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Geobeacon


knowschad

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Haven't heard it in da U.P. either -- maybe I'll have to use it! :(

EDIT: We just call it a "hide" -- different than (true) camouflage -- usually quite obvious.

I believe I've used it in the U.P. But yeah... the common term up there is, "I tink I see it over dere by dat buck, 'ey?" (OK, in all fairness, you don't hear much Yooper-speak anymore, but when I was younger you sure did!)

 

Actually, still quite prevalent around here. It's just that there are sooooooo many YITs* today. Retirees and wannabee retirees from ChiTown, Detwa and other metro-type areas. Apparently fleeing the helter-skelter madness and horn-honking frenzies.

 

Also, I think the schools are moving back towards grammar studies, ey! :)

 

 

* Yooper-In-Training :D

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It seems that some terms can be very regional. I live about 80 milles from Rochester, NY where I have cached a couple of times and have read lots of listing which use the term "Lammie", as in, "there's a lammie for FTF". I'm still not sure exactly what it is (though I have a guess) and I've never seen the term anywhere 40 miles outside of Rochester.

 

A 'lammie' apparently is a laminated card that states some nonsense congratulating you for being first to find for that particular cache. I had to ask the other day actually because I was curious what the heck they are too. At first I thought they were a cute nickname for lanyards til I realized, well... that doesn't quite make sense, does it. Heh.

 

Geobeacon is a new one to me. I have also used geopile exactly as an earlier poster did... an (usually) obvious pile of natural debris used to cover/conceal a cache's hiding spot.

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I like the decoy idea. I might have to create a few of those around a future cache hide. However, I think cachers would be a lot less likely to replace decoys than actual cache covers.

 

My thought on a decoy.

 

Since it isn't a geocache and Groundspeak doesn't sanction decoys, and I can't find any activity described as "decoy hunting" with GPS or otherwise, a "decoy" is merely garbage left near a cache location and if someone practices CITO, cool. (not that I would ever interfere with a cache owner messing with someone for their own sadistic entertainment, mind you and CITO a decoy myself)

Edited by bittsen
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It was on the first page:

 

Never heard such a thing in Western NY or Southern Ontario. Yepper, I'd say you have a regional term on your hands there. :D

 

Funny, it's buried on like page 17 of the famous Rogue Reviewer thread, but I just noticed a highly regional term the other day, when a link to a similar "reviewer doesn't think it's there cache" was posted (it was in Indiana). There was all kinds of talk about "red herrings" near the cache. I'm like "what the heck are these people talking about?" It seems they were talking about decoy caches near the cache. Anyone I ever heard talk about decoys calls them, um, decoys. ;)

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My thought on a decoy.

 

Since it isn't a geocache and Groundspeak doesn't sanction decoys, and I can't find any activity described as "decoy hunting" with GPS or otherwise, a "decoy" is merely garbage left near a cache location and if someone practices CITO, cool. (not that I would ever interfere with a cache owner messing with someone for their own sadistic entertainment, mind you and CITO a decoy myself)

 

A pile of twigs and bark isn't CITO material, is it?

 

Maybe "red herring" is a better term. And I don't consider it any more sadistic than a puzzle cache. It's just a way of increasing the challenge.

Edited by oakenwood
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It was on the first page:

 

Never heard such a thing in Western NY or Southern Ontario. Yepper, I'd say you have a regional term on your hands there. :D

 

Funny, it's buried on like page 17 of the famous Rogue Reviewer thread, but I just noticed a highly regional term the other day, when a link to a similar "reviewer doesn't think it's there cache" was posted (it was in Indiana). There was all kinds of talk about "red herrings" near the cache. I'm like "what the heck are these people talking about?" It seems they were talking about decoy caches near the cache. Anyone I ever heard talk about decoys calls them, um, decoys. ;)

OK, I see. But a red herring is not a typically used to refer to a physical decoy (and it also is hardly a regional term!) You can Google "red herring"... its a very old literary term, I believe. "Geobeacon", on the other hand, is apparently a very regional term, although I first heard it years ago, when I first started geocaching.
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My thought on a decoy.

 

Since it isn't a geocache and Groundspeak doesn't sanction decoys, and I can't find any activity described as "decoy hunting" with GPS or otherwise, a "decoy" is merely garbage left near a cache location and if someone practices CITO, cool. (not that I would ever interfere with a cache owner messing with someone for their own sadistic entertainment, mind you and CITO a decoy myself)

 

A pile of twigs and bark isn't CITO material, is it?

