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Feature request Pocket Quereys


dan-da-man

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Here is a workaround (assumes you run gsak, others don't have to)...

 

Have everyone give you their "MyFinds" query (either from here or from a gsak filter of their data).

 

In GSAK:

Clear all userflags

Import everyones "MyFinds" query (as long as you have your userID set correctly it won't flag their finds as your finds)

Now filter on whats NOT checked.

 

There ya go...

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Here is a workaround (assumes you run gsak, others don't have to)...

 

Have everyone give you their "MyFinds" query (either from here or from a gsak filter of their data).

 

In GSAK:

Clear all userflags

Import everyones "MyFinds" query (as long as you have your userID set correctly it won't flag their finds as your finds)

Now filter on whats NOT checked.

 

There ya go...

If you're going to recommend violations of the site's terms of use, perhaps you might do so in a place other than the Geocaching.com website forum? Thanks.

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Here is a workaround (assumes you run gsak, others don't have to)...

 

Have everyone give you their "MyFinds" query (either from here or from a gsak filter of their data).

 

In GSAK:

Clear all userflags

Import everyones "MyFinds" query (as long as you have your userID set correctly it won't flag their finds as your finds)

Now filter on whats NOT checked.

 

There ya go...

If you're going to recommend violations of the site's terms of use, perhaps you might do so in a place other than the Geocaching.com website forum? Thanks.

How is this a violation?? Please explain...

 

This issue (I assume your talking about the "sharing" of PQ's) has come up before and it has been shown that it is NOT a violation among premium members with the current wording..

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Assuming you have been collecting the logs for the same time frame your buddy has been caching in GSAK - I am fairly certain you could do a filter directly in GSAK with your own "my finds" PQ and accomplish the same thing.

Problem is its not unusual for a cache to get more than 5 logs in a weekend, and some people don't pull their PQ's every day. I've seen caches (not events, where the problem is worse) get more than a dozen hits in a day, so unless you were alert to this and grabbed the individual .gpx off the cache page (which still limits to 20 logs) you have a very high potential to miss logs.

 

This would be a real hit and miss.

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Putting caches on a "to-do" list using the shared bookmark list feature is a nice alternative to the transfer of pocket query files among users. Use of pocket query files is subject to the waypoint license agreement.

 

· Licensee shall not sell, rent, lease, sublicense, lend, assign, time-share, or transfer, in whole or in part, or provide unlicensed third parties access to the Data, Related Materials, any updates, or Licensee's rights under this Agreement.

· Licensee shall not reverse engineer, decompile, or disassemble the Groundspeak-compatible data format(s) in an attempt to duplicate the proprietary and copyright-protected Groundspeak data model(s) and/or export format(s).

· Licensee shall not remarket, resell, and/or redistribute the Data or any derived portion(s) of the Data in its digital form to unlicensed third parties.

 

Can't share with "Unlicensed", but no restrictions against sharing with other licensed users...

 

But this still leaves the question of gc having the legal right to even limit the data to start with as it is NOT their data to license or distribute, it belongs to the owners of the cache, not gc.

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Just go through their finds and download the LOC files. No question whether that's a TOU violation.

That sounds like data scraping to me, which is clearly a TOU violation.. Mass/Bulk collection by visiting lots of individual pages...

 

Just think if someone has over 1000 finds, each page shows 20, thats more than 50 pages that you have to visit, then check, then download... Now repeat for two or three friends that are going hunting with you... and were complaining the site is slow now??? imagine a couple hundred people doing this on friday night so they can get ready for the weekend...

 

Your asking me to scrape a lot of pages...

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Can't share with "Unlicensed", but no restrictions against sharing with other licensed users...

 

But this still leaves the question of gc having the legal right to even limit the data to start with as it is NOT their data to license or distribute, it belongs to the owners of the cache, not gc.

I think you should table your second argument if you want this to work out well for you. Otherwise, why don't you shoot an email to the contact@ address to see if TPTB agree with your analysis. I suspect that you are correct.

 

Just be really careful that the data doesn't get shared with non-PMs.

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Here is a workaround (assumes you run gsak, others don't have to)...

 

Have everyone give you their "MyFinds" query (either from here or from a gsak filter of their data).

