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Qual é para cada um de nós o valor de um FTF? A sensação que nos provoca? Aquilo que nos atrai? Suponho que estes conceitos terão sido de certo modo alterados a partir do momento em que as notificações por SMS ou email se generalizaram... ao ponto de ultimamente se ter criado um regime de "vale-tudo", com caches a serem logadas pela primeira vez, perante o olhar de muggles, enquanto geocachers mais conscienciosos que tendo chegado ao GZ primeiro e não querendo colocar a cache em risco, observam de longe tal heresia. Caches a serem visitadas e logadas após jantares com aprovadores (e já agora vamos lá publicá-la). FTF's por procuração, etc. No início cheguei a logar FTF's na sequência de beta-tests... mas cumprindo integralmente tudo o que era pedido no enunciado da cache, que o owner não é de dar abébias... agora não o faria, optando talvez pelo bom exemplo de quem loga folhas adiante, deixando as iniciais para os próximos Aquilo que mais me (nos) atrai num FTF é encontrar a cache sem ter a possibilidade de help-desk (se exceptuarmos o owner, obviamente)... e em contrapartida ter a possibilidade de ajudar os seguintes. O nosso FTF mais marcante foi feito a 160km de casa e um mês após publicação da cache... duvido que hoje fosse possível Digam de vossa justiça!

I wasn't aware there was a way to have text notification sent for new caches - I only see email address listed, not phone number. Unless you are talking about an email address that actually sends a text message, like: Send SMS from E-Mail Alltel: phonenumber@message.alltel.com. AT&T: phonenumber@txt.att.net. T-Mobile: phonenumber@tmomail.net. Virgin Mobile: phonenumber@vmobl.com. Sprint: phonenumber@messaging.sprintpcs.com. Verizon: phonenumber@vtext.com. Nextel: phonenumber@messaging.nextel.com. US Cellular: phonenumber@mms.uscc.net. If not this, then can you explain a bit more about where you are trying to change the phone number?

I think you have the right idea and I have also done some work with SMS messaging. The advantage of making a 160 character (max) message available is that it it doesn't require setting up an SMS gateway service to actually deliver the messages via SMS. There are lots of bulk SMS services available but they're not free and setting up a reliable SMS gateway is not trivial. There are however lots of free subscription based SMS to Email services. Essentially when you register for the service you provide your cell phone number and you get an email address. When someone sends email to that address the service converts it to an SMS message and sends it to the phone number provided. There is no cost to the sender of the email address. I developed a very heavily user subscription based report delivery service for a well known federal government agency and have seen several subscribers that have set their email address to an "sms" address even thought the content is often much larger than 160 characters. I like the idea of be able to choose the notification format. Ideally I would like to be able to provide a "mobile email address" in addition to a general email address. and have the notifications sent to both. The one sent to the mobile address could have the wap.geocaching.com link (with attributes such that it goes directly to the cache listing) while the notification for the main address would have the links to the main site.

Note that you have to have your email set up just the way Groundspeak wants it for this to work. If you have a geocaching-specific address that forwards to your real address, then this won't work, because your replies will come from your real address, not from your geocaching-specific address. I had to change my email settings on geocaching.com to make this work. Here you go: The MC is fine for the same kind of communication that SMS texting is good for: short messages that won't be important a week from now. For more substantial communication, I prefer a real email system.

Use the phone where there's service and you don't need to worry about pre-loading. Please read my posts before responding, don't just reply while ignoring my post. I don't like all the popups about no data unrelated to "preloaded phones", and the many surprises that occur when data service is weak or intermittent or failing. I can absolutely not pre-load Waze, Message Center, log sending, new cache info, email, SMS, and data on other online Apps. So I use a phone for phone things, and a GPS for GPS things. I will continue to do so. I've already asked you nicely to stop trolling about it. I'm asking again. Stop it.