 

Maybe "red herring" is a better term. And I don't consider it any more sadistic than a puzzle cache. It's just a way of increasing the challenge.

 

But, puzzle caches can be removed from a pocket query. If one takes a traditional, which is coordinates/cache and adds a level of difficulty by adding decoys, why not call it a puzzle cache? The only reason I can think is because the CO would want someone to have to solve a puzzle when they weren't intending to.

 

If a traditional cache has a bunch of empty containers laying around it, then they are trache. Unless the cache is listed as a puzzle, of course. Otherwise how are we supposed to know if we should be CITOing the empty soda bottles, fast food containers and other miscellaneous junk?

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My thought on a decoy.

 

Since it isn't a geocache and Groundspeak doesn't sanction decoys, and I can't find any activity described as "decoy hunting" with GPS or otherwise, a "decoy" is merely garbage left near a cache location and if someone practices CITO, cool. (not that I would ever interfere with a cache owner messing with someone for their own sadistic entertainment, mind you and CITO a decoy myself)

 

A pile of twigs and bark isn't CITO material, is it?

 

Maybe "red herring" is a better term. And I don't consider it any more sadistic than a puzzle cache. It's just a way of increasing the challenge.

 

But, puzzle caches can be removed from a pocket query. If one takes a traditional, which is coordinates/cache and adds a level of difficulty by adding decoys, why not call it a puzzle cache? The only reason I can think is because the CO would want someone to have to solve a puzzle when they weren't intending to.

 

If a traditional cache has a bunch of empty containers laying around it, then they are trache. Unless the cache is listed as a puzzle, of course. Otherwise how are we supposed to know if we should be CITOing the empty soda bottles, fast food containers and other miscellaneous junk?

What ARE you talking about, anyway? Decoys? CITO? Empty containers? Trache? Puzzles? Have you even read this thread?
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What ARE you talking about, anyway? Decoys? CITO? Empty containers? Trache? Puzzles? Have you even read this thread?

I didn't see in the guidelines that reading the entire thread was a prerequisite to posting a comment. I was replying to a comment and I thought that was enough.

You are 100% correct, sir. It is not a guidelines thing. Staying on topic is more of a forum etiquette thing, but this isn't exactly an important topic, so I won't pet the sweaty things, OK?
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You are 100% correct, sir. It is not a guidelines thing. Staying on topic is more of a forum etiquette thing, but this isn't exactly an important topic, so I won't pet the sweaty things, OK?

 

Nope, haven't heard that phrase around these parts. But I like it and I may use it. Possibly the nastiest turn of phrase I've heard in a while.

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Actually, still quite prevalent around here. It's just that there are sooooooo many YITs* today. Retirees and wannabee retirees from ChiTown, Detwa and other metro-type areas. Apparently fleeing the helter-skelter madness and horn-honking frenzies.

 

Also, I think the schools are moving back towards grammar studies, ey! :D

 

* Yooper-In-Training ;)

 

My sister, Civil Tytto, lives in the U.P. (so I guess she's a YIT) now and she's starting to pick up the yooper accent. She's starting to say, "Wah!" instead of similar expressions of disbelief, like holy cow. When she comes down to visit, it sounds ridiculous outside of a U.P. context.

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Decoys and Yoopers reminds me ...

 

One night during deer season, a state cop was staking out a particularly rowdy bar in the U.P. to fill his quota on DUI tickets by targeting downstate deer hunters. At closing time, he saw a deer hunter tumble out of the bar, trip on the curb, then try his keys in five different trucks before he found his. He sat in the front seat fumbling around with his keys for several minutes. All the other deer hunters left the bar and drove off. Finally he started his engine and began to drive away. The cop was waiting for him though, and he stopped the driver, read him his rights and administered the Breathalyzer test. The results showed a reading of 0.00% blood alcohol level! The puzzled officer demanded to know how that could be. The deer hunter replied, "Tonight I'm the designated decoy." :)

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Decoys and Yoopers reminds me ...

 

One night during deer season, a state cop was staking out a particularly rowdy bar in the U.P. to fill his quota on DUI tickets by targeting downstate deer hunters. At closing time, he saw a deer hunter tumble out of the bar, trip on the curb, then try his keys in five different trucks before he found his. He sat in the front seat fumbling around with his keys for several minutes. All the other deer hunters left the bar and drove off. Finally he started his engine and began to drive away. The cop was waiting for him though, and he stopped the driver, read him his rights and administered the Breathalyzer test. The results showed a reading of 0.00% blood alcohol level! The puzzled officer demanded to know how that could be. The deer hunter replied, "Tonight I'm the designated decoy." :)

LOL! You almost got me there, TAR, but your slip-up was calling them "downstate DEER hunters". As any Yooper knows, they are downstate COW hunters. Great try, though. I never would have thought that you'd even know what a Yooper was, much less, the difference between a deer and a cow! :P
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What ARE you talking about, anyway? Decoys? CITO? Empty containers? Trache? Puzzles? Have you even read this thread?