 

In GSAK:

Clear all userflags

Import everyones "MyFinds" query (as long as you have your userID set correctly it won't flag their finds as your finds)

Now filter on whats NOT checked.

 

There ya go...

If you're going to recommend violations of the site's terms of use, perhaps you might do so in a place other than the Geocaching.com website forum? Thanks.

 

I'm haven't a clue how this request is vialating any TOU agreement. All I would be getting by my idea is a querey of caches that 2 or 3 people havent found. Could you please explain.

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Why don't you shoot an email to the contact@ address to see if TPTB agree with your analysis. I suspect that you are correct.

 

I did try to get an answer about this directly from them about two or three months ago... No Reply... Plus I've posted this same thing here in the forums before, which we all know that Jeremy and others follow (at least until recently, they've been pretty quiet recently) with no response from them.

 

Just be really careful that the data doesn't get shared with non-PMs.

Actually, this is also a grey area (the thing that initially made me want to contact gc for an "official" statement of their feelings. PM's and non-PM's (regular users with an account, but not paying) are forced to agree to the same statement. So, no where does it say that a licensee is a PM, and since same agreement is forced onto both PM and non-PM, it could be inferred that licensee is anyone with an account.

 

Also, looking at this how do you address husband/wife parent/children, or other combinations of teams where only one is a PM, and the others just want to track their logging separately? Can my wife (who's not a PM) touch my gps receiver since I loaded it up with a PQ generated under my PM account??

 

I think you should table your second argument if you want this to work out well for you.

Its been brought up before (here in forums and privately) that the data is NOT an "original work" of gc (its the original work of the cache owner, and his/her data as such). GC is only reporting/repeating the data as a service to users. Also no where does GC request/inform the cache owner that they are turning over rights of the "original work" to GC. GC has never responded to this (in forums or privately). All of this means that GC has no rights to limit the distribution of the data (now any proprietary or anything else that they may add to the data they may have a legal right to limit, but PQ's just don't consist of any data not originated by the cache owner, or cache seekers, which again, seeker logs are "original works" of the seekers, not GC).

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"Scraping" indicates some form of bot to do the work. Do you think that Geocaching.com would have a problem with you opening up each individual resulting 20 pages, manually clicking the "check all" and manually clicking the "download"?

 

I don't.

Although "Scraping" is typically done in an automated (robot) fashion, the word scraping strictly means (in the web world) mass collection of data by visiting multiple related pages (ie, clicking next, collecting data, clicking next, etc)

 

I also think the website would choke up before I could do this for all the different people I may cache with... But thats a separate thread...

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... Its been brought up before (here in forums and privately) that the data is NOT an "original work" of gc (its the original work of the cache owner, and his/her data as such). GC is only reporting/repeating the data as a service to users. Also no where does GC request/inform the cache owner that they are turning over rights of the "original work" to GC. GC has never responded to this (in forums or privately). All of this means that GC has no rights to limit the distribution of the data (now any proprietary or anything else that they may add to the data they may have a legal right to limit, but PQ's just don't consist of any data not originated by the cache owner, or cache seekers, which again, seeker logs are "original works" of the seekers, not GC).
You are correct. The verbiage is the property of the author. However, the sorting, spindling, packaging, etc that returns it in a GPX file is Groundspeak's work.

 

I don't understand why you believe that it is OK to share the data with non-PMs. While it is true that TPTB generally turn a blind eye to information exchange within a household, one should not interpret that to mean that the data can be shared willy nilly.

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Putting caches on a "to-do" list using the shared bookmark list feature is a nice alternative to the transfer of pocket query files among users. Use of pocket query files is subject to the waypoint license agreement.

 

· Licensee shall not sell, rent, lease, sublicense, lend, assign, time-share, or transfer, in whole or in part, or provide unlicensed third parties access to the Data, Related Materials, any updates, or Licensee's rights under this Agreement.

· Licensee shall not reverse engineer, decompile, or disassemble the Groundspeak-compatible data format(s) in an attempt to duplicate the proprietary and copyright-protected Groundspeak data model(s) and/or export format(s).

· Licensee shall not remarket, resell, and/or redistribute the Data or any derived portion(s) of the Data in its digital form to unlicensed third parties.

 

Can't share with "Unlicensed", but no restrictions against sharing with other licensed users...

