Ftf Claimed The Cache Owner? How Does This Work?

June 2, 2006

I just bag a micro cache, after work and on the way home from the office, where I thought I was the FTF. This is a newly released cache and when I looked at it earlier in the working day (I know, I should be working, not surfing the GC website .. but I was jonesing) there where no logged finds against the cache.

However, when I returned home to log the cache find on the GC website, I found the owner of the cache had claimed the FTF in the cache's website "logged visits". It isn't a big deal to me, I just enjoy the high of caching. Besides, a local "well known" cacher was there before me earlier in the day ... she signed the cache log but didn't log the find on the website.

My question is ... do you feel this is ethical to claim your own cache as a FTF after the local reviewer has released the cache into the wild?

11.3k · June 2, 2006

Judging from all the recent discussions in the Forums, and this experience you just encountered, I'm beginning to believe "Ethical Caching" is an oxymoron . . . :laughing:

20.7k · June 2, 2006

I'm thinking 'newbie mistake'.

June 2, 2006

Looks like his son was not available to FTF, so he did it himself :laughing:

5.3k · June 2, 2006

May 31 by OWNER (## found)

FTF -- EEK!! good hide! Be sure to replace the lid so it's level, else the container will be extremely difficult to open. TFTC!!

????? :laughing:

5.3k · June 2, 2006

Did they take the FTF prize :laughing:

But really, we had a noobie doing the same thing a while ago, whenever they hid a cache they claimed the FTF. My guess is that they do not know any better, besides anyone the sees that the person that hid the cache and the person that is claiming FTF will not pay any give the fake FTF any real consideration. I would just add

"the real FTF" at the end of the log.

3.1k · June 2, 2006

It looks like the owners daughter gets all the FTF's on the caches hidden by that owner. So maybe on that one cache the parents account was signed in instead of the daughters, when they logged.

June 2, 2006

Wow, sure enough they claimed FTF on their own cache! Even if it was a family member and not the actual hider I'd still say it's pretty lame. FTF should be reserved for someone completely seperate from you or your family.

The only time I've even claimed a find on one of my own (actually daughter's) caches is after we had to go look for it for the third time. Muggles kept relocating it, sometimes as far as 200-300 feet away. After the third time we figured we'd earned a smilie.

June 2, 2006

May 31 by OWNER (## found)

FTF -- EEK!! good hide! Be sure to replace the lid so it's level, else the container will be extremely difficult to open. TFTC!!

?????

WOW, now that is darn right scary. Do you work for the NAS or just a good Moderator? Does the all knowing Subservient Chicken see all?

The "EEK" was due to the fact there was a rubber bug in the cache container and, by this newbie's limited experience, it was a "good hide".

20.7k · June 2, 2006

Wow, sure enough they claimed FTF on their own cache! Even if it was a family member and not the actual hider I'd still say it's pretty lame. FTF should be reserved for someone completely seperate from you or your family.

The only time I've even claimed a find on one of my own (actually daughter's) caches is after we had to go look for it for the third time. Muggles kept relocating it, sometimes as far as 200-300 feet away. After the third time we figured we'd earned a smilie.

On the other hand, if its a young daughter finding it (for real), I don't have a big problem with it. The person who finds it next knows knows that it is a FTF.

1.5k · June 2, 2006

I know of one situation where the mom hid the cache, son posted FTF on the cache page and the name was never in the logbook

June 2, 2006

Will GC.com even allow you to claim your own cache as a find? That person must be hard up to get there number of finds up, if that is the case ever time I go out and do some cache maintence I should be able to claim it as a find.

June 2, 2006

As an "owner" of a cache, I never log a find on it (what sense does that make?). Likewise, anyone who helps in the hiding generally can't claim the find if they participated in and know the final hide location from the outset (at that point you're a co-owner) -- although if you're along for the hide but not able to see where it was hidden because you stayed in the car, etc., you can still find it later. I also use some folks to "test drive" a find before it's released -- but ask that they not claim it until it's been out for a week or at least three people have found it.

1.9k · June 2, 2006

At least he was nice enough to thank himself for the hide.

2.6k · June 2, 2006

Only got one thing to say about this..... WHAT THE @#$@!!!

2.8k · June 2, 2006

Will GC.com even allow you to claim your own cache as a find? That person must be hard up to get there number of finds up, if that is the case ever time I go out and do some cache maintence I should be able to claim it as a find.

Yes, GC.com will technically allow you to claim a find on your own cache. I've done it myself accidentally when posting a note to drop a bug, and selected "found it" by mistake. I of course quickly corrected it.

10.2k · June 2, 2006

It looks like the owners daughter gets all the FTF's on the caches hidden by that owner. So maybe on that one cache the parents account was signed in instead of the daughters, when they logged.

Ding ding ding, we have a winner. Not a big deal in this case, sort of comical. Not that I haven't seen "geo-pals" of cache hiders who were given cache coordinates before approval claim to be the legimate FTF. But that's a whole 'nuther thread.

2.6k · June 2, 2006

It looks like the owners daughter gets all the FTF's on the caches hidden by that owner. So maybe on that one cache the parents account was signed in instead of the daughters, when they logged.

Ding ding ding, we have a winner. Not a big deal in this case, sort of comical. Not that I haven't seen "geo-pals" of cache hiders who were given cache coordinates before approval claim to be the legimate FTF. But that's a whole 'nuther thread.