I didn't see in the guidelines that reading the entire thread was a prerequisite to posting a comment. I was replying to a comment and I thought that was enough.

You are 100% correct, sir. It is not a guidelines thing. Staying on topic is more of a forum etiquette thing, but this isn't exactly an important topic, so I won't pet the sweaty things, OK?

 

I learned it from the master...

 

And, lest we forget, the "Don't pet the sweaty things" is a bittsen original.

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What ARE you talking about, anyway? Decoys? CITO? Empty containers? Trache? Puzzles? Have you even read this thread?

I didn't see in the guidelines that reading the entire thread was a prerequisite to posting a comment. I was replying to a comment and I thought that was enough.

You are 100% correct, sir. It is not a guidelines thing. Staying on topic is more of a forum etiquette thing, but this isn't exactly an important topic, so I won't pet the sweaty things, OK?

 

I learned it from the master...

 

And, lest we forget, the "Don't pet the sweaty things" is a bittsen original.

Well, not withstanding the great George Carlin, of course. We would not want to forget to give him credit, would we?
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What ARE you talking about, anyway? Decoys? CITO? Empty containers? Trache? Puzzles? Have you even read this thread?

I didn't see in the guidelines that reading the entire thread was a prerequisite to posting a comment. I was replying to a comment and I thought that was enough.

You are 100% correct, sir. It is not a guidelines thing. Staying on topic is more of a forum etiquette thing, but this isn't exactly an important topic, so I won't pet the sweaty things, OK?

 

My fault. When talking about a regional term such as Geobeacon, there was a reference to Red Herrings being used as a synonym for Decoy's in another current thread, and I brought it up here as another example of another regional term. Of course this was all like a month ago, and I probably never would have even remembered bringing it up. :)

 

But I did and still do know what a Yooper is. I've never heard the term "pet the sweaty things" though. But I like it, and am going to use it.

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What ARE you talking about, anyway? Decoys? CITO? Empty containers? Trache? Puzzles? Have you even read this thread?

I didn't see in the guidelines that reading the entire thread was a prerequisite to posting a comment. I was replying to a comment and I thought that was enough.

You are 100% correct, sir. It is not a guidelines thing. Staying on topic is more of a forum etiquette thing, but this isn't exactly an important topic, so I won't pet the sweaty things, OK?

 

My fault. When talking about a regional term such as Geobeacon, there was a reference to Red Herrings being used as a synonym for Decoy's in another current thread, and I brought it up here as another example of another regional term. Of course this was all like a month ago, and I probably never would have even remembered bringing it up. :P

 

But I did and still do know what a Yooper is. I've never heard the term "pet the sweaty things" though. But I like it, and am going to use it.

No sweat (excuse me for saying that!). At least it gave me the opportunity to say "You are 100% correct, sir.", once again raising the question that was rather ambiguously answered in another thread. :)
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OK, I've been as guilty as anyone for taking this thread off track, so to get it back onto the old beaten trail, let's re-post the original thread:

 

 

I ran into an out of state cacher this summer that was puzzled by the term "geobeacon". It is a very common term here in Minnesota (and certainly western Wisconsin as well) but I was surprised to hear that it may be strictly a local term. It refers to an obvious hiding spot... generally large dead, hollow trees and that sort of thing. Is this term used in your area? If not, do you have another word that refers to a similar feature?

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I never would have thought that you'd even know what a Yooper was, much less, the difference between a deer and a cow! :)

You bet I do! Driving my Impala with 300k+ miles on it home from Bananera, Morales Izabal Guatemala one Christmas eve trying to make Birmingham AL before the kids woke up Christmas morning I was over-caffeinated, bleary-eyed and hell-bent fighting to stay awake. My car had broken down in three countries since I had started the 54 hour drive and now there was no taller mechanico anywhere around so I was deep in prayer and broke to boot. The only radio station I could get was some AM station in Little Rock Arkansas that called itself "The Home of the Queer Frontier". They played "Rusty Chevrolet" by DaYoopers and I laughed so hard it kept me awake for hours. I could SO relate to that song! They've been a favorite band ever since!

 

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=50IgzksUqpQ

 

And every deer hunter dreams of a 30-point buck!