 

But this still leaves the question of gc having the legal right to even limit the data to start with as it is NOT their data to license or distribute, it belongs to the owners of the cache, not gc.

Just playing devil's advocate here, I'm no lawyer (though I would tend to agree with the opinion of the one posting in this thread) but lets move your colors around a little, shall we?

· Licensee shall not sell, rent, lease, sublicense, lend, assign, time-share, or transfer, in whole or in part, or provide unlicensed third parties access to the Data, Related Materials, any updates, or Licensee's rights under this Agreement.

· Licensee shall not reverse engineer, decompile, or disassemble the Groundspeak-compatible data format(s) in an attempt to duplicate the proprietary and copyright-protected Groundspeak data model(s) and/or export format(s).

· Licensee shall not remarket, resell, and/or redistribute the Data or any derived portion(s) of the Data in its digital form to unlicensed third parties.

By only looking at certain parts instead of the whole you are not getting the true meaning.

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By only looking at certain parts instead of the whole you are not getting the true meaning.

Generally if there is more than one OR in a phrase, its looked at as more of a separator and not a hard condition. This could be argued that way quite easily.

 

Also, to break it down further:

 

sell, rent, lease, sublicense, lend

all imply giving away for profit or other gain, clearly not the case for "comparing finds"

 

assign

implies ownership (which neither GC is asserting, nor the PQ user, can you assign ownership of something you don't own to start with??)

 

time-share

again, profit

 

or transfer

again, ownership

 

So your not breaking any provision of the statement anyway, even if you look at the OR's favorably.

 

GC has still also never asserted that it's their "original work", but even if they claimed original work on the .gpx as a whole (ignoring the data inside), thats easily fixed when the data is imported into gsak, and gsak then does an export for someone else. GC does not own, nor were they the first to use .gpx format. Although certain extensions to the format of a gpx file they may lay claim to, then they need to go after programs that generate those extensions, not the data within the extension.

 

I still have not heard ANYONE dispute the "original works" statement, except to claim the format of the data, which at best is grey.

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Based on the fact that there seems to be some confusion regarding the scope and limitations of the Waypoint License Agreement, in the interest of further clarifying Groundspeak's position, the relevant text has been changed to read as follows:

 

"• Licensee shall not sell, rent, lease, sublicense, lend, assign, time-share, or transfer, in whole or in part, or provide access to the Data, Related Materials, any updates, or Licensee's rights under this Agreement to any third party whatsoever."

 

"• Licensee shall not remarket, resell, and/or redistribute the Data or any derived portion(s) of the Data in its digital form to any third party whatsoever."

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Problem solved.

Well, it clears up the legal question of PQ sharing, ...

Nope, actually doesn't.

 

Courts have consistently stated that you can't limit distribution of something thats not your original work to start with, or that you have not otherwise obtained the rights to.

 

So, this means if you download something that is an original work of GC's, they can impose limitations on distribution (say the monthly froggie calendars).

 

However, Cache descriptions, are the original works of the owners (and GC is not asserting rights when the cache is "listed") and logs are the the original works of the finders (again, GC not asserting rights when posted).

 

So as unfortunate as GC may see this, there is still a question of if GC even has the right to limit the data to start with. Unless they get the cache owners to hand over ownership, the answer is nope...

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Problem solved.

Well, it clears up the legal question of PQ sharing, but doesn't solve the problem raised in the OP.

 

I seem to remember reading about the site someday having a "group" capability (buddy list). Perhaps such a feature will include the ability for geocachers to easily generate lists of common unfound caches.

 

With the old license terms, I would argue that PMs could compare essentially the same PQs to determine caches that they all had not found when planning a cache outing, while they would not be allowed to split up an area among themselves and then put their PQs together to essentially get more data than each was entitled to under the license. With the new guidelines, it is no longer clear if I can share the decrypted hint in the field for a cache I have loaded in my PDA with a fellow cacher. :) Obviously, when someone tries to drive a truck through a loophole, they can ruin it for those that are just trying to get a bicycle through.

Edited by tozainamboku
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Problem solved.

Well, it clears up the legal question of PQ sharing, ...

Nope, actually doesn't.

 

Courts have consistently stated that you can't limit distribution of something thats not your original work to start with, or that you have not otherwise obtained the rights to.

