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Jeep on Ebay


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he's got another green jeep on Ebay!

 

http://www.ebay.com/itm/RARE-trackable-Green-Jeep-/221114031021?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item337b6c5bad#ht_500wt_949

 

Looks like we now know what happened to a number of the Travelers that disappeared from the Geowoodstock IV event!

 

Same person is selling more of them! $80 this time! Amazing geocachers collecting these things and profiting from it. I am a little sick!

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Important:

If you find a Travel Bug, it has the text "Don't keep me" and information on how to track it. It's not confusing. But if you're confused, you may enter the tracking number here and log it:

http://www.geocaching.com/track/default.aspx

 

(still confused? contact Geocaching.com: http://support.Groundspeak.com/index.php?pg=request)

 

That's what to do nomatter what. If you're donating a bag of them to a thrift store, make a log about that. If you are throwing them all away, log them. If you're selling them at auction, or if you buy one on ebay. Anything. Log them.

 

I would also suggest that selling something on ebay is MORE confusing than logging a Travel Bug. And the guy selling them is on no way confused. He has REFUSED to log them. And if (as he claims) he's not a Geocacher, I'm Queen Victoria.

Edited by kunarion
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Important:

If you find a Travel Bug, it has the text "Don't keep me" and information on how to track it. It's not confusing. But if you're confused, you may enter the tracking number here and log it:

http://www.geocaching.com/track/default.aspx

 

(still confused? contact Geocaching.com: http://support.Groundspeak.com/index.php?pg=request)

 

That's what to do nomatter what. If you're donating a bag of them to a thrift store, make a log about that. If you are throwing them all away, log them. If you're selling them at auction, or if you buy one on ebay. Anything. Log them.

 

I would also suggest that selling something on ebay is MORE confusing than logging a Travel Bug. And the guy selling them is on no way confused. He has REFUSED to log them. And if (as he claims) he's not a Geocacher, I'm Queen Victoria.

 

Not that I disagree with you on logging TBs, but the Jeep travel tags DO NOT say "Don't keep me", nor do they mention geocaching dot com. Instead they say "Help me travel from cache to cache. Visit http: // jeep.geocaching dot com." Entering the tracking number at the Jeep site will take you to the TBs geocaching dot com page, though.

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the Jeep travel tags DO NOT say "Don't keep me", nor do they mention geocaching dot com.

True, but not only does every other TB dogtag have that text, it's no secret that they are not to be kept or sold.

 

The very first one listed on ebay had a laminated tag saying "This Jeep is a trackable, not a keeper!", "place into a cache within two weeks", and had a link "for more information" to the Geocaching.com Trackable page. If that's confusing, and is interpreted to mean it can be sold on ebay, I don't think it can be made any more plain. They probably should not be bought, either, but then it's likely the TBs would remain lost.

 

It's great that these TBs are being rescued. They were stolen and hoarded, had logs forged, and a phony backstory, for the purpose of sale on ebay, with the added threat of "if I can't sell these I have to throw them away". I'd suggest that they should only be passed to Geocachers who can be trusted to not mishandle them, or kept by the buyer. Place them in a cache, and now they're likely up for sale again. This is bad news for all Trackables.

Edited by kunarion
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That last green jeep sold for $102 :(

 

This guy totally knows what he's doing, either because inquiring minds have now inspired him, or because he knew from the beginning. What muggle has the common sense to turn around the ID tag?! Half the cachers can't even figure that one out!

 

CF

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This guy totally knows what he's doing, either because inquiring minds have now inspired him, or because he knew from the beginning. What muggle has the common sense to turn around the ID tag?! Half the cachers can't even figure that one out!

It is curious how he had the good fortune to buy a "bag of Jeep TBs in a thrift store" (although his story seems to have changed) that had convieniently faked logs to show they are currently in Geowoodstock 4, a nice selling point. So the sequence of events is, an actual Geocacher changed all the logs to "Geowoodstock 4" by accident, then gave them to the thrift store by accident, a non-Geocacher bought them in case they were valuable, decided they are, yet was too confused to turn them back to the game, even after I and several others explained how that may be accomplished. AND he's only selling TBs that have owners (Jeep) who won't contest the sale. AND he had a moment of non-confusion, showing the side of the tag that has no tracking number (Why bother? My guess: That would reveal too much. Okay, also to prevent Geocachers from posting some very important Note Logs about the sale). He also refused to post relevant questions/answers in his ebay listing.

 

And something's missing. Something real obvious. Did anyone else notice?

