Why Doesn't Travel Bug Appear In Cache?

[+Thot]

Last week I got a notice that one of my travel bugs had been placed in a cache. When I go to the bug page, indeed it show it as in this cache. But, when I go to the cache page it says there are no bugs in the cache. So it appears to be in limbo somewhere.

 

Anybody had this problem? Know how to fix it?

[+the hermit crabs]

Is it CyberBug - The Invisible Travel Bug? (I'm guessing that it is, since your other bugs look right).

 

It's probably because it's a virtual TB, and has been locked and moved to "Unknown location". (If someone were to try to log it, they'd now get this message: "The listing has been locked and is not accepting new log entries.")

 

(edit: The discussion about eliminating virtual TBs was in this thread by Jeremy, in the Web Site forum.)

Edited December 12, 2005 by the hermit crabs

[+welch]

when the TB page says "Recently Spotted: Unknown Location" then the icon isn't on any cache page. Noone knows where the TB is so the icon is no where....

TBs can be move to location uknown by the traveler owener, the cache page owner it was sitting on, and the reviewers and admin people. Seems this one was problem moved by somone in the last catogory.

Usually, the next person with the serial number who logs it will be able to retreive it from location unknown and move it normally. However yours has been locked as well, when you try to post a log it comes back "The listing has been locked and is not accepting new log entries". See Hermit Crabs explaintion for why.

[+welch]

sorry, double post

Edited December 12, 2005 by welch

[+Thot]

Is it CyberBug - The Invisible Travel Bug? (I'm guessing that it is, since your other bugs look right).

 

It's probably because it's a virtual TB, and has been locked and moved to "Unknown location".  (If someone were to try to log it, they'd now get this message: "The listing has been locked and is not accepting new log entries.")

Yes it is. I read at that v e r y long thread you referred me to but it seemed to be about some travel bug belonging to his wife that had been improperly handled. I didn't see him say he was banning virtual bugs in the future, much less preexisting ones, and I can't ask this follow-up question because he locked the thread.

[+Thot]

Usually, the next person with the serial number who logs it will be able to retreive it from location unknown and move it normally. However yours has been locked as well, when you try to post a log it comes back "The listing has been locked and is not accepting new log entries". See Hermit Crabs explaintion for why.

So, how do I get it out of the unknown limbo location and get it moving again?

 

How could some random stranger have the authority lock someone else's travel bug? Seems like this opens the door to all kind of mischief.

[+welch]

Usually, the next person with the serial number who logs it will be able to retreive it from location unknown and move it normally. However yours has been locked as well, when you try to post a log it comes back "The listing has been locked and is not accepting new log entries". See Hermit Crabs explaintion for why.

So, how do I get it out of the unknown limbo location and get it moving again?

 

How could some random stranger have the authority lock someone else's travel bug? Seems like this opens the door to all kind of mischief.

Normally, you could just use the serial number to log it back into a cache if you knew it was there. Or leave it for the next person that finds it (like if you weren't sure where it was). BUT SINCE YOUR TB IS "LOCKED" YOU CAN'T DO ANYTHING. To get it unlocked, if it can be unlocked, you need the help of an admin.

 

Your TB wasn't locked by a random stranger, it was some admin type person, only admins can lock them like that. And it isn't just your TB, they went and locked down all the virtual travelers they could find recenty. I thought this was covered in one of the threads Hermi Crabs linked to, maybe not?

[+the hermit crabs]

Is it CyberBug - The Invisible Travel Bug? (I'm guessing that it is, since your other bugs look right).

 

It's probably because it's a virtual TB, and has been locked and moved to "Unknown location".  (If someone were to try to log it, they'd now get this message: "The listing has been locked and is not accepting new log entries.")

Yes it is. I read at that v e r y long thread you referred me to but it seemed to be about some travel bug belonging to his wife that had been improperly handled. I didn't see him say he was banning virtual bugs in the future, much less preexisting ones, and I can't ask this follow-up question because he locked the thread.