 

Edited by TheAlabamaRambler
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OK, I've been as guilty as anyone for taking this thread off track, so to get it back onto the old beaten trail, let's re-post the original thread:

 

I ran into an out of state cacher this summer that was puzzled by the term "geobeacon". It is a very common term here in Minnesota (and certainly western Wisconsin as well) but I was surprised to hear that it may be strictly a local term. It refers to an obvious hiding spot... generally large dead, hollow trees and that sort of thing. Is this term used in your area? If not, do you have another word that refers to a similar feature?

 

Oh, we call that a "non-decoy".

 

Just kidding. But in my private parlance, it's a "dead giveaway".

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Decoys and Yoopers reminds me ...

 

One night during deer season, a state cop was staking out a particularly rowdy bar in the U.P. to fill his quota on DUI tickets by targeting downstate deer hunters. At closing time, he saw a deer hunter tumble out of the bar, trip on the curb, then try his keys in five different trucks before he found his. He sat in the front seat fumbling around with his keys for several minutes. All the other deer hunters left the bar and drove off. Finally he started his engine and began to drive away. The cop was waiting for him though, and he stopped the driver, read him his rights and administered the Breathalyzer test. The results showed a reading of 0.00% blood alcohol level! The puzzled officer demanded to know how that could be. The deer hunter replied, "Tonight I'm the designated decoy." :laughing:

LOL! You almost got me there, TAR, but your slip-up was calling them "downstate DEER hunters". As any Yooper knows, they are downstate COW hunters. Great try, though. I never would have thought that you'd even know what a Yooper was, much less, the difference between a deer and a cow! :blink:

 

Downstate? All the yoopers I know ( I am married to one) refer to the natives of the lower peninsula as "Trolls". A reference to the fact that we live below the Mackinac Bridge.

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Geo Beacon is the name of a puzzle cache in west central Florida. It's the only time I've ever heard the term. The cache owner is from Minnesota.

Geo Beacon

 

Ahh, our friend Grey Wolf. He's very highly respected in these parts. He used to live in Florida and still has people maintaing his Florida hides. The question is, and I should have looked, did he hide the cache before or after he moved to MN?

Edited by bflentje
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Geo Beacon is the name of a puzzle cache in west central Florida. It's the only time I've ever heard the term. The cache owner is from Minnesota.

Geo Beacon

Ahh, our friend Grey Wolf. He's very highly respected in these parts. He used to live in Florida and still has people maintaing his Florida hides. The question is, and I should have looked, did he hide the cache before or after he moved to MN?

I suspected it was one of GW's caches as soon as I read "Florida" and before I saw the part about the cache owner being from Minnesota.

 

I guess he knew that it was a Minnesota term, since he asks, "Do you know what a great Geo Beacon looks like? " I'm sure few in Florida have any idea!

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Geo Beacon is the name of a puzzle cache in west central Florida. It's the only time I've ever heard the term. The cache owner is from Minnesota.

Geo Beacon

Ahh, our friend Grey Wolf. He's very highly respected in these parts. He used to live in Florida and still has people maintaing his Florida hides. The question is, and I should have looked, did he hide the cache before or after he moved to MN?

I suspected it was one of GW's caches as soon as I read "Florida" and before I saw the part about the cache owner being from Minnesota.

 

I guess he knew that it was a Minnesota term, since he asks, "Do you know what a great Geo Beacon looks like? " I'm sure few in Florida have any idea!

In fact, I solved the puzzle and still had no idea until I was at GZ.

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Never heard such a thing in Western NY or Southern Ontario. Yepper, I'd say you have a regional term on your hands there. :blink:

 

Funny, it's buried on like page 17 of the famous Rogue Reviewer thread, but I just noticed a highly regional term the other day, when a link to a similar "reviewer doesn't think it's there cache" was posted (it was in Indiana). There was all kinds of talk about "red herrings" near the cache. I'm like "what the heck are these people talking about?" It seems they were talking about decoy caches near the cache. Anyone I ever heard talk about decoys calls them, um, decoys. :huh:

A "red herring" is a very common expression in UK for anything designed to deliberately mislead.

 

We don't have geobeacons though.