SMS = Short Message Service It's a communications protocol for text messaging; most cell phones support it. Send your cell phone a text message from another phone or through your email provider, and you'll know if you have it. Keep in mind that SMS messages have a limit of 160 characters, and more importantly that the geocaching.com notifications are not formatted with that limit in mind. Systems like the one that Chuy! posted about and teleflip are mere SMS gateways while will take the first 160 characters of an email message and send it to a cell phone using the SMS protocol. Since the first characters of a notification is "This is an automated message from Geocaching" a lot of useless information would be included as part of the message. If this were done right, the geocaching.com site would either have to set up an SMS gateway(it's not that difficult, I have done it myself) or use one of the many commercial SMS gateway services available. Then when producing the email notifications it would produce a SMS version which only had the most important information (coordinates, waypoint, cache type (it would be nice to know if it was a puzzle cache) and send. The site would also have to have a place where geocachers would enter their cell phone number and a check box to indicate that they wanted to receive notifications via SMS. I just set up my geocaching.com account such that it uses a gmail address. I have a Blackberry Pearl which and a data plan so I can read (and send) email from my phone. I have it set up so that a distinctive tone is played when I have new mail from my gmail account. It does get somewhat frustrating when I hear that tone 5 minutes into an hour long meeting. Awhile back the alert when off as I was finishing something up and I checked the site to find that new cache was placed about a five minute walk from my office. In fact, it looked to be very close to where I park my car (and where my GPS was currently located) every day. I snuck out to go look for it about 15 minutes after the alarm went off sure that I would get a FTF. As I approached GZ I could see the cache from 100' away, grabbed it without breaking stride, and walked to my car to sign the log. I was *second to find*! I pulled out my GPS and checked the location and found that my car was parked 100' from where the cache was placed. I replaced the cache then returned to work and went to log my find. The FTF had already logged it. It was only 20 minutes from the time the cache was published to the first *online* log.

I was considering leaving mine un-hidden due to it being such a pain to un-hide after hiding. Especially if I might forget which conversation was which, and must send a new message to get a hidden conversation restored. In order to keep things sorted and searchable, maybe I'd save the emails (the notifications of the Messages) on the phone as well as on the PC. This IS an improvement, right? Right? Isn't it? One way the MC really shines (aside from being a thrill for the SMS-chat crowd), is it's pretty much possible to communicate with someone who otherwise can't be contacted by email (or if you can't), especially if either party is not actively trying to not be contacted. The App of course has popup notifications, and it's easy to tell the message is live and can be read (as opposed to email where you don't know until a reply arrives). The web site has a little yellow dot to show a message is waiting, but that's the site programmers' idea of a visible notification, not necessarily the only way it could be presented. Another advantage of the MC is there's plain evidence that the message occurred, and all the recipient has to do is attempt one of the several ways to read it. It's available, and both parties can forevermore read exactly what the message says. No email settings needed. For the rest of us, if the sender's email address is posted, and if it is sent with each message, and if email is tested and assured to be functioning with the site most of the time, and if the recipient has similar things in effect, go ahead and use email. Not necessarily "PM" with its built-in "No-Reply" Geocaching.com address, but actual email to real addresses. If you can't be bothered to ensure your email works, bite the bullet and check the MC once in a while. The previously hidden conversation is automatically unhidden at that time. Your first reply should be "my actual email address is [*****], I will respond from that, please reply to that address". All the weirdness and functionlessness of the MC goes away, because you're using email directly. You will also lose the online record of the conversation, if it's possible for GS to see it to solve disputes faster, but you can report emails to solve disputes, too. If the recipient prefers the online record provided by MC, maybe due to him getting a lot of "I didn't get your email" replies or whatever, ratchet the angst down a bit, and use MC with that person. If instead they are just playing with App features, go the email route. A connected phone can send and receive email just as well as "messaging", so go ahead and state your request. And if one is trying to prevent communication and enjoys the chaos of "PM" alone, sorry. The new MC causes messages to get through. There's no excuse anymore, to say you didn't get the message. It's right there. Go read it.

You can. Most (all?) cell providers have what's called an email-to-SMS service. It will receive an email, convert it to a text message, then send it to your phone. If you Google your cell provider and "email to sms", you should be able to find out how their email-to-SMS addresses are set up (ie. [phonenumber]@[provider].com, etc.). Then you need to create new notifications on Geocaching.com and use that address as the "email" address. You are right! Went to the Wikipedia page and it told me how to it easily and now I have the text SMS notifications all set up now! Thank You!!