 

So, this means if you download something that is an original work of GC's, they can impose limitations on distribution (say the monthly froggie calendars).

 

However, Cache descriptions, are the original works of the owners (and GC is not asserting rights when the cache is "listed") and logs are the the original works of the finders (again, GC not asserting rights when posted).

 

So as unfortunate as GC may see this, there is still a question of if GC even has the right to limit the data to start with. Unless they get the cache owners to hand over ownership, the answer is nope...

Except, every time you hide a cache you also agree to follow their terms of use. The actual cache description is the cache owner's original work, and stays with the owner. One of the things you agreed to when you submitted your cache is you give Groundspeak the rights to derivative works; which is what the PQs are.

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So as unfortunate as GC may see this, there is still a question of if GC even has the right to limit the data to start with. Unless they get the cache owners to hand over ownership, the answer is nope...

 

With all due respect, we disagree with your legal analysis. If, as it seems, you do not agree to the terms and conditions as stated in the Waypoint License Agreement, then we (Groundspeak) are unwilling to license the data to you. Consequently, if you continue to use the pocket query functionality on geocaching.com without fully agreeing to the terms as stated, we will have no choice but to restrict your access to geocaching.com.

 

Please feel free to contact me via PM and we will make a policy exception and refund your Premium Membership fee in its entirety.

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"• Licensee shall not sell, rent, lease, sublicense, lend, assign, time-share, or transfer, in whole or in part, or provide access to the Data, Related Materials, any updates, or Licensee's rights under this Agreement to any third party whatsoever."

 

So I can't tell even my wife the name of a cache, a description of a cache, or the coordinates of a cache if I'm reading off my PDA. That's exactly what you're saying. I am the licensee, she is a third party, telling her is a transfer and cache names, descriptions, and coordinates are data.

 

By the way, it would be great to get a query of caches that neither myself nor my caching buddies have found so that when we go caching together and only look for the caches that both of us can log as found.

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So as unfortunate as GC may see this, there is still a question of if GC even has the right to limit the data to start with. Unless they get the cache owners to hand over ownership, the answer is nope...

 

OK, let's take this one step at a time... (stop me when I make a mistake!)

 

- The data (logs, cache descriptions etc) is copyright the original authors, not Groundspeak

- A condition of using GC.com is that the users grants GC.com a licence to distribute this data

- If you contact all 40000+ cachers and negotiate a licence with each of them, that's perfectly legal (Groundspeak can't stop you, since it's not their data)

- You can even store it in a GPX file, since this is an open standard

- You may even be able to use the Groundspeak schema extensions in that GPX file (it's not clear - the last time I saw the question asked, Groundspeak initially suggested the extensions were public domain, but then appeared to retract this statement)

 

- Or alternatively, Groundspeak will sell you a licence to download the data from them. This is probably easier! :laughing:

 

I don't think Groundspeak are saying "we are the copyright holders and you can't have the file unless you pay us". Rather I think they're saying "we're licensed to redistribute our users' data; and, if you agree to our conditions, we're prepared to exercise this right and send you a file containing their data".

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So as unfortunate as GC may see this, there is still a question of if GC even has the right to limit the data to start with. Unless they get the cache owners to hand over ownership, the answer is nope...

 

OK, let's take this one step at a time... (stop me when I make a mistake!)

 

- The data (logs, cache descriptions etc) is copyright the original authors, not Groundspeak

- A condition of using GC.com is that the users grants GC.com a licence to distribute this data

 

Owner grants GC license to distribute the data, NOT the right to claim exclusive use...

 

I don't think Groundspeak are saying "we are the copyright holders and you can't have the file unless you pay us".

Its exactly what they are trying say.

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So as unfortunate as GC may see this, there is still a question of if GC even has the right to limit the data to start with. Unless they get the cache owners to hand over ownership, the answer is nope...

With all due respect, we disagree with your legal analysis.

With all due respect, I've been on both sides of this argument and in the courtroom with this issue (not gc.com, but rather ownership and distribution of non-owned data). I'm just stating what courts have consistently stated. And case law (something we depended on strongly) also consistently agrees.

 

For the record, I do only use the data personally.

