Where's George...?

[+FireRef]

It was my understanding, when I looked at the Where's George website a long time ago, that placing and tracking bills through Geocaches was banned.

 

Now, reading the disclaimer link off of the "Resources" page at GC.com, it appears that it is now allowed, as long as the hider takes the bill and spends it, or places it into another cache, without any extra people getting to log it.

 

In other words, basically what you're supposed to do with travel bugs. Find them, move them, and log them. Not have everyone who you come into contact with - friends, family, etc, log them also.

 

Is this correct? Can we "legally" put WG bills in caches, and not get them (or ourselves) banned from WG.com?

 

Thanks!

 

FireRef

[Rocking Horse Ranch]

I love tracking Where's George bills! Looking forward to the answer here.

[+FireRef]

I love tracking Where's George bills! Looking forward to the answer here.

 

Well, I looked into it a while back, and if I remember, it was a pay service a long time ago. I looked into it again when I saw one around Christmas last, and decided to get into it. I have just over 1000 bills in there, and keep adding more almost daily. I just want to know if I can drop one or two in caches, along with my TB's here and there, and won't get in trouble for doing it.

[+CO Admin]

You should be asking the Where's George website if its ok. They were the ones that said it was not ok before. Groundspeak can not speak for the Where's George website.

[+FireRef]

You should be asking the Where's George website if its ok. They were the ones that said it was not ok before. Groundspeak can not speak for the Where's George website.

 

Probably true - but the reason I asked here is because the "Disclaimer link" from here went right to there... I wanted to see, since it did say they were working well together, if I was reading it right.

[+Team Teuton]

They're dollar bills. Do what you want with them.

[+Renegade Knight]

You should be asking the Where's George website if its ok. They were the ones that said it was not ok before. Groundspeak can not speak for the Where's George website.

 

Probably true - but the reason I asked here is because the "Disclaimer link" from here went right to there... I wanted to see, since it did say they were working well together, if I was reading it right.

Last word I heard was that the WG guy had thrown his hands up in disgust at dealing with us over here.

 

Since his goal is to track the natural circulation of a bill maybe he reconsidered somewhat and decided to recognize that bills move in and out of caches regardless of WG.com and just prevent the use as a free travel bug tracker which some people were doing.

 

Either way what you post is news to me.

Edited March 19, 2007 by Renegade Knight

[+MREAGLEWO1]

He should look at it as a good thing for them being in caches because everytime someone logs the bill in, there are advertisements on their site that gives commission to the web site i assume. so more hits the better probably.

 

Also, when was it ever a pay service?

[+niffir]

There are quite a few of us cachers who are active georgers as well. I have been georging since 2001 and caching since 2002. Only 101 caches found and closing in on 15,000 bills entered, so I am much more of an active georger than cacher.

 

Anyway.... Yes, the goal of wheresgeorge is to track the natural circulation of your bills. Hank (the creator of the wheresgeorge website) struggled for a while with what to do with wheresgeorge bills that were placed in geocaches. There wouldn't be too much of a problem if geo-georgers (participants in both hobbies) were just placing bills in caches that they found and then those bills were being spent by the person who took them back out of the cache. The big problem was that cachers were familiar with the idea of tracking things with unique serial numbers -- travel bugs-- and then placing them in other caches. So lots of bills that were either placed into caches by geo-georgers or that were found by cachers in natural circulation and then placed in a cache were suddenly turning into travel bugs. Those bills might quickly rack up 5 or 10 or more hits on them just from being passed on from cache to cache. So those geocaching bills were starting to appear in the lists of the top hit and top traveling bills on wheresgeorge.

 

But lots of georgers weren't too happy about those "artificial" hits on bills. We aren't allowed to just send bills to people to enter-- hits on our bills are to come from natural circulation of our money. So why were these bills being passed around among a group of cachers suddenly allowed to appear on the Top 10 lists on the website. They just didn't fit in with the natural circulation rules of the site.

 

Rather than ban geocaching bills totally, Hank came up with the solution of flagging geocaching bills in the system so that they would be classified seperately from regular bills. People can report a bill as being a geocaching bill, or the system can pick up on it if any of the notes associated with the bill mention geocaching. Those bills are perfectly "legal" in the georging world, but they simply aren't eligible for inclusion in the Top 10 lists on the site.

 

Oh...and just like geocaching, wheresgeorge is and has always been a free site. Also like geocaching, wheresgeorge has a premium membership available that provides extras like the removal of ads, extra data about the bills, and access to extra refreshes of a user's data. But there is no fee to use the site, and you can even enter wheresgeorge bills that you find without registering for an account. You just won't be notified if they get entered again unless you have the bills logged into your wheresgeorge account.

 

I'll go search my bills and find a couple of my geocaching bills to show you how they get flagged by the system.