There are a couple things going on here. One-you said you have added your phone number. It is not your phone number, but rather an email address that is probably based on your phone number that you need. You probably also have your email you used to sign up. So what you are trying to do is to get notification sent to your email and at least 2 phones(with different numbers) While you can have multiple email addresses, you can only have ONE that gets notifications. So you sign up with email@email.com and add your phone email edresses-phone1@email.com and phone2@email.com This will not automatically send the notifications to either phone, you have to go to the link you so kindly provided yourself and go to step 2 in the notifications to SMS. Just a heads up, depending on your provider the message may me cut off. It is best to go with an email address such a gmail. create a gmail account and have all devices signed onto that account, this way you can get your notifications on all devices, yet still be using one email address. My email is already with gmail. I added the numbers in the format set out in section two, number@mycarrier from the list I found elsewhere in this forum (but now can't find). Not sure what else I can do. Are you saying that I can't have new cache alerts sent to my email AND my phone, it's got to be one or the other? Is there something I'm not seeing here. BTW I'm not a frequent mobile/cell phone user and have just updated to a Windows 8 phone which is SMS enabled. I've never used a phone for caching either as I use a GPSr.

A few thoughts... 1. Email notifications - These should definitely be improved. Provide the option for immediate or digest. Primarily: provide a way to treat the MC as an email communication tool for those who don't want it or don't want to use it. If someone sends a message to a user who doesn't check the MC, the worst is for it to remain there unchecked unbeknownst to anyone. Email notifications for new messages without the content would go ignored by such people too. So treat a new message like an existing communication. Include the message in the email. You can default the sender to no-reply, so you don't have to worry about non-validated users (as currently). And if the recipient wants to reply, then a link going right to that conversation on the site would be HUGE (and as simple as linking to the 'send message' page to reply). Better though would be to allow replying to the message email and inserting the reply as a response in the conversation (as described in a previous comment here, can't remember which post #). By providing the message content in the email notification, it accomodates users of the MC, as well as those who couldn't care less about the MC, without creating holes of communication with the implementation of the new system. A digest option would be helpful as well, depending on busyness of the user's MC inbox. But that's just an idea. 2. Conversation deletion - I'm not positive how forums tend to handle message exchanges and deletions, but afaik I believe that 'deleting' a sent message doesn't remove it from the recipient's inbox. Usuaully PMs don't show up as conversations as it's more a message exchange type format. Facebook however, I can't remember if you can actually delete a conversation. (as opposed to functionally hiding it from your view). Ultimately, I don't think it should be possible for one person to delete a whole conversation. Now, if one person 'hides' (or deletes, by label) a conversation, and all other participants do the same, then it could be wiped form the system. But I think if there's a 'delete' option, it really is just a 'hide' from the system perspective, until it has no more context. At the same time though, it would also be comforting to know that you retain control so you can delete your own message(s) completely. ...yeah actually I'm not sure really where I stand on what a 'delete' option should do. 3. Unread messages - The unread message count should definitely be clearly visible on the website. And I don't mean a white on green number outline in the far right border of the website header that is so far away from main vision that it's easy to miss, or have scrolled off the browser edge if the window isn't wide enough on any page. I mean use the generally accepted scheme of bright red dot with a bold, contrasting number in it. Perhaps as well, if a message/conversation remains unread for a few days or a week, send an automated reminder EMAIL that the user has unread messages. At worst, if they intend to ignore them, then there can (should) be a 'Mark all as read' option. 4. Opt-out the MC - Why? Just ignore it. Ideally, some of the things I mention here should make it easier or smoother for people to indirectly 'opt out' by pretending it doesn't exist. But if it's there for all users, it should not be turned off for some. I've never understood the "I don't like... I'll never use... So it shouldn't exist" mentality. At best, an argument could be made for development resources being put to good use elsewhere, but even then it's no tangible loss, even presuming there is actually only one development resource being put to use at any one time So, opt-out of the message center? No. But options to make it as transparent as possible for users if they so desire? Yes, I'd say that should be doable. * forward messages as emails per the existing system (message content in notification emails) - these shouldn't mark the conversation as read however * allow replying by email to participate in the conversation (or provide a link to the page on which to send the response) * clear and bright unread message count badge on every page of the website * periodic reminder email of unread messages, including a brief summary of the conversations' senders and last message datestamp, if not including more conversation content 5. User blocking - Yes! At any time, not just after receiving a message. This should be a transparent effect too - equivalent to an automated ignore. No notifications received for new messages from a blocked user, and conversations are hidden. Blocked user doesn't know they're blocked. Incoming messages are still treated as normal in the chance the blocker unblocks the user (unhides all past correspondance). The blocked user could be left not knowing if the receipient has 'seen' the message(s). I admit I don't really have any idea whether the numbers would back me up, but my guess is that anyone without a validated e-mail address is as unlikely to check their gc messages as to correct their e-mail address. Ironically enough, one of the biggest suggestions in the topic of contacting unvalidated-email users was an on-site messaging system. And that's what we've got. Now we're seeing comments that a problem with the messaging service is that people without a valid email may not use the website so won't get the messages...? If there's a user like that, then there is no hope, apart from validating email addresses. While I still firmly believe ALL emails should be validated before being able to do anything on the site (even mobile users), I just find it ironic this circle in the argument See THIS is a big benefit. (for those with smartphones). If one of the senders is the GS notification system, then you could have a 'conversation' where one of notification system options is to send a MC alert. Then if you have push notifications on with your app, you actually would get immediate notification. That would be a huge draw, imo. heh, you realize you're making an argument that because there are 3rd party apps that compete with their own, they shouldn't offer any features to encourage people to buy and use their own? That said, yes I'd love to see the MC, if it's integrated into the official app, have API hooks to allow 3rd party apps to also make use of the in-app messaging. But I think jumping to them considering people who use other apps "second class citizens" is pretty off the mark. They want people, justifiably, to use their app. Even though (afaik) on iOS it's the most expensive and not really the most feature rich at this point Personally, if they actually integrated push notifications in app (not sms alerts or email), then I'd make use of it again. Thanks also, seandynamite for chiming in this thread