Sorry to make you read all that; I had thought that it was pretty clear from the very first sentence of that long thread:

Let's just say that the possibility of allowing what folks are calling "virtual" travel bugs has moved to absolute zero.

But maybe it just seemed clear to me, because I had read his previous posts in other threads about disliking the entire concept of virtual TBs, describing them as an abuse of the TB-tracking feature. He had been mulling over banning them entirely; the recent hijacking of his wife's TB and it then turning into a virtual TB was the last straw. All known virtual TBs began being locked almost immediately after that (though there are still some that they haven't gotten to yet).

 

As to how to get your TB back in circulation: you'll have to make it a real one, not a virtual, and you'll have to ask Groundspeak to reactivate it for you. See the first few posts in this thread (less than one page! )

[+welch]

As to how to get your TB back in circulation: you'll have to make it a real one, not a virtual, and you'll have to ask Groundspeak to reactivate it for you. See the first few posts in this thread (less than one page! )

Yep, post three. " If you actually plan to release the Geocoin we would be happy to set that up for you to restart it on its real journey. "

[+the hermit crabs]

I didn't see him say he was banning virtual bugs in the future, much less preexisting ones, and I can't ask this follow-up question because he locked the thread.

Here are a few other places where he mentions that virtual coins and bugs are not allowed:

 

From the Ability To Delete Virtual Coin And TB Entries thread:

"virtual" coins and travel bugs were not the intent of the features of the site. They create an unusually large log entry list which causes unnecessary stress on the machines and on bandwidth. I have been locking these bugs and geocoins to stop this kind of activity.

 

So yes. I hate it too. I may have to add a report feature for these listings to let us know when the feature is being abused so we can address this better. Geocaching is an outdoor activity and travel bugs are meant to track real world movements. Virtual travel bugs and geocoins are a PITA.

From the Icon Swap Meets thread:

As for virtual geocoins and travel bugs I'll just have to keep locking them and deleting the log entries. After a while they'll figure out that it is an abuse of the site features to do this.

From the Virtual Travel Bugs And Geocoins thread:

The idea of a Travel Bug is to physically move an object from cache to cache. If it is stolen or abused it does not mean that it can travel as a fake bug from cache to cache. That was never the point of Travel Bugs.

From the New Feature - Virtual Travel Bug List thread:

There are no such things as virtual travel bugs. There are Travel Bugs that you track their physical movements as they go from cache to cache and person to person. This is just a made-up term that was never a feature nor will it ever be.

From the Travel Bug Tracking -- A Call For More Features! thread:

This "virtual" travel bug nonsense is just a made up term to describe an abuse of the Travel Bug system.

[+Thot]

"virtual" coins and travel bugs were not the intent of the features of the site. They create an unusually large log entry list which causes unnecessary stress on the machines and on bandwidth. I have been locking these bugs and geocoins to stop this kind of activity.

As for virtual geocoins and travel bugs I'll just have to keep locking them and deleting the log entries. After a while they'll figure out that it is an abuse of the site features to do this.

The idea of a Travel Bug is to physically move an object from cache to cache. If it is stolen or abused it does not mean that it can travel as a fake bug from cache to cache. That was never the point of Travel Bugs.

There are no such things as virtual travel bugs. There are Travel Bugs that you track their physical movements as they go from cache to cache and person to person. This is just a made-up term that was never a feature nor will it ever be.

This "virtual" travel bug nonsense is just a made up term to describe an abuse of the Travel Bug system.

If Jeremy was so het up about this he should have jumped in when I posted my message to see if they were OK. He didn’t utter a peep about them being an ‘abuse of the website and travel bug’ or ‘not permitted’ when I got replies indicating they were legitimate. My purpose in posting was to see if they were OK and I got nothing back to suggest they weren’t and did get replies saying they were permitted.

 

There was no clue on this website they were not permitted, even given my post asking about virtual travel bugs. Had I known they were illegal I would never have created one. I thought there would be a lot of people who would enjoy it which obviously there were, as reflected by the number of people who had fun moving it.

