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New World Record - 1157 geocache finds in 24 hours


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OK, if the record was legitimate in the first place and if it has now been beaten is not off on a tagent.

 

Let me get this straight. The OP started this self proclaiming themselves the world record holder with a title of "New World Record - 1157 geocache finds in 24 hours" and then listed the other records they claim they beat.

 

I beat their record by making 3,500 "finds" in less than an hour and the reply is:

 

"If even you don't think your finds were legitimate enough to put in your stats, why should anyone else care about them? Further, your 'record' is not going to affect the OP because you used different standards than he did. Therefore, you didn't overcome his achievement. You just made a record doing something else, apparently."

 

Is not that EXACTLY what the OP did in making their claim for the "world record"? Are you saying the OP used the same standards that were used in all the other records they are claiming to have beat?

 

The only standard they had was someone in their group finding the cache and within 24 hours. What they did was much easier than what some of the other records they claim to have beaten. I met the same standards they did.

 

I don't think it is legitimate for them to self proclaim themselves world record holders. I don't think they ever had a legitimate claim practically since I think it is cheating to claim a find someone else made while you were sitting in the car as a part of a "world record." (I don't have a problem with someone logging something like that as a find, but what they did is like claiming the home run record by counting home rums your teammates hit.)

 

While I don't think their claim was legit, my claim is certainly more legit than theirs. If they can claim a world record by finding an easier and more lame way to make finds than others, why can't I do the same thing to them to beat their record?

 

I wish there were some official standards to claim a world record. I suspect they would be more than finding the lamest way possible to claim a find-I would hope that would stop this trend of quality being overrun by quantity.

 

Myotis

World Record Holder for most finds in a day

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Perhaps geocaching is like Heraclitus's river. It is always changing so you can't compare what someone did yesterday with what someone does today. Clearly it's unfair to compare a "record" set in these days of mindless power trails with records set just a few months ago. And certainly one can't compare it with someone setting the record for most caches in a day a few years ago.

 

One could go further and say that you can never find the same cache twice. The weather is different, the cache was not replaced exactly has found, the footprints of the previous finder show the way to the cache; so the experience is different for each finder. Even if two teams were to find the same caches on the same power trail, could you really compare the achivements? The experiences of the two teams will be different. And if every experience finding a cache is different, why not recognize a recorde for finding the same cache 3500 times?

 

The story goes that Heraclitus later realized that you couldn't even step into the same river once, since it was constantly changing. At that point he shut up and never spoke again. Perhaps we can learn something from Heraclitus. :D

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Perhaps geocaching is like Heraclitus's river. It is always changing so you can't compare what someone did yesterday with what someone does today. Clearly it's unfair to compare a "record" set in these days of mindless power trails with records set just a few months ago. And certainly one can't compare it with someone setting the record for most caches in a day a few years ago.

 

One could go further and say that you can never find the same cache twice. The weather is different, the cache was not replaced exactly has found, the footprints of the previous finder show the way to the cache; so the experience is different for each finder. Even if two teams were to find the same caches on the same power trail, could you really compare the achivements? The experiences of the two teams will be different. And if every experience finding a cache is different, why not recognize a recorde for finding the same cache 3500 times?

 

The story goes that Heraclitus later realized that you couldn't even step into the same river once, since it was constantly changing. At that point he shut up and never spoke again. Perhaps we can learn something from Heraclitus. :D

I'll admit I'm not up on my Greek philosophers, so it was enjoyable to brush up on this weeping philosopher. As someone with a strong affinity for dualism, I'll have to read some more on him.

 

Bringing it back to the subject...

 

I've mentioned the logs of the E.T. Trail a couple of times. I suppose it is because I was struck by how much visitors enjoyed their experience and it wasn't the same experience as the Ventura_Boys. To borrow the analogy, they stepped into a different river.

 

Out on the plains, east of Denver, you can find film canister caches on the side of the road. For the most part, the comments are little more than "TFTC". But there are many logs on the E.T. Trail with a variety of experiences being described. Some are happy for how much they accomplished in a day. Some discussed enjoying the Nevada Desert, others mention what a wonderful experience it was their group of friends/family. Many state they have no interest in getting all the caches and others do want to get them all but at a leisurely pace. Each one pulls something different from the power trail and almost all are different from what the Ventura_Boys experienced. It's obvious that many people enjoy doing the power trail for their varied and unique reasons.

 

While the Ventura_Boys are proud of their unofficial world record run, I'll bet they treasure the accomplishment whether others wish to recognize it or not. It was, no doubt, a memorable experience and that is what geocaching is all about - making memorable experiences.

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There has always been competition in geocaching and there is nothing wrong with that. The problem is the number hounds have pushed it way to far to being about the numbers vs having quality caches. In earlier times, you competed by having interesting locations and evil challenges and the ability to plan and navigate. Now it is turning into mindlessness going from one lame cache to the other. I think the ET Trail and the surpassed so-called "world record" is today's locationless caching yellow jeep. Just like the yellow jeep cache pushed locationless caches to being ridiculous, the same thing is happening here. While the ability to filter out this stuff would be a big help, what I really wish is Groundspeak would start cracking down on some of this stuff just like they got rid of the locationless caches.

 

Right now the only way we are compared is the number of finds-that is what shows up about us. If this was not the way we were rated and compared, I think there would be much less demand for something like the ET Trail and it would move caching more back toward quality. If the ONLY rating is the number of finds without regard to the difficulty of the finds, why should anyone be surprised with people pushing to find lamer and easier ways to find caches instead of pusing to find ways to provide a fun experience. If we were rated in a way that takes into account things like difficulty into a rating, there would not be so much pressure to make easy finds instead of quality finds. If Groundspeak had some official way to determine who is the top geocacher, we would not have so much pressure for lame numbers.

 

While things always change, instead of letting someone self proclaim themselves the world record holder by finding the easiest and lamest way to claim a find, there could be a standard like this: Number of finds / the number on the team * the number of miles from cache to cache * the average terrain rating * the average difficulty rating. Whoever got the top rating could claim the world record or the top cacher. It seems to me something like this would be more fair than letting someone claim the record by finding lamer and lamer ways to claim a find. It would also help restore the balance between quanity and quality.

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