Trev, you're probably right. SMS'd notififations are not easy. For me, the next best way is to receive the email notifications on my phone, and a SMS telling me I have email. The email can be immediately retrieved, the link clicked, and be on the cache page within seconds, downloading the GPX-file to import into your application, if needed. Quoting from http://mail.mtnloaded.co.za: "An SMS notification for new emails will be (are) available as an option. Whenever a new email is received an SMS notification is sent containing the subject line of the email. The default setting for this SMS notification is off but you can turn it on (and off) via the web on the settings page. These SMS notifications are free."

Assuming the MC works in your environment. If it doesn't, then that minute becomes forever. And in situations where an archive of past conversations is important (e.g., volunteer reviewers and EarthCache owners), the MC takes the conversation out of the email context where that archive of past conversations is conveniently available. The same could be said about the MC user who replied to the email via the MC. Different people prefer different systems at different times for different reasons. Sometimes I reply to email via IM, or via phone, or even via postal mail. Sometimes I reply to voicemail via email, or via IM. I usually reply to SMS via email (once I finally notice the SMS). And so on. It's not a crime to switch communication systems when you reply. I'm not really an opponent of the MC. But I'm not a fan either. The only messages I've sent on the MC have been test messages of one sort or another, and I can understand the points raised by the opponents of the MC. From my perspective, it's yet another PM system that I'll probably ignore, except when I get an email notification, or when I happen to notice the "unread message" icon on the site.