[+Renegade Knight]

...Also, when was it ever a pay service?

Sorry for the confusion.

 

WG.com is free. Travel bugs on this site cost money. Thus using WG.com to track a bill in and out of caches was a way to track the movement of something for free.

[+niffir]

Uggg...midnight is database update time, so am having delays finding some nice links for you to my geocaching bills. In the meantime, here is the official word on the subject from Hank (found at http://www.wheresgeorge.com/wrapper.php?page=top10bills_dgc if you want to see it for yourself).

 

---

Rules for using Where's George? with Geocaching

Greetings Where's George?/Geocache User.

 

If you are interested in using Where's George? with Geocaching, please read this page.

 

Geocaching.com allows (and even encourages) friends and family

to place and remove Travel Bugs from Geocaches and log each as a separate

event along the way for the Travel Bug. When a family is involved, this can

cause multiple events or logs of the Travel Bug in a very short period of time.

While this is fine for most Travel Bugs, it presents a serious problem for

Where's George? bills placed in Geocaches as Travel Bugs or hitchikers.

 

The general rules of this site (available here) specifically prohibit trading

or exchanging bills with friends, family or anyone known to the bill distributor.

This rule is to encourage "natural circulation" of the currency, and to prevent multiple

"fake hits" from happening on any bill. Afterall, the purpose of Where's George? is to

track the manner in which currency naturally circulates throughout the country and the

world. Allowing people to arbitrarily enter multiple hits to track that a bill was

traded among a circle of friends and family defeats the entire purpose of this site.

In reality, nobody really needs Where's George? to track that they traded some

bills with friends/family.

 

When it comes to Where's George? bills being used as Travel Bugs, this rule

conflicts with the Geocache site which allows such exchanging and logging of Travel Bugs.

Therefore, if you are going to use Where's George? bills as Travel Bugs or in any Geocache,

the rules posted below now apply.

 

In addition, it is apparent that the existence of the "Top 10 Geocache Bills" report

had created competition to get the top bill listed. As it is trivial to log entries

of a bill and make any bill the "Top #1 Bill", the existence of this report was causing

several bills to be hit repeatedly in violation of the general rules of the site.

This is not the purpose of this site, and the report has been removed to prevent the

site from being abused in this manner.

 

In the future, if this site is abused for this or similar purposes, all Geocache

bills will be removed from this site. I do not want this to happen as there is great synergy

between the sites, so please follow the rules and keep this site "Geocache Friendly".

 

Thank you.

 

----

 

#1 Natural Circulation of bills in a Geocache

The purpose of Where's George? is to track the natural and geographic circulation of currency. This means that any bills you enter should be spent by you in the normal course of everyday life. Giving bills to friends, relatives and/or associates for the purpose of re-entry into the website or simply exchanging any bill though any Geocache violates the whole premise of Where's George?. After you have logged any Where's George? bill you have found in a Geocache, you can either spend it normally or place it in another Geocache. You can not, however, allow any friends, family, or other known Geocachers remove the bill to generate their own entry on the bill. If subsequently found, it must be found by a Geocacher unknown to the previous Geocacher who placed the bill in the Geocache. In general, the Where's George? definition of natural and geographic circulation is spending your cash in the course of any normal transaction with any unknown person/entity.

 

#2 Bill Marking

Where's George? does not encourage the defacement of U.S. Currency. If you choose to mark your bills, do so in a reasonable and prudent manner. Please see the FAQ page for the legal details, but remember, the bill must not be "unfit to be re-issued." If you deface the bills in such a manner that does render the bills unfit to be re-issued," you may violate the law.

 

#3 Usage of Bills in Geocaches

Only real, actual U.S. dollar bills can be used as Travel Bugs in Geocaches if they are to be logged on this site. Photocopies or other duplicates of bills will not be allowed and any instances of this will be deleted and blocked from entry. Once any bill has been found in a Geocache, it is marked as such on this site and is removed from the summarizations and other Top 10 reports found on this site. Once a bill is tagged as a "Geocache Bill", it will not be untagged as such, even if it is returned to normal circulation.

 

#4 Hit Validation

The Where's George? management reserves the sole right to delete or otherwise edit bills and/or hits that it deems violates any or all of these guidelines. Our decision is final and once hits are deleted they will not be reinstated.

 

#5 Abuse/User Account Termination

Any Where's George? user that abuses this website by entering fake bills, generating fake hits, or entering bills that they don't personally have possession of at the time and place (zip code) of entry, at the sole discretion of the Where's George? Management, can be totally removed from the system without warning. Geocachers who intentionally exchange Travel Bugs or Where's George? in and out of Geocaches to generate hits risk having their accounts terminated.

[+Cardinal Red]

Groundspeak Profile Of Hank Eskin

No information in the profile but you can follow the link to all his posts on this forum.

