What Is Waymarking Anyway?

[+Ama&Papa]

I've been re-reading the postings here and feel I must write to help sort out my own confusion. I've posted a few waymarks on the new site because I found a subcategory that worked perfectly but I found myself baffled on several other attempts.

 

- there often isn't a sub category that works for my listing

 

- I find myself blocked from entering info at the category level, it would seem all categories should have sub categories OR provision for submitting to the category level, with the understanding that the category manager would redistribute as appropriate

 

- the Waymarking concept seems to be leaning more towards "locationless" items or simple travelogue places without accomdating "virtual" items that include puzzles, questions or "take a picture" (I think an additional field should be provided for puzzle makers)

 

- I'm having trouble with the concept of "collecting" waymarks in the same way as I have geocaches. I don't see a control on my claims ie. no one seems to be asking me to take a picture of my gps at the location or email the answer to a question. (Am I missing something here?)

 

I'm excited about this new concept in caching. I hope by February, Waymarking will satisfy all our whims.

[+cache_test_dummies]

- there often isn't a sub category that works for my listing

We're still in Beta, and the process by which categories can be added hasn't been fully worked out yet. So the categories which are currently available on the site are primarily a reflection of the old locationless caches which have been transferred over from GC.com. It will probably will be at least a few more months before the category lists begin to expand to the point where this becomes less of an issue.

 

- I find myself blocked from entering info at the category level, it would seem all categories should have sub categories OR provision for submitting to the category level, with the understanding that the category manager would redistribute as appropriate

Only Groundspeak site administrators have control over the categories which contain subcategories. And the structure of the site, by design, does not allow waymarks to be listed for a category which contains subcategories (to do otherwise would likely result in real confusion). Category managers (i.e. site users, not Groundspeak site adminstrators) have control over the waymarks which are listed for their categories, but don't have the ability to move waymarks to another category. This is also by design.

 

- I'm having trouble with the concept of "collecting" waymarks in the same way as I have geocaches. I don't see a control on my claims ie. no one seems to be asking me to take a picture of my gps at the location or email the answer to a question. (Am I missing something here?)

The requirements for both listing waymarks and logging a visit to a waymark are controlled by the category managers. If a category manager doesn't require a verification picture, then none has to be provided. Some will include such a requirement, others won't. Will some people 'cheat' and log visits to waymarks they never visits? Yeup. Does it really matter? Nope.

 

By the way, perhaps a mod could move this topic to "Getting Started" forum? It would seem to fit better there.