1. I think this is the key for me. Initial messages? Respond. Repeated messages that enter the realm of 2 and 3? Then they might be getting an ignore. 2. On first contact (or maybe 2 or 3, my judgment) I'll still respond. Sometimes a friendly response goes a long way when facing an angry or annoying person. Maybe their assumption is that I'm one of those andgry/annoying people so they start off on the wrong foot. Yep, I'll always respond first, and judge further replies on how the convo goes. 3. Did you reply initially? (I assume so). Depending on the cache, if they're just having difficulty finding it, I'd give them suggestions - ask someone who's found it already for a tip, or I might give them a tip, or say go with at least 1 or 2 friends to team up and find it; or maybe I'll offer to meet them and go find it. Without context, your #3 implies you never responded due to the question; I'd have responded. If you did and they continued, I'd have attempted to steer the person away from that basic, simple question (give'em a tip - who cares, whether it's easy or hard; or else go help them) But yeah I'd never just tell them exactly where it is or how to find it. Same, I try to do that whether it's an SMS, a FB msg, twitter DM, or GC message. So many manners of immediate contact these days, to me geocaching messaging is just another one. But in the context of geocaching, that's the surefire way of getting a hole of a cache owner - especially since a GC message also goes by email. Knowing what it's like to send a message while on site, hoping for a quick reply, I do my best to respond to GC messages ASAP. If I get that, I tend to get to the point of "I can't say any more otherwise it's a giveaway". And if it's not my cache, I'll suggest they just ask the CO. That will certainly determine whether the CO would care if someone 'gives out answers'. For my own, I'd prefer to be the one to choose whether someone is 'given' the answer or not. Really bugs me when others do that behind the CO's back. Some COs will give out their own answers, others won't. It's more like a see-no-evil-hear-no-evil under the table exchange. They don't know if the CO would care because they never asked. I try to be up front on my caches - if you want a hint, just ask me, please don't go around getting answers from people; I'm open to chatting

By presenting faceplant as the example of how to make a communication system, the OP's whole premise is flawed. Many people don't even realize you have to dig for their "Messenger" service, and many who use it don't remember to check it. I have several standing messages there, a couple of them for years, with no reply, and no other way to contact the person. And friends who do use "Messenger" also interchange that and the phone SMS and email, so today they are I guess checking only one of the three, and I get no reply this week. It's a mess, and not worth emulating. And it's pretty much what we get at Geocaching.com already. I mean, it's OK as it goes, but it's not fast.

A geocaching.com nem kuld SMS ertesitot, csak egy e-mailt. Az SMS ertesito ugy mukodik, hogy az email ertesito kuldesehez egy olyan postafiokot adsz meg, aminel van SMS ertesito szolgaltatas. Ott be van allitva egy szuro segitsegevel, hogy ha ilyen email erkezik, kuldjon egy SMS-t. Amit en a PM-ben kihasznalok: - pocket query - konnyen letoltom pl. az adott ponttol 30 km-es korzetben az osszes olyan kest, ami erdekel (be lehet allitani szurok segitsegevel), foleg olyan varosban jo ez, ahol tobb mint 1-2 kess van, - bookmark - listak letrehozasa, pl. nekem van egy origami es egy komaromi erodredszer listam, - nincsenek reklamcsikok a keresesnel a ladak kozott, - lehet szurni a ladakat a terkepen is tipus szerint, - es persze a mar emlitett ertesito - nekem erre kulon email cimem van, amirol mindjart kapok SMS-t is, ha megjelenik a lakhelyem kornyeken uj lada. Raadasul, a PM-el tamogatom az oldal fejleszteset is, es amint latni, foglalkoznak az oldallal es folyamatosan fejlesztik.