 

Hanks first post.

 

Hank Eskin is the owner of the Where's George? websit. He created the profile to explain to Geocachers why our participation on his site was not the "natural and geographic circulation of currency". Interesting reading.

 

Note: After reading the post by niffir, that matches very well with what Hank has been posting here.

[+niffir]

Ok...was able to get some bill reports.

 

Here is a bill that I found in a cache in New Orleans that was placed there by a fellow geo-georger. I believe this bill find predated the geocaching rules being set up on wheresgeorge, and I believe I self-reported this bill as a caching bill back when the caching rules were implemented. In case anyone was curious-- Hank now says that you don't really need to bother to self-report the bills unless they rack up several hits.

 

http://www.wheresgeorge.com/report.php?key...9d&entcnt=0

 

And here's a bill that has been incorrectly flagged by the system as being a geocaching bill. A friend (who is a helper on the site) has told me that it becomes an issue with any bills that are wrongly flagged, I can have the incorrect flagging removed. I know that this bill, for example, was not spent in connection with my caching because I wasn't able to go caching until a week later due to that storm mentioned in the note.

 

http://www.wheresgeorge.com/report.php?key...ed&entcnt=0

[+briansnat]

There was never a ban of georges in geocaches. WG.com started flagging bills that moved from geocache to geocache as geocache bills so they didn't appear in top 10 lists. I can see this, as it would artifically inflate the hits on the bill.

 

But they also flag any bill that has ever appeared in a geocache. People have been placing money in caches since the beginning. If money is placed in a geocache then that IS the natural circulation of the money.

 

I once found a bill in my change and wrote in the note that "This is the first bill I ever found outside of a geocache" and it was flagged as a geocaching bill. That is just silly, as is flagging any bill that ever appeared in a geocache.

[Trinity's Crew]

Well I wasn't aware of these rules when I posted a note on a Where's George? bill that I received as change. I mentioned that I was considering putting it into a geocache. I wound up spending it but my mention of the word "geocache" tagged that bill as a "Geocaching" bill. I felt like a heel. I assume the tracker of the bill was able to get the geocaching "stigma" removed, but I still felt bad. I haven't logged a bill since, and I don't plan to in the future.

 

Edit: Briansnat beat me to it.

Edited March 19, 2007 by Trinity's Crew

[+FireRef]

Thanks to everyone who responded to my question. I found the link, but was a little confused as to how it worked. I don't know why I remember it as a pay site, but maybe it had something to do with reading about the premium membership - if I understood that back then, I probably would have continued to play rather than waiting until a few months ago.

 

The only thing I found by reading on the WG forums, in addition to what was posted here, was that a lot of the WG participants who are not geocachers would prefer that their bills don't get put into caches - they don't want to lose the ability for their bills to make the top ten lists, which is the only restriction placed on bills which are placed in caches. It can be circumvented if the bill is erraneously listed as a GC bill, but it appeared that the serious WG people would prefer to avoid it all together.

 

Thanks for all the info!

[Trinity's Crew]

<snip>

It can be circumvented if the bill is erraneously listed as a GC bill, but it appeared that the serious WG people would prefer to avoid it all together.

 

I will do my part to keep the peace by continuing to ignore any and all WG? bills that come into my possesion.

[+team moxiepup]

I had a bill get "marked" once. Since then, I usually just put a note something like this...

 

"Found this bill in the middle of the woods at the Bayview Estuary preserve" Usually followed by a winky face

Geocachers know where I got it, yet it shouldn't end up as "marked".

 

For the record, I usually spend WG dollars I find, and only occaisionally place ones I've started in caches.

[Trinity's Crew]

I had a bill get "marked" once. Since then, I usually just put a note something like this...

 

"Found this bill in the middle of the woods at the Bayview Estuary preserve" Usually followed by a winky face

Geocachers know where I got it, yet it shouldn't end up as "marked".

 

For the record, I usually spend WG dollars I find, and only occaisionally place ones I've started in caches.

 

Here I am preaching from my soap box about how snarky the WG? website is about excluding a $bill from being eligible for the "Top 10" list at the mere mention of the word "geocache" in the log, and you have to spoil it with a perfectly legitimate (and kinda fun) way to circumvent the WG? system.

 

Now I have to decide whether to spite the trackers or the tracking site.

 

Actually, you're right. I should still log WG? bills. I'll just be more descriptive in my logs to avoid the issues of mentioning "we who must not be named". Thanks for the perspective.

Edited March 19, 2007 by Trinity's Crew

[+tozainamboku]

I once found a bill in my change and wrote in the note that "This is the first bill I ever found outside of a geocache" and it was flagged as a geocaching bill. That is just silly, as is flagging any bill that ever appeared in a geocache.