I reiterate.... WHAT THE @^#$

10.2k · June 2, 2006

May 31 by OWNER (## found)

FTF -- EEK!! good hide! Be sure to replace the lid so it's level, else the container will be extremely difficult to open. TFTC!!

?????

By the freakng way. Is it just me, or are all these hides by username "dazon" with FTF's by a relative just in front of people's houses in residential neighborhoods? I think I need to go into self-imposed exile from the forums again

Edited June 2, 2006 by TheWhiteUrkel

1.4k · June 2, 2006

No need for exile or angst for me. Try mockery.

2k · June 2, 2006

Time to scurry back to the Off-Topic side.

More fun. Less angst.

June 2, 2006

I just laugh and let them fool themselves. I curently have 15 caches I take care of. 13 are in locations my son chose. I technicly own them and placed the I don't log them. My son scouted the location and knows the container I won't let him log them. Just as a gag I like to DNF my own cache's when I check on them.

June 2, 2006

Will GC.com even allow you to claim your own cache as a find? That person must be hard up to get there number of finds up, if that is the case ever time I go out and do some cache maintence I should be able to claim it as a find.

I "found" the one I adopted lol. So while yes, I do own it, I had to find it first.

June 2, 2006

I hide mine so well, I can't find them....

38.2k · June 2, 2006

Anybody can "claim" a FTF, but only one person (or team) can be a FTF. That would be the first person who found the cache AFTER it was hidden. The owner can claim whatever he wants, but he isn't the FTF.

2.3k · June 2, 2006

Why does my avatar say...oh, never mind.

June 2, 2006

I thought the general consensus is that numbers don't matter, FTF doesn't matter (after all, competing for FTF would make this family friendly game "competitive"), and nothing related to geocaching really matters except the hunt and possibly not defacing the container.

I don't understand why anybody cares. After all, it's just a game. Let them play the way they want. If they want to log 20,000 FTF logs on their own cache, it's allowed, and will just be put off as "Hey, that's how they want to play, so go find some caches and quit whining."

[/sarcasm]

Edited June 2, 2006 by ThePropers

10.2k · June 2, 2006

No need for exile or angst for me. Try mockery.

Now mockery isn't nice! Besides, even in my own opinion, I've already done that So yeah, what you have here is someone claiming FTF's on a relatives caches (not just the one in question, but all four caches placed by that relative), with obvious "inside information" before the caches were published. Obviously the claimed FTF that sparked this thread was mistakenly logged on the wrong account, the cache owner's. This happens all the time, everywhere. The claimed FTF'er is only fooling themselves, who cares how they play. The OP knows they are the legitimate FTF. I myself have been the legiitimate FTF "victim", for lack of a better term, twice on caches hundreds of miles apart in two different states. I choose to say nothing about it in my logs. No sense creating angst on a cache page. That's what the forums are for

Edited June 2, 2006 by TheWhiteUrkel

June 8, 2006

wasn't logging one's own find part of the Dallas Record Run?

3.9k · June 8, 2006

I just bag a micro cache, after work and on the way home from the office, where I thought I was the FTF. This is a newly released cache and when I looked at it earlier in the working day (I know, I should be working, not surfing the GC website .. but I was jonesing) there where no logged finds against the cache.

However, when I returned home to log the cache find on the GC website, I found the owner of the cache had claimed the FTF in the cache's website "logged visits". It isn't a big deal to me, I just enjoy the high of caching. Besides, a local "well known" cacher was there before me earlier in the day ... she signed the cache log but didn't log the find on the website.

My question is ... do you feel this is ethical to claim your own cache as a FTF after the local reviewer has released the cache into the wild?

This is extremely bizarre and unusual, and it certainly is not the norm. I suspect that the owner meant to file a log "Note" and accidentally filed it as a "Find" instead; hopefully he or she will notice this mistake and correct it soon. On the other hand, perhaps the owner had been at GW4 and had attended a class on "How to Inflate Your Find Count", and you are now seeing the fruits of his/her studies!

June 8, 2006

Just as a gag I like to DNF my own cache's when I check on them.

Please don't. Gauging cache suitability (for me, that is) by number of recent DNFs is a big part of my pre-caching prep work.

(Not likely that I'll ever go near any of your caches, but still ... others might be doing the same.)

June 8, 2006

I've seen owners log FTF or Find on their own caches, just to boost numbers. Whatever. Like said in an older thread, "posting a find on your own cache is like congratulating yourself for remembering where you parked your car at the mall," or something like that.

June 8, 2006

The log has been changed to a different account.

It appears that the finder is the daughter of the hider, she has got FTF on all 5 of the hider's caches to date.

Looking at some of her other logs, it appears that they are seperate people, and they don't go together to cache.

My guess is that she found it on her own, but probably knew when it was going to be published and was ready. I think she had basically a legitamite FTF (with a little head start from knowing it was coming up) and accidetally logged it on the wrong account.

June 8, 2006

"....... is like congratulating yourself for remembering where you parked your car at the mall,"

I do this all the time. I forget to mark my parking spot on my GPS and I can be hunting for hours. Have you seen the size of some of those Super WalMart parking lots?????

June 8, 2006

I've seen owners log FTF or Find on their own caches, just to boost numbers. Whatever. Like said in an older thread, "posting a find on your own cache is like congratulating yourself for remembering where you parked your car at the mall," or something like that.

Hey now, sometimes I think I DESERVE a smiley for finding my car at the mall

Ftf Claimed The Cache Owner? How Does This Work?

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