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It would be great to get a querey of caches that niether myself of my caching buddy(s) have found so that when we go caching together we can only look for the caches that both of us can log as found. dan-da-man

INATN produces a stat that compares your finds with someone else's and displays the GC numbers and cache names of the finds as both an intersection and a union. With a little help from GSAK, you can take advantage of that and accomplish what you're looking for. Both you and your friend can use this with your own personally-generated PQs (INATN cannot generate a GPX file for you) and you don't need to swap data at all.

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Can it do multiple cachers? In otherwords, either an intersection or a union of up to 6, 7 or more cachers?

 

Edited to Add: I see that it it does. I got a php error though.

 

I think you can just re-run the GSAK macro with the "union-list" from the other cacher(s). As long as you don't clear the user flags it should continue to mark additional caches as "found by at least one person".

Edited by Stunod
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With all due respect, I've been on both sides of this argument and in the courtroom

Sorry, please help me out here, 'cos I must be being thick!...

 

You go into a shop and buy book -- it's a collection of short stories. Now, the individual writers hold the copyright to the stories but have each granted a non-exclusive licence to the publisher to include their stories in the collection. By analogy, you appear to be arguing that, because the publisher of the collection does not actually hold the copyright to any of the stories, they are not allowed to restrict duplication of their book, and that you can freely make copies of the stories (or even the whole book!) and give them to your friends. Despite the fact that none of the individual writers have granted you a licence to do so! If that really is what you're saying then, whilst IANAL, it sounds like nonsense to me!

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With all due respect, I've been on both sides of this argument and in the courtroom

Sorry, please help me out here, 'cos I must be being thick!...

 

You go into a shop and buy book -- it's a collection of short stories. Now, the individual writers hold the copyright to the stories but have each granted a non-exclusive licence to the publisher to include their stories in the collection. By analogy, you appear to be arguing that, because the publisher of the collection does not actually hold the copyright to any of the stories, they are not allowed to restrict duplication of their book, and that you can freely make copies of the stories (or even the whole book!) and give them to your friends. Despite the fact that none of the individual writers have granted you a licence to do so! If that really is what you're saying then, whilst IANAL, it sounds like nonsense to me!

 

No, your taking it out of context... I'm saying that it IS the owner (of either the cache or of the log), and NOT gc that has the rights to control the data (and its inferred, with or without an agreement in place, just by the act of posting that cache or log I give gc permission to distribute the data, but I have never given gc ownership or exclusive use of the data). My whole entire argument is that it IS the owners data. GC wants to infer that it is their data, and that they have exclusive control, when its not.

 

I as the owner of logs or caches (I currently don't have any caches, but would say the same if I did) own the logs or caches that I post here.

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I as the owner of logs or caches (I currently don't have any caches, but would say the same if I did) own the logs or caches that I post here.

Errr, yes. Clearly. When have you ever seen it suggested otherwise? Certainly not by Groundspeak!...

All comments, articles, tutorials, screenshots, pictures, graphics, tools, downloads, and all other materials submitted to Groundspeak in connection with the Site or available through the Site (collectively, “Submissions”) remain the property and copyright of the original author.

My point is that, as the copyright holder of my Submissions, I never gave anyone permission to copy them and send them to their friends! On registering on GC.com, I granted a non-exclusive licence to Groundspeak to re-distribute my works, but you have no such licence, so please cease and desist! :)

 

You seem almost to be viewing the whole body of cachers as a single legal entity who -- of course -- all share your views that their Submissions should be freely distributable amongst other users. Since you own your Submissions you, by implication, also own mine? Sorry, but no!

 

Actually, I personally agree wholeheartedly with your underlying wish for Groundspeak to be far more generous regarding the sub-licensing of their users' Submissions. But their lack of generosity does not give you the right to breach my copyright!!!

 

I'd be interesting to see the examples of case law you believe are applicable. Because, on the face of it, you don't seem to have a leg to stand on.

 

[Edit - Of course, if the "My Finds" query were only to contain an individual user's data -- and not the cache description for example -- the I'd be more inclined to support your argument that Groundspeak can't restrict distribution by that user. They would need to prove that the file was their own substantive work, and I believe that they could not (as always, IANAL!). However, as it stands, your "My Finds" query might contain my data, and the only redistribution licence I've agreed was with Groundspeak, not you.]

Edited by Teasel
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