I once got a Where's George bill as change when I paid for my pizza at a Geocaching event. I think I wrote that in the note. Ya think that one got flagged too?

Edited March 19, 2007 by tozainamboku

[Trinity's Crew]

I once found a bill in my change and wrote in the note that "This is the first bill I ever found outside of a geocache" and it was flagged as a geocaching bill. That is just silly, as is flagging any bill that ever appeared in a geocache.

I once got a Where's George bill as change when I paid for my pizza at a Geocaching event. I think I wrote that in the note. Ya think that one got flagged too?

 

If you used any variant of the word geocache it probably did.

[Mr.Yuck]

There was never a ban of georges in geocaches. WG.com started flagging bills that moved from geocache to geocache as geocache bills so they didn't appear in top 10 lists. I can see this, as it would artifically inflate the hits on the bill.

 

But they also flag any bill that has ever appeared in a geocache. People have been placing money in caches since the beginning. If money is placed in a geocache then that IS the natural circulation of the money.

 

I once found a bill in my change and wrote in the note that "This is the first bill I ever found outside of a geocache" and it was flagged as a geocaching bill. That is just silly, as is flagging any bill that ever appeared in a geocache.

 

Now that's funny. I've actually found about 25 or so Georges in natural circulation, but of course I go out of my way to notice them, I suppose. It's true, if you use the word "geocache" or "geocaching" in your log for a bill, it will usually be tagged as a geocaching bill. I've seen the system miss it at least a couple of times.

 

Best I know, geo-georging is not banned, but the apparent threat is always there, per the official text someone posted from WG.com

[+wimseyguy]

Hmm, I see WG bills several times a month at my restaurant. I used to log them, but as I'm an active cacher and a passive georger I decided to stop doing it after the big snit thread. It just rubbed me the wrong way. Just because one family started using them as their free and private TB's shouldn't dictate the operation of an entire website.

 

Perhaps I should start logging them again with "found during the restaurant cash out. I think I'll use it as geocache swag next week".

 

Who wants the spoon next?

[Dinoprophet]

I understand the multiple log issue, but I don't see why WG considers geocaches outside a natural exchange of money. Is giving your grandkid a dollar for his/her birthday outside of natural spending? Finding one on the ground? Dropping one in an SA kettle? Some bills get spent, some are given as gifts, some get passed around geocaches. I like captialism, but geez, I like to be a *little* creative with my money.

[+markz68]

I just found a WG dollar in a cache a couple weeks ago:

 

http://www.wheresgeorge.com/report.php?key...08&entcnt=0

 

As you can see, it is marked/flagged just like some of the others linked here.

 

Hank hangs out on another forum I frequent, and seems like a nice guy.

 

I can understand both sides. Like one poster mentioned, dollars get passed along in all sorts if ways. Caching is just another way of passing them on. On the other hand, Hank had a cool idea for a website, and passing dollars on by caching wasn't in his plan.

[+niffir]

Yes, Hank is a very nice guy. I've known him through the wheresgeorge forums and contact forms for years and met him a year and a half ago at a wheresgeorge gathering.

 

It is easy to get your nose put out of joint about a policy that he has to put in place on wheresgeorge to prevent abuses of the system. But it is also easy to forget that he runs this giant website with the assistance of a handful of volunteers, and a seemingly small problem like a small percentage of bills generating large numbers of fake hits, can take up many hours of his time to fix. Last I knew, he was still working as a programmer to support himself with wheresgeorge being a fun idea that he just came up with one day that grew to monster proportions. Oddly enough, he's never even been into the entering, marking, and spending of his own money-- he just created the means for the rest of us to do so.

 

I have been a little disheartened by some of the posts in this thread that have either said that people will now refuse to enter wheresgeorge bills or will intentionally try to circumvent the system. There is no real penalty to having a bill flagged in the system as a geocaching bill. In fact, any bill flagged as a geocaching bill then has that information displayed at the top of the bill report-- it's like advertising for the sport of geocaching to a group of people who are more likely than the general population to be interested in caching. The only negative thing that *might* happen is if it ends up being one of those rare bills that end up with 10 or more hits and would have been eligible for the Top 10 list. Let me tell you...I've been georging for more than 5 years and have about 15,000 bills that I've entered into wheresgeorge and NONE of them have gotten within 3 or 4 hits of making it into the Top 10 list. The bills on that list are very unusual examples of wheresgeorge bills that somehow managed to beat the odds and get noticed again and again to be reentered on the site. It *wouldn't* be appropriate for a bill to sit in a cache and be repeatedly discovered or to be put in a baggy and treated as a travel but to make it to the top of that particular list-- a dollar acting as a travel bug is not anything close to natural circulation.

