's unlikely they will be updated anytime soon.

Personally, I don't log any waymarks as a visit without a photo regardless if I know if I visited the location or not. I have skipped visiting some waymarks because I didn't think the object being waymarked could fit into any other category, only to find out later there was an obscure category I wasn't thinking of. I always add a photo of the object being waymark to my logs. In my opinion no photo should imply no credit. It's not that hard to take photos nowadays. Back when Waymarking was created in 2005, smartphones did not exist so not everyone had the capabilities of taking photos of everything like they do now. I think this is the original reason many older categories did not explicitly require them. But today, it's kinda an unwritten rule to log waymarks. How else are you supposed to prove you visited it? With geocaching, we have logbooks which makes it very easy for an owner to check the online logs to the physical log in the cache. With Waymarking, that's not really applicable. Even if the object is very blurry in the photo or is very far away in the photo, I still allow it on my waymarks because it proves you visited that object. So long as the object being waymark is in a photo that the visitor uploaded, I allow it. Otherwise, no photo should equal no credit (in my opinion).

Same thing happens when I try to review an edited waymark. The system will not allow me to view the waymark in question to approve/decline the review edits. So I am unable to clear it from my review queue. Hope this gets fixed soon.

I've been receiving my visit emails recently. No issues on my end.

This would be very hard to prove and I assume there would be some, not a lot, of them in Europe and likely less so in the US and Canada. I don't really find that too interesting. There are probably other existing categories to which those shops can fit into.

As an avid waymarker (I have created more waymarks than I have found geocaches), I completely agree with Ernmark. Two weeks notice is not enough time to save all of our logs/photos. Three months (i.e. 12/31) would have been a reasonable amount of time. I'm currently in grad school and have no time in the next two weeks to recover my photos/logs on my over 300 benchmarks logged. It's also midterm week for me so I'm quite busy studying on top of doing research. I am positive all my years hard work creating logs, finding, and documenting benchmarks, will unfortunately go to waste. At least allow people who have photos to submit their findings over to Waymarking. Heck, HQ should try and encourage it! Bring more people over to the Waymarking site. We have over 1 million waymarks which took about 15 years to achieve. Who knows, maybe we will hit 2 million in 5 years because HQ helped promote geocachers to create waymarks. If, for some reason, HQ does encourage or incentives it (i.e. maybe a new benchmark souvenir on their geocaching profile) it would help to document and move everything over to Waymarking where data (photos, logs, coordinates, etc.) will be saved. A few years back, I created (and currently run) the Latin American Benchmarks category. There are several other benchmark categories that encompass most of the entire world. Those living outside the US have their own benchmark categories to which they can submit their own listings. Give people a reward to create a benchmark waymark (like a souvenir). Souvenirs get people to go caching for "virtual games", why not do the same with benchmarks? I think that would help encourage people to both visit and become familiar with the existing Waymarking site and to build hype about benchmarks. Who knows? Maybe the geocaching benchmark site will see a huge increase in active users during its last two weeks of existence. Its a win-win.

HQ has done a lot of things that has been disappointing. But this actually makes me quite angry.

It would seem every comment here is in favor of keeping benchmarks as a part of the GC site. As others have said, I am also willing to pay more for my Premium Membership if it means benchmarks are not axed from the site. The price of a Premium Membership has not changed in the 15 years I have had it. Why not raise it slightly and use the extra funds to put more resources to revamping and preserving the benchmark database? I'm okay with that. I, and many others, have been against new changes by HQ over the years. First with the updated stricter (and in my opinion less fun/enjoyable) challenges, then by allowing over saturation of ALs, and now this? To me, it would seem they are trying their best to reach a broader audience rather than trying to keep the large one they currently have. This actually makes me pretty upset and borderline mad. I urge HQ to reconsider after hearing our concerns.

The very same thing can be said for the Waymarking site, which hasn't had a major overhaul in years. And many bugs have appeared and were left unfixed for months, sometimes years. There's probably less than 75 active users per month and I'm one of them. I understand the benchmark feature is widely underused. But that should not be a reason to discontinue and remove them entirely from the site. Maybe create or move the database to a separate website, as what occurred with locationless caches to Waymarking in 2005/06. For the same reasons, people years later wanted to log/find locationless caches. Groundspeak listened. Two new ones were added, with a third several months ago. I am positive benchmarks will follow the same route. All we (the community) are asking is not to remove them entirely. At least keep the database accessible to view with the option to log them if others plan to in the future. Like others have mentioned, for the majority of benchmarks, the geocaching site is the only place to view photos of them. We shouldn't destroy and loose historical documentation because of this. I really hate to beg here, but please save this important data.