I indeed referred to those who read and post here, understanding that it is a self-selecting population. That said, the complaints on this feature change have come more quickly and in greater volume than is often the case, which also indicates that this one 'stung' more than usual. The specifics of the complaints, most particularly with regard to cell phone use, will certainly impact a wider audience than we have here. I do not receive my gc.com email over my cell phone, but fully appreciate the brain damage this is likely causing those that do, hence my comments. When Groundspeak decided to get rid of the Google Earth geocache link because only about 200 people were using it and tha it was putting undue load on Grounspeak servers, this forum filled with complaints and thy brought back th link. I really think they were taken by surprise by the response to the email changes. I suspsect they had a number of meetings discussing ways to improve the emails and incorporate many of the changes people have been aksing for for a long time. THey might have even have had some focus groups of geocachers review the proposals. I don't think the expected so many people who were relying on the messages being formated in some specific way or having the email subject line containing specific fields. I suspect the more typical case would be someone like me. I too had the emails from Geocaching.com go to a separate email folder. In this respect I was completely uneffected, the emails all continued to sort to the same folder as before. What I normally did was read the emails and then click throug to the cache page for caches I might be interested in. With the exception of the low contrast color scheme, the formatted emails are in fact easier for me to read. The font size was perfect (I may have set the default font for HTML email to a larger sixe, and it seems the emails abide by that selection). The additional information that is provide means that I can make a better decision as to which cache I click through to bring up the page. It takes me less time to get through the geocaching emails now. Beside the color, the only other issue that has been brough up that I have seen are the notifications for other than publish that dont have the log type. I don't use the notifications to run out for FTF like some people. My understand is that the published notifications to still have a text option that can easily be forwarded as an SMS message to a mobile device. This text contains more information about the cache than the previous message. Smartphones have email clients that can display HTML emails and the format seems to be one considers how it will fit on a small screen. I understand that some people prefer forwading the emails as text SMS messages to avoid data charges. This can be done with the published logs which are the emails where timely delivery is critical. For most people, the new emails may need some minor tweaking but it seems to be a better solution. People who rolled their own solution to automate how they deal with emails should not be surprised to see that break when changes are made. Personally, I had [LOG] and [GEO] going to one one folder. I also had Owner going to another folder, and Published going to a third. If they could add a [NEW] tag to the newly published caches, I could sort them and I guess I could learn to live with the rest of the changes. I do not like the new formats, but have been on the net since 1992 when the WWW basically started. I've learned that companies do not like to roll back changes that they have paid money to create. NASCAR.com is a classic example. For a number of years, they rolled out an entirely new web site on the date of the first race of the season. Fans were so confused that they couldn't figure out how to use the site on the most important date that they needed to do so. Despite the complaints, they continued to do this year after year. Just like with the email updates, nothing new was added, just everything was moved around, or information was deleted. Finally, someone figured out that all they were doing was spending money to to do nothing but piss off their customers.

Thanks. I've tested both numberATtxt.att.net and numberATmms.att.net. I get the initial message from GS when setting up the email, and I'm able to validate it (apparently I can only have 2 email addresses active (others in the area have at least 3), so I've toggled between the 2 addresses a few time with similar results). However, I don't receive notifications after the address is associated with one of my notifications. Compared results to the emails I receive under a separate notification, and GS and I have both posted notes and disabled caches to test the notification, without success. I also consistently receive SMS and txt messages at both of the addresses from many other services (schools, kids sports, work, I sent from my email addresses, etc..). GS seems to be the only system where I know I have a problem. I had ATT check on their end, much more responsive to my request than I expected. They researched and couldn't not find a cause. I would activate email push notifications, but I receive thousands of emails per day between work and personal, many with attachments, so that would run up my data limit since I can't restrict which account is set to push; and I would ignore most notifications due to volume. I'll be patient, and hope GS (and/or ATT) can resolve. I'm anxious to submit a few that I've recently hidden, but I'd like to know the messages go out consistently to the locals.

I just did some Googling, and it looks like Vtext is the name of the Verizon email-to-SMS service. Their site, as well as several others, say that it's limited to 160 characters. I think the OP is out of luck unless they change providers like you suggested. 160 characters is the limit for ALL SMS text messages. Many newer phones will split longer messages into as many SMS messages as necessary to deliver the long message. Depending on the receiving hardware the multiple message will either be rejoined or displayed as standalone messages. Most internet to SMS services truncate long messages to the allowed 160 characters. This has little to do with whom the provider is.

You can. Most (all?) cell providers have what's called an email-to-SMS service. It will receive an email, convert it to a text message, then send it to your phone. If you Google your cell provider and "email to sms", you should be able to find out how their email-to-SMS addresses are set up (ie. [phonenumber]@[provider].com, etc.). Then you need to create new notifications on Geocaching.com and use that address as the "email" address.