 

As was noted, there are some georgers who don't like the idea of their bills ending up in a geocache. They don't consider that to be a natural place for their bills to travel. There are also cachers who have lots of limitations they would like to place on who logs their caches or the manner in which they are logged. The difference here is that on geocaching they can delete logs that they don't want-- georgers have no direct control over the information entered by others about their bills. They *can* have a note sanitized if someone puts something inappropriate in it-- and trust me, there are thousands of people out there who all think they are being clever and unique when they write about getting the bill as change from a hooker (what hookers give $1s as change anyway?) and then using it to snort a line of coke before using it as toilet paper.

 

There is a huge crossover population that enjoys both geocaching and georging. I learned about geocaching through wheresgeorge, and introduced several people to geocaching at a wheresgeorge gathering that I hosted last summer-- two immediately went out to their own GPSrs and haven't looked back. There is no need for one hobby to be angry at the other or to try to interfere with the joys the others take in these hobbies. If you find a wheresgeorge bill in a cache or in regular circulation, you would make someone else's day if you took a few moments to enter the bill on wheresgeorge before spending it. The thrill of getting a "hit" is a real one, and someone's day could be made much happier if you took a few moments to let them know where their bill is. It is up to you whether or not you want to mention geocaching in your note-- I try now to avoid mentioning it *unless* I am leaving a particular bill in a cache. No need to have the 50 bills I enter before a day on which I might go caching all end up being flagged. But it isn't the end of the world if a bill does end up flagged.

[+niffir]

I understand the multiple log issue, but I don't see why WG considers geocaches outside a natural exchange of money. Is giving your grandkid a dollar for his/her birthday outside of natural spending? Finding one on the ground? Dropping one in an SA kettle? Some bills get spent, some are given as gifts, some get passed around geocaches. I like captialism, but geez, I like to be a *little* creative with my money.

 

Everything you mentioned, aside from geocaching, is considered a perfectly acceptable way of money changing hands in the world of wheresgeorge. Geocaching was also treated the exact same way as any of those other methods of exchange until serious abuses of the database occurred by a few geocachers. The problem isn't that georgers or Hank *dislike* caching-- it is that cachers are already familiar with the idea of travel bugs, and having a bill treated like one (passed along from cache to cache or discovered by a few dozen people at an event, for example) can do crazy things to a bill's history that make it different from most bills in circulation. As a result, geocache bills are treated a bit differently.

 

I leave bills in caches. I give bills to my parents or sister if I owe them money. The dropped money idea is similar to a whole class of bills that some georgers like to leave -- called serendipity bills (leave a bill in a place where someone is likely to find and notice it like a phone book or a park bench or something similar). Every Christmas, I drop several bills in Salvation Army kettles. Every one of those bills is entered on wheresgeorge and marked. And there is nothing at all wrong with any of those ways of spending my georged money. Wheresgeorge isn't a hobby about restricting how and where you spend your money-- the few restrictions that are in place are there because of some pretty serious abuses of the wheresgeorge game. Unlike geocaching bills, there are a couple of methods of bill distribution that *are* banned-- namely georgers mailing marked bills to other people (this was the result of years of struggling with people mailing bills to other georgers who would then enter them, essentially trading fake hits) and depositing bills in banks (some banks get very upset when people drop off hundreds and hundreds of marked bills, which then causes headaches for Hank when the banks decide to contact this Wheresgeorge Person and complain).

[+niffir]

I just found a WG dollar in a cache a couple weeks ago:

 

http://www.wheresgeorge.com/report.php?key...08&entcnt=0

 

As you can see, it is marked/flagged just like some of the others linked here.

 

 

That bill of yours was entered by another geo-georger. She goes by sun-moon-starz on both wheresgeorge and geocaching. She is the opposite of me-- more of a cacher than a georger.

 

Here is her wheresgeorge profile (which talks about caching as well):

http://www.wheresgeorge.com/user_profile_p...aa61a0862a4243c

 

And here is her geocaching profile:

http://www.geocaching.com/profile/?guid=33...b8-cb0a371f1583

[+BlueDeuce]

I think the wg practices and policies are just fine.

 

The events sound interesting, beside good food and conversation do you have things like wg related games? Seriously, I'd like to know.

 

Although I'm betting you don't log bills at these event.

[+niffir]

I think the wg practices and policies are just fine.

 

The events sound interesting, beside good food and conversation do you have things like wg related games? Seriously, I'd like to know.

 

Although I'm betting you don't log bills at these event.

 

It's mostly just getting together with fellow georgers and talking. We usually eat a meal together and just hang out for a few hours. We bring along all the georging gear-- stamps, ink pads, printouts and coloring books to show where our bills have been found, etc. Quite a bit like geocaching gatherings-- meeting up with people you know from online interactions, sharing stories with them about the hobby, helping newbies out, etc. Pretty much like many geocaching gatherings, I suppose The main difference you noted-- geocachers can then go out caching together (or have cache hunting events as part of the gathering), while georgers are NOT allowed to give or recieve hits from bills obtained at the gatherings.