I agree with everyone else, this decision seems it wasn't well thought out. Removing them entirely is just bad taste in my opinion. I enjoy finding and logging them, and many others that I have talked to do too. This decision is such a disappointment. At least give us a year's notice to give the community time to find the last benchmarks they want to hunt. This will effect some Waymarking categories since we depend on the weblinks provided by geocaching. So this poor decision doesn't just effect geocaching. I really hope HQ reconsiders this mistake. Here's an idea: send out a community poll before removing benchmarks. I'm convinced the vast majority of us still prefer them to be apart of the geocaching website. I'm sure HQ underestimates how many geocachers enjoy benchmarks. The benchmark website has not been updated for as long as I can remember. Maybe revamp it? Add a map feature like with the geocaching map or intergrade it with the app. But please do not remove benchmarks entirely. That to me seems like a terrible idea.

What countries are we missing? And of these countries, is there enough "tourism" or need to justify a new catch all category?

I watched it live yesterday. Incredible to see the pictures right before impact! I saw DART launch last November from my house and now to see its mission complete is surreal.

While walking around Hollywood Forever Cemetery in Hollywood over the HOT weekend, I came across a cenotaph of a Hattie McDaniel, famous for her role as Mammy in Gone with the Wind. I wanted to waymark it into grave of a famous person, but she is not buried there. So, it had me thinking. What if there was a category for cenotaphs. And if so, should it be selective to only be "cenotaphs of a famous person"? I'm curious to know what your thoughts are. Feel free to discuss and let me know. On a side note, I also came across a cenotaph of Toto from the Wizard of Oz, whose real name was Terry. She was buried on ranch outside LA and due to rapid economic expansion of the region, her grave was destroyed during the construction of a freeway.

Only time I've seen them change was some time after a new category gets approved. When the generic icon becomes, in lack of better words, the more specific icon. I remember a few years ago, most of the historical marker categories got an overhaul in their icons and that occurred several years after these categories were approved. But other than this, I can't think of other times they were updated. But I would assume it's possible.

I was planning on going to Geowoodstock and the HQ celebration (as it's the closest it's been to me in years). However, my plans have changed and I cannot get time off from school. I know many geocaching friends in my area who are going and I wished I could have be able to join everyone. I wish everyone who is going, including pmaupin, to enjoy the northwest and have fun! Super jealous! It's one of the only places in the country I have not visited and hope to make it out there someday! It would be interesting to see where Geowoodstock would be next year and if they are moving back to the normal May dates.

Strange. I'm currently living in the 951 region for school. I know Don is in the Baltimore area, with a 410 area code. Luckily, I haven't received any strange messages from Don. And I agree, every time he has messaged me, he has addressed me directly. A simple "hi" is out of the ordinary. I hope Don has this all sorted out.

It may be my keen eye, but on the bottom right of the building it seems like that's a corner stone. If you have a photo of that, you could submit it to that category. As far as other categories I'm unsure. Maybe this could mean there is a need to create a new category for: "non-profit organization headquarters and centers". I've seen a few like this which currently have no category to put them into. An example would be the DAR headquarters in DC which I have visited, and documented, but have no category to place it in. If there is a need, I'm willing to help develop that category.

Really like the feature that shows a user's department development. You can tell when I got a new phone/camera as well as when I'm on vacation or in school. Love it! Great work!

I have come across a few in my travels and would think a new category could work in theory. Definitely prevalent, but I feel in some areas such as National Wildlife Refuges and other nature areas might have hundreds of them. However, I will say, the ones I have come across are usually by themselves. I would need to see the proposal to make a final decision. My advise, create a group to get started on the proposal. Some questions that you'll need to answer moving forward: Is a new category needed? Are these interesting enough that a new category would be needed? (I would say, for me at least, this is borderline. I could be persuaded either way) How can you overcome instances of over prevalence such as in a nature reserve or national park? (something to be discussed here int he forums) What would qualify a nest to be approved in this category? I think man-made ones should be the only ones accepted. Would natural ones be accepted too? The ones on tall masts with a small platform at the top. What if there's a large bird house type structure? Can that be accepted here too? (I'd say no, however these guidelines need to be fleshed out) Just a few things to consider.

Looks like if I was still on the east coast of the US, I could have helped with this flyover. The path goes down the eastern seaboard. Sadly, I am not at the moment. I'll still offer help for a flyover the west coast of the US.

I just thought of an brilliant idea. PISA-Caching, you should make this a "photo goal" with the intent for waymarkers to recreate photos of themselves taken some amount of years ago. If you decide on the 50 year requirement, such as in the Photos Then and Now category, I will need to wait quite a bit of time before any photo of me surpasses it. I actually think it would be fun to see the creative ways waymarkers recreate photos of themselves.

Have you tried Rose Gardens? Other ideas may be WWII Memorials or Citizen Memorials (or both). I'm an officer in citizen memorials, but would send it to a group vote to see what others say as I think it's borderline.