I think so, too. I'm not so sure it need to be reinvented. There are existing full-featured SMS systems. There are hints around here that the “Free App” will become “The App”. Until then, open both the “Intro” and Paid, and you get the Message Center. So there's a slight inconvenience for now, in order to use the slightly inconvenient Message Center . Use it mainly to help Intro App Users (the word help being key) and PM or better yet, actual email for anyone else. If their email is working. But more that one “MC” per device would become a problem. People would be asking which one to shut off. I also thought the MC could be its own separate App, and let the phone open whatever App you use, from within it. If the sender has set their Profile to publicly display their email address, can you reply via email directly from the emailed MC notification? I haven't gotten a wide enough variety of MC notifications to know. If so switching from MC to actual email can be seamless. It requires a special Profile setting, but if the plan is to be able to contact everyone, all avenues of communication must be open. If or when an Intro App user decides to join the web site, they may switch to "PM" (but let's not confuse PM with "email", PM is a GS server to email system with tons of problems) like everybody else. For those who are still bringing up the "Verified" thing, I'll point out yet again that someone just testing the App may not want to reveal a "Verified" email address to a company they haven't decided to use, and I don't blame them. "Verified" is to prove the web user is a human, which App users have in fact proven several ways ($60/mo data plan, anyone?). They've revealed plenty by just having a phone. People using the Intro App don't need email, we contact them via the MC. If one needs everyone "Verified", take that up with TPTB. Convince them about the periodic "re-verified" plan or whatever, because it's a much bigger issue on the web site than it ever was in the App, with many who cannot be contacted who never used the App, plus the web site has "Verified" non-human Spambots to this day. "Verified" is not about the App. I've stated this until I'm blue in the nose yet somehow it never sinks in.

I indeed referred to those who read and post here, understanding that it is a self-selecting population. That said, the complaints on this feature change have come more quickly and in greater volume than is often the case, which also indicates that this one 'stung' more than usual. The specifics of the complaints, most particularly with regard to cell phone use, will certainly impact a wider audience than we have here. I do not receive my gc.com email over my cell phone, but fully appreciate the brain damage this is likely causing those that do, hence my comments. When Groundspeak decided to get rid of the Google Earth geocache link because only about 200 people were using it and tha it was putting undue load on Grounspeak servers, this forum filled with complaints and thy brought back th link. I really think they were taken by surprise by the response to the email changes. I suspsect they had a number of meetings discussing ways to improve the emails and incorporate many of the changes people have been aksing for for a long time. THey might have even have had some focus groups of geocachers review the proposals. I don't think the expected so many people who were relying on the messages being formated in some specific way or having the email subject line containing specific fields. I suspect the more typical case would be someone like me. I too had the emails from Geocaching.com go to a separate email folder. In this respect I was completely uneffected, the emails all continued to sort to the same folder as before. What I normally did was read the emails and then click throug to the cache page for caches I might be interested in. With the exception of the low contrast color scheme, the formatted emails are in fact easier for me to read. The font size was perfect (I may have set the default font for HTML email to a larger sixe, and it seems the emails abide by that selection). The additional information that is provide means that I can make a better decision as to which cache I click through to bring up the page. It takes me less time to get through the geocaching emails now. Beside the color, the only other issue that has been brough up that I have seen are the notifications for other than publish that dont have the log type. I don't use the notifications to run out for FTF like some people. My understand is that the published notifications to still have a text option that can easily be forwarded as an SMS message to a mobile device. This text contains more information about the cache than the previous message. Smartphones have email clients that can display HTML emails and the format seems to be one considers how it will fit on a small screen. I understand that some people prefer forwading the emails as text SMS messages to avoid data charges. This can be done with the published logs which are the emails where timely delivery is critical. For most people, the new emails may need some minor tweaking but it seems to be a better solution. People who rolled their own solution to automate how they deal with emails should not be surprised to see that break when changes are made.