 

We are also into a number of charities and other hobbies in general. I mentioned geocaching as one-- there will sometimes be a group that will break off after a gathering and go geocaching. It usually involves a cacher showing some georgers who have heard about the hobby how it all works. We have a few charities that georgers have created, so sometimes the gatherings also raise money/supplies for them. Two charities I can think of are Operation KoolAid (which sends care packages to troops stationed in Iraq) and Operation Doomer (which raises money for cancer related charities--named in honor of a georger who is fighting cancer). There are also sometimes book crossing tables for trading books, and that sort of thing.

 

Sometimes the gatherings involve attending a bigger event with the gathering just being a part of it. I've been to a gathering weekend at the Albuquerque Balloon Fiesta and am leaving soon to go on a cruise that is going to have about 30 georgers on it.

[+markz68]

I just found a WG dollar in a cache a couple weeks ago:

 

http://www.wheresgeorge.com/report.php?key...08&entcnt=0

 

As you can see, it is marked/flagged just like some of the others linked here.

 

 

That bill of yours was entered by another geo-georger. She goes by sun-moon-starz on both wheresgeorge and geocaching. She is the opposite of me-- more of a cacher than a georger.

 

Here is her wheresgeorge profile (which talks about caching as well):

http://www.wheresgeorge.com/user_profile_p...aa61a0862a4243c

 

And here is her geocaching profile:

http://www.geocaching.com/profile/?guid=33...b8-cb0a371f1583

 

Cool, thanks for the info! Nice to see there are other WG'ers/cachers!

[Trinity's Crew]

<snip>

 

I have been a little disheartened by some of the posts in this thread that have either said that people will now refuse to enter wheresgeorge bills or will intentionally try to circumvent the system.

 

If you are referring to any of my quotes then perhaps I need to explain further:

 

Here I am preaching from my soap box about how snarky the WG? website is about excluding a $bill from being eligible for the "Top 10" list at the mere mention of the word "geocache" in the log, and you have to spoil it with a perfectly legitimate (and kinda fun) way to circumvent the WG? system.

 

I had stopped logging WG? bills, but Moxiepup made me realize that I was just being obstinate.

 

As far as circumventing the system, I didn't mean that in the way that you seemed to take it. I wasn't planning to turn a dollar into a TB, or pass one around at an event, or make hundreds of copies and release them into caches. I was just going to avoid mentioning the "G" word when logging a bill. In my mind there is no reason to "mark" a WG? bill as a Geocache bill if it only passed through one or two caches before being put back into circulation. If it's been banging around caches for a while, it's likely already been tagged anyway, so why worry?

 

Also, remember that I accidentally got a bill flagged by mentioning that I was PLANNING to put it in a cache. As it turns out I spent it instead. Although if I read your posts correctly, having a bill flagged as a geocaching bill is no big deal. If that's true, I suppose I could start mentioning that I'm a geocacher every time I log a WG? bill, regardless of what I plan to do with it.

 

 

Now I have to decide whether to spite the trackers or the tracking site.

 

This was a joke. Notice the weird little yellow guy with his tongue hanging out.

 

Actually, you're right. I should still log WG? bills. I'll just be more descriptive in my logs to avoid the issues of mentioning "we who must not be named". Thanks for the perspective.

 

This is the point where I decided to re-think my position and resume logging WG? bills as I came across them. It seemed like the right thing to do. After reading your posts I feel the pendulum swinging swiftly back in the other direction. I simply don't need the hassle. Happy Georging!

 

Edit: Fixed emoticons

Edited March 20, 2007 by Trinity's Crew

[Dinoprophet]

niffir, thanks for your response. I was being sort of tongue-in-cheek, but I do still wonder why putting a bill in a cache would be considered less legitimate than the other things I mentioned. It seems like if the person would use a bill in a particular way without WG, then it would be a legitimate, natural use. Without WG, people would still leave bills in caches (though maybe not as often); mailing $1 or taking hundreds of $1 to a bank, on the other hand, are probably done only because of the site.

 

I don't mean to be a pest, I'm honestly curious. But like I said, I understand the multiple log problem, and maybe that's reason enough.

[Mvillian]

its your dollar do what you want with it I say

[+BlueDeuce]

 

It's mostly just getting together with fellow georgers and talking. We usually eat a meal together and just hang out for a few hours. We bring along all the georging gear-- stamps, ink pads, printouts and coloring books to show where our bills have been found, etc. Quite a bit like geocaching gatherings-- meeting up with people you know from online interactions, sharing stories with them about the hobby, helping newbies out, etc. Pretty much like many geocaching gatherings, I suppose

 

Thank you for answering. I agree, simply sharing the experience across a table is often time well spent.