 

Also, it was done willy-nilly. Some virtuals were trashed, others are still active.

 

Given there is no rule against virtual bugs, the existing ones should have been grandfathered. As a minimum common courtesy dictated a comment/note/explanation to the owners of these bugs before trashing them. Summarily throwing my work (and the work of others) away after the time and effort spent to make the images and build the HTML page for it, because his wife’s travel bug got screwed around with is, well . . . hubris. [Hubris, noun (Greek): a reckless disregard for the personal space of other people coupled with lack of control over one's own impulses]

 

What happened to his wife was clearly an illegitimate abuse of the travel bug system, but it has little to do with virtual bugs and, I submit, banning virtual bugs will not and cannot prevent similar abuses in the future.

[+The Leprechauns]

If Jeremy was so het up about this he should have jumped in when I posted my message to see if they were OK. He didn’t utter a peep about them being an ‘abuse of the website and travel bug’ or ‘not permitted’ when I got replies indicating they were legitimate. My purpose in posting was to see if they were OK and I got nothing back to suggest they weren’t and did get replies saying they were permitted.

 

There was no clue on this website they were not permitted, even given my post asking about virtual travel bugs. Had I known they were illegal I would never have created one. I thought there would be a lot of people who would enjoy it which obviously there were, as reflected by the number of people who had fun moving it.

 

Also, it was done willy-nilly. Some virtuals were trashed, others are still active.

 

Given there is no rule against virtual bugs, the existing ones should have been grandfathered. As a minimum common courtesy dictated a comment/note/explanation to the owners of these bugs before trashing them. Summarily throwing my work (and the work of others) away after the time and effort spent to make the images and build the HTML page for it, because his wife’s travel bug got screwed around with is, well . . . hubris. [Hubris, noun (Greek): a reckless disregard for the personal space of other people coupled with lack of control over one's own impulses]

 

What happened to his wife was clearly an illegitimate abuse of the travel bug system, but it has little to do with virtual bugs and, I submit, banning virtual bugs will not and cannot prevent similar abuses in the future.

Jeremy doesn't follow the travel bug forum.

 

There is precedent for locking down virtual travel bugs and even banning user accounts for travel bug abuses, going back several years. It's just that everyone's noticing the recent crackdown due to the change in the volume of virtual traveler activity.

[+the hermit crabs]

There was no clue on this website they were not permitted

...

Given there is no rule against virtual bugs, the existing ones should have been grandfathered.  As a minimum common courtesy dictated a comment/note/explanation to the owners of these bugs before trashing them. 

Jeremy's take on this was in one of links above. There was no need for a specific rule against virtual TBs, because a TB is as an object that moves from cache to cache or person to person. By definition, anything that doesn't fit that description isn't a travel bug, and doesn't need a specific rule to to say that it isn't.

 

It only seams fair to me that because it was not made fully clear that this activity was taboo that the team at GC.com allow the Virtual TB and Virtual Coin holders to take these coins/TB's back into our control so that we can play the game the way you intend.

 

It is odd that GC.com did not see if fit to hand out a warning to each owner that the bugs/coins will be disabled

If you actually plan to release the Geocoin we would be happy to set that up for you to restart it on its real journey.

 

Keep in mind, however, that I am not doing this because we "didn't hand out a warning". That would be a moot point after the fact, no pun intended. There was no reason to have a rule in place to say that fake logging wasn't allowed either. A "virtual" travel bug or geocoin is some manufactured term we never used here. Since the intent was to actually map a physical move in the real world we thought that the point of a Travel Bug or Geocoin was pretty clear.

[+Thot]

There was no clue on this website they were not permitted

...

Given there is no rule against virtual bugs, the existing ones should have been grandfathered.  As a minimum common courtesy dictated a comment/note/explanation to the owners of these bugs before trashing them. 

Jeremy's take on this was in one of links above.

All those quotes are recent -- made long after my bug was released.