Yes that would be vodacom as that site CapeDoc pointed to indicates. I tried sending myself a message and got the reply that I had to register which I did. You get to send 3 sms per day from the REGISTERED address. There for simply putting yourcellnumber@vodacom.co.za into the email address of the notification setup screen will not work as the originating Groundspeak email address will obviously not be an email address registered on the vodacom system. I don't think it is possible. Of course vodacom say this is to provide you with a better service.......yes of course it is! Even if this did work, it might be of limited use as the subject that is sent is included towards the 140 character maximum length SMS. The notification I forwarded to my cell phone from my own mail address arrived as an SMS but of limited value as there was not much info - the subject header had taken half the SMS. The FREE solution as I see it. You have to have a machine that is online all the time receiving your notification alerts - perhaps best to set up a separate email address. On receiving a notification have it forward the notfication from your vodacom registered address. This is quite easily done in any mail client. This will be good for three SMS per day. But the same problem of the subject taking up valuable message space applies. Better solution but requires some "programming" . When your notification comes in you would have to parse the relevant information and strip out the fluff and then send the message to your phone without a subject. I am not sure if the mail clients out there can do this so you might have to write your own interface program to do the parsing. Sending the mail would be trivial and if you know what you are doing so would the parsing. Unfortunately I do not have the programming skills required but I am sure the solution is a short python (or insert your fave language) script away! Battlerat - you up for it? Trev

If you use gmail (or possible other email services), then the free app Boxcar can effectively give you this. What you do is create a filter in gmail (on the web page) that when you receive an email that matches whatever criteria you want, you forward the email to a special boxcar email address. Then the boxcar app can be set to give a unique alert sound for the matching emails. I use this to do that for messages from my family and I keep meaning to set up one for geocaching alerts but I haven't done it yet. It's a little klunky how it works, but it does the trick. I do hope that iOS 6 has this feature though and we don't need anything like Boxcar to do it for us. For me, I set up an alias email for my geocaching account, which forwards email to my personal inbox, as well as mobile email through Rogers. So, while I never read the email that goes instantly to my phone, the alert I receive contains the sender's email address. If the sender is noreply@geocaching.com I know it's a GC-related email. From noreply@Groundspeak.com means a newsletter or forum notification. Either way, as soon as I get that alert, I open up my mail app and download the new email - instant instant email notification The way I see it, any other service you employ will still have somewhat of a notification lag. The SMS notification of new email to my phone is as fast as it'll come, as it comes straight from Rogers on my plan. After I know there's an incoming email, I can just check it manually if I'm free to do so. It would of course be nice if the instant email notification would include more than just the sender's email address, but that's sufficient for the way I use it.

Notifications (a premium member feature) are sent immediately, so it would depend on your mobile provider and how you have mobile notifications sent, or else how often or how fast you check your email. We have a number of FTF hounds around here as well, but there's really nothing you can do to stop them unless you can make them consider giving someone else a chance (or try to beat them, of course) If I can't get a cache, sometimes I check back to see who got it, and occasionally I'm surprised if it's in a known FTFer area but a newcomer gets to it first When summer comes around, I get my little email workaround up and running again; my provider doesn't have much flexibility in mobile notification content, so I whipped up an automated scanner and dedicated email address so that as soon as one arrives it sends me an sms with a little more detail for a quick lookup. AFAIK there aren't any push notifications with the official geocaching app connected to the notifications you've set up in your profile. I think gc.com does have SMS notifications for some providers though. I would love to see push notifications via the app, or allowing 3rd party apps to set up push notifications from existing profile settings.

There are a couple things going on here. One-you said you have added your phone number. It is not your phone number, but rather an email address that is probably based on your phone number that you need. You probably also have your email you used to sign up. So what you are trying to do is to get notification sent to your email and at least 2 phones(with different numbers) While you can have multiple email addresses, you can only have ONE that gets notifications. So you sign up with email@email.com and add your phone email edresses-phone1@email.com and phone2@email.com This will not automatically send the notifications to either phone, you have to go to the link you so kindly provided yourself and go to step 2 in the notifications to SMS. Just a heads up, depending on your provider the message may me cut off. It is best to go with an email address such a gmail. create a gmail account and have all devices signed onto that account, this way you can get your notifications on all devices, yet still be using one email address.