[Trinity's Crew]

<snip>

I do still wonder why putting a bill in a cache would be considered less legitimate than the other things I mentioned. It seems like if the person would use a bill in a particular way without WG, then it would be a legitimate, natural use. Without WG, people would still leave bills in caches (though maybe not as often);

 

Exactly! Lots of dollar bills are left strictly as trade. Many people wind up leaving money because they find something cool in a cache and don't have anything else to trade. Sometimes the money is a WG? bill.

 

The practice of "tagging"any bill that mentions geocaching in a log seems like an over-reaction to a few isolated problems. But it's Hank's website. He can do as he sees fit. However, I can also over-react and continue my practice of ignoring WG? bills because they're my dollars.

[+niffir]

I don't mean to be a pest, I'm honestly curious. But like I said, I understand the multiple log problem, and maybe that's reason enough.

 

That is the reason exactly. A single hit on a bill placed in a cache as a trade item and then retrieved isn't a problem. It's the bills that get a dozen or two hits from being treated as a travel bug sort of item that are the issue.

[+QuesterMark]

Well I wasn't aware of these rules when I posted a note on a Where's George? bill that I received as change. I mentioned that I was considering putting it into a geocache. I wound up spending it but my mention of the word "geocache" tagged that bill as a "Geocaching" bill. I felt like a heel. I assume the tracker of the bill was able to get the geocaching "stigma" removed, but I still felt bad. I haven't logged a bill since, and I don't plan to in the future.

 

Edit: Briansnat beat me to it.

 

I'm the other way. I put a WG$ in a cache as an FTF prize. I wanted the finder to just spend it like normal. But he logged it as a geocaching bill. Given that this doesn't quite match what wg.com is about, I just don't participate in moving the wg$s from geocaches.

 

Off topic, I don't move TBs either. I'm getting a record for having TBs go missing. I'd rather just discover them and let someone else move 'em.

 

Back on topic, I enjoy georging. I just don't put those into caches anymore.

Edited March 20, 2007 by 0ccam

[+briansnat]

It seems like if the person would use a bill in a particular way without WG, then it would be a legitimate, natural use. Without WG, people would still leave bills in caches (though maybe not as often); mailing $1 or taking hundreds of $1 to a bank, on the other hand, are probably done only because of the site.

 

The practice of "tagging"any bill that mentions geocaching in a log seems like an over-reaction to a few isolated problems. But it's Hank's website. He can do as he sees fit. However, I can also over-react and continue my practice of ignoring WG? bills because they're my dollars.

 

I agree that geocaches are often part of the natural circulation of currency and also that tagging any bill that mentions geocaching is silly. Particularly because it can be argued that registering and marking a bill means that the natural circulation of the bill will be altered. If you get a WG$ in change, you are likely to hold it until you can register it. If you change the way you treat a bill in any way because its a WG$ you are altering its "natural circulation".

[Dinoprophet]

It seems like if the person would use a bill in a particular way without WG, then it would be a legitimate, natural use. Without WG, people would still leave bills in caches (though maybe not as often); mailing $1 or taking hundreds of $1 to a bank, on the other hand, are probably done only because of the site.

 

The practice of "tagging"any bill that mentions geocaching in a log seems like an over-reaction to a few isolated problems. But it's Hank's website. He can do as he sees fit. However, I can also over-react and continue my practice of ignoring WG? bills because they're my dollars.

 

I agree that geocaches are often part of the natural circulation of currency and also that tagging any bill that mentions geocaching is silly. Particularly because it can be argued that registering and marking a bill means that the natural circulation of the bill will be altered. If you get a WG$ in change, you are likely to hold it until you can register it. If you change the way you treat a bill in any way because its a WG$ you are altering its "natural circulation".

Countering my own point: while it's true that bills would pass through geocaches even without WG, they probably wouldn't be moved among caches very often.

 

But that just ties in to Brian's other point, that the markings themselves change the natural flow. If someone gets a WG$ as change, and they'll be going on vacation in a week, it's likely they'll hold onto that bill rather than spend it immediately, just so they can give it a jump. There's not much that can be done about that, though.

 

At any rate, I've always liked the WG concept, which I've known about longer than geocaching and travel bugs. I participated briefly, but I never got any hits on the bills I registered myself, and I've never come across one outside a geocache (and even then, only once or twice).

 

ETA: I had a TB that was sort of a WG parody, Where's Saddam?. Unfortunately, it vanished from the last cache it was in.

Edited March 20, 2007 by Dinoprophet

[+Muddy Chris]

Sep-19-06 10:44 PM Destin, FL 21 Days, 23 Hrs, 50 Mins 8.4 0.38

User's Note My kids found George in a sealed 2 liter Coke bottle bobbing on the waves in Choctawhatchee Bay. I think I'll put him back in the bottle and take him fishing with me in the Gulf this weekend. Oops! Man overboard!