 

Geobacon is often used at camping events for geobreakfast butties. :blink:

 

MrsB

Mmmm... Red Herrings...

gummi19medd.jpg

Never heard of a Geo Beacon. Have heard of Red Herrings. Have used one in a puzzle I made. :laughing:

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Never heard such a thing in Western NY or Southern Ontario. Yepper, I'd say you have a regional term on your hands there. :blink:

 

Funny, it's buried on like page 17 of the famous Rogue Reviewer thread, but I just noticed a highly regional term the other day, when a link to a similar "reviewer doesn't think it's there cache" was posted (it was in Indiana). There was all kinds of talk about "red herrings" near the cache. I'm like "what the heck are these people talking about?" It seems they were talking about decoy caches near the cache. Anyone I ever heard talk about decoys calls them, um, decoys. :huh:

A "red herring" is a very common expression in UK for anything designed to deliberately mislead.

 

We don't have geobeacons though.

 

Geobacon is often used at camping events for geobreakfast butties. :blink:

 

MrsB

Mmmm... Red Herrings...

gummi19medd.jpg

Never heard of a Geo Beacon. Have heard of Red Herrings. Have used one in a puzzle I made. :laughing:

 

Well, to tie Geobeacons and Red Herrings together even more, the same Grey Wolf that has that Florida Geobeacons cache also has this one in Minnesota.... you can translate the Latin:Crimson Clupea harengus

Edited by knowschad
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Geobeacons. Nope. The only place I've seen it is in these forums, by Minnesota cachers. Cache magnet I've heard in reference to objects like light post skirts and unusually loose fence-post caps, regardless of whether they harbor a cache.

 

There is a kind of hyper-regionalism here with regard to nanos. In the South Bay, they are called blinkers. Just 8 miles north in the East Bay, they're universally nanos. The first time I read a cache description that simply said "Blinker in the usual spot", I was dumbfounded. I'd found what they were calling "blinkers" before, but had never seen them in their virgin state, so I couldn't even make the connection as to why they would be called that. Kind of a different story with Alaskans and PCR tubes. The name they use refers to their index case cache. I can't recall what that is off the top of my head.

 

.... There was all kinds of talk about "red herrings" near the cache. I'm like "what the heck are these people talking about?" It seems they were talking about decoy caches near the cache. Anyone I ever heard talk about decoys calls them, um, decoys. :laughing:

Decoys are fake caches. Extra cache containers sprinkled around GZ to make the search more tedious. Red herrings are usually literary device a bit more cleverly crafted into the cache description of a puzzle. A puzzle page might read:
North was mad. Three times he'd asked Severus for coffee. Three times. Whatever the slackard was up to was NO good. Pointedly, he had reinforced the FIRST principle. Promptness. Well, the boy's leaving for school on the nineteenth.

 

Still, the ambassador West is due here in less than 12 minutes. Horrors! ...

...and so on. Follow the numbery-ish red herrings, they'll plunk you in the bay. Count the words in the sentences and find the cache.
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I ran into an out of state cacher this summer that was puzzled by the term "geobeacon". It is a very common term here in Minnesota (and certainly western Wisconsin as well) but I was surprised to hear that it may be strictly a local term. It refers to an obvious hiding spot... generally large dead, hollow trees and that sort of thing. Is this term used in your area? If not, do you have another word that refers to a similar feature?

 

I've heard "geobeacon" several times here in Central Iowa. Must be a Midwest thing!

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<br />
<br />Here in AZ, we call it the 'Obvious Location'.<br />
<br /> <img src='http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/public/style_emoticons/default/rolleyes.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':(' /> <br /><b>Or Un-Natural Rock-Pile</b> <img src='http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/public/style_emoticons/default/cool.gif' class='bbc_emoticon' alt=':)' /><br />
<br /><br /><br />

UPS = Unnatural Pile of Sticks

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Yah, Yah, I've heard of dat term geobacon. I hear it tastes alot like dat der lutefisk. MMMmmmmm good stuff. :P I was born and raised in southern MN. I have not heard the term geobeacon out this way.

 

Maybe I should start using it in my area and see if it would spread. A linguistic experiment, like the guy who spoke Klingon to his kid for three years. In the meantime I need to find a good source of lefse, like my aunts used to make, but both of these are probably something for the off topic forum.

 

Like the concept of a linguistic experiment:

 

Hmmmmmmmm how about someone from the Boonville, Califotnia area hook us up with something from "The Boont Language" and see if it will spread

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I hadn't realized "beacon" was such a regional thing. I see it all the time on logs here in northern IA & southern MN (Rochester-Austin area). I use the term frequently myself. I've probably confused several people in KY by using the term in my logs down there.

 

Have not heard "geobeacon" used in California. We pretty much say, "Ground Zero (GZ)" or Obvious Spot. :)

I've always though "ground zero" was simply where the GPSr pointed. When you get close to Ground Zero you start looking for beacons.

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