 

I know I should just let this thread die, but how is this log entry from a WG top 10 bill really any different than placing a WG $ in a geocache? They put the bill in a container for someone else to find. WG's arguements vs. geocaching just lost all respect here.

 

Chris

Edited March 21, 2007 by Muddy Chris

[+Kit Fox]

#3 Usage of Bills in Geocaches

Only real, actual U.S. dollar bills can be used as Travel Bugs in Geocaches if they are to be logged on this site. Photocopies or other duplicates of bills will not be allowed and any instances of this will be deleted and blocked from entry. Once any bill has been found in a Geocache, it is marked as such on this site and is removed from the summarizations and other Top 10 reports found on this site. Once a bill is tagged as a "Geocache Bill", it will not be untagged as such, even if it is returned to normal circulation.

 

If I remember correctly, some geocacher decided to make multiple copies of a miniaturized WG Bills (as his own travel bugs) and drop them off in caches. When different cachers started logging these multiples, "all hell broke loose."

[+niffir]

Sep-19-06 10:44 PM Destin, FL 21 Days, 23 Hrs, 50 Mins 8.4 0.38

User's Note My kids found George in a sealed 2 liter Coke bottle bobbing on the waves in Choctawhatchee Bay. I think I'll put him back in the bottle and take him fishing with me in the Gulf this weekend. Oops! Man overboard!

 

I know I should just let this thread die, but how is this log entry from a WG top 10 bill really any different than placing a WG $ in a geocache? They put the bill in a container for someone else to find. WG's arguements vs. geocaching just lost all respect here.

 

Chris

 

For the record, putting bills in bottles to be tossed in the ocean is a "no no" on wheresgeorge. As is doing a balloon release with wheresgeorge bills. These are for environmental reasons, however, not for the reasons you are trying to bring up.

 

As has been repeated in this thread many times, it is the fact that wheresgeorge bills often end up treated as travel bugs that got geocaching bills their differential treatment on wheresgeorge. And in no way are geocachign bills forbidden or otherwise restricted on wheresgeorge. The *only* differences are 1) bills flagged as geocaching bills will say so in prominant text on the bill report and 2) they cannot be in the Top 10 list of bills on the site. That's it. Nothing more. It's really not a big deal.

Edited March 22, 2007 by niffir

[Double Agents]

I've handled about 6 Where's George bills. I logged 1, it was the first one I found. I've even seen a couple in geocaches, but left them because I don't like trading money through geocaches.

 

It's sorta cool, I guess. Mostly I saw it as a PITA trying to log one. Let's go Geocaching instead of writing things on money. I'll take the "d**n Micros" and "f**ing Lampost Caches" over hassling with logging defaced money any day.

 

The $1 travel bug is a nice benefit of the WG site, and they seem to be handling it fairly well, even if they do over react a bit. They could definately both be fun hobbies. I just think a Travel Bug is more interesting to find or follow than a dollar bill.

[+nikcap]

...

I once found a bill in my change and wrote in the note that "This is the first bill I ever found outside of a geocache" and it was flagged as a geocaching bill. That is just silly, as is flagging any bill that ever appeared in a geocache.

 

I've almost always write a similar note on WG's that I receive not from caches. Oddly enough, I very rarely note what Geocache I found a WG in. I guess I've inadvertently be blacklisting WG for the last few years, whoops.

 

The natural movement bit is hog-wash if you ask me. The cafeteria where I work has another WG geek that frequent it, as I often receive WG as change there. Several co-workers know that I do the WG thing, and often save the bills for me.

 

Unfortunately, I haven't converted many co-worker to Geocaching, but that still enjoy listening to my tales of slogging through the mud or getting attacked by vulture.

[+markz68]

...

I once found a bill in my change and wrote in the note that "This is the first bill I ever found outside of a geocache" and it was flagged as a geocaching bill. That is just silly, as is flagging any bill that ever appeared in a geocache.

 

I've almost always write a similar note on WG's that I receive not from caches. Oddly enough, I very rarely note what Geocache I found a WG in. I guess I've inadvertently be blacklisting WG for the last few years, whoops.

 

The natural movement bit is hog-wash if you ask me. The cafeteria where I work has another WG geek that frequent it, as I often receive WG as change there. Several co-workers know that I do the WG thing, and often save the bills for me.

 

Unfortunately, I haven't converted many co-worker to Geocaching, but that still enjoy listening to my tales of slogging through the mud or getting attacked by vulture.

 

Someone I work with always gives me the WG bills he finds too! I have just recently been finding WG bills again. There must be someone new in my area that is doing it now. I bet I went a year with no bills found, but in the last month, my coworker has found 3, I have found 1, and I found 1 in a cache this weekend.