Edited by kunarion
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Just did a google search for Jeep Recovery Project. Lead me to to things of interest. One is a cache GC22w9g, its an archived TB hotel. The other is TBH2NW, its a Jeep TB. Looks like someone has either worked out a deal with the guy or is buying them up to rescue them from this guy.

 

Whoever the Jeep recovery Project is I say THANK YOU!

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Ok now for the rest of the story........

 

I am one member of the Jeep Recovery Project. I take lost or stolen Jeeps that have been out of circulation and grab them with the proper travel bug tag number and put them back into the world. IE TB1NWF3, TB132HT, and TBH552. I have purchased many of the original type Jeeps used for the Green and White Jeep and placed a new tag on them. When I was at the block party a few weeks back I dropped off 19 Jeeps that went all over the world. To date I have recovered 48 Jeeps and will continue to do more. I have a few friends who have donated money as it costs about $3 a Jeep to recover. Otherwise it is done out of my pocket and I am glad to keep these relished TB's going.

 

The Jeeps that were in the auction were indeed purchased at a thrift store. I had extensive conversations with the seller. The particular Jeeps were all at one point taken by a specific cacher. That said cacher has not logged in for some time so something may have happened to him. That is why they went to the Salvation Army store. The seller chose to stop the auctions due to all the emails he received from cachers. I am trying to obtain the jeeps and will try to get them back out soon.

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The Jeeps that were in the auction were indeed purchased at a thrift store. I had extensive conversations with the seller. The particular Jeeps were all at one point taken by a specific cacher. That said cacher has not logged in for some time so something may have happened to him. That is why they went to the Salvation Army store. The seller chose to stop the auctions due to all the emails he received from cachers. I am trying to obtain the jeeps and will try to get them back out soon.

Here's a key question that has not been answered -- along with a bunch of other unanswered questions (A little help, Eartha? Anybody?):

--> When were the Jeeps logged into "Geowoodstock 4"?

It was long after Geowoodstock 4, so they were NEVER at Geowoodstock 4. I'm thinking the fake logs were done this year, in 2012, before the sale, for the purpose of the ebay sale. What luck that the guy who bought them was planning to sell them!

 

Is the "Salvation Army" story true? If so, it's time to get the word out to "The Salvation Army" that Trackables aren't for sale (just liike most any stolen items that the Thrift Store may receive, they don't automatically sell everything). And to stop selling items by the bagful unseen (REALLY, that whole story is hogwash, right?!).

 

I wrote to the seller, who was dismissive and evasive. None of the important questions/answers were posted on the ebay listing (to make it appear that there were no questions). I didn't believe any of it.

Edited by kunarion
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At the bottom of every listing you will now find a link saying "Report this item". Since the item isn't property of the seller it should be reported. Ebay does review them.

Those items were reported, and no action was taken. That's kind of the whole problem.

 

You will also notice only ONE feedback, after at least FOUR auctions happened. How can you "cancel" an auction after the winning bid is done? If ebay can't even hold a legitimate auction, I'd say ebay is not all that interested in what is or isn't one's property.

Edited by kunarion
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The sellers back-story has changed yet again. It kinda makes you glad that what goes around, comes around.

 

"If you are familiar with Geocaching, you know that even though these are trackable, they are not Geocoins, or travel bugs."

 

I'm familiar with Geocaching and definitely did not know that!

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The sellers back-story has changed yet again. It kinda makes you glad that what goes around, comes around.

 

"If you are familiar with Geocaching, you know that even though these are trackable, they are not Geocoins, or travel bugs."

 

I'm familiar with Geocaching and definitely did not know that!

I guess he thinks that if he doesn't call them Travel Bugs, then they aren't but truth is, they ARE Travel Bugs, and they were created for Geocachers/Geocaching

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Here we go again, More Jeeps listed on Ebay

If someone will sell my Trackable, I say that person should be me. Am I right?!

 

So why not take action?

 

Remove all of your own Trackables from the game, as many as possible. Change the goal of each to this:

“If you find this Trackable, please PM me immediately! I'll pay postage to send it to me. I need all of my Trackables returned as soon as possible. People are actively selling stolen TBs on eBay since August 2012, and I don't want mine sold.”

 

When you find a Trackable, post this in its log: “People are actively selling stolen TBs on eBay since August 2012. Before I place it into a cache, please PM me, and I will send it to you. You should keep it. Then it can't get stolen and sold.”

 

Be ready with links and info, in case of questions. If more and more honest Geocachers join this worthy cause, fewer and fewer Trackables will remain in caches for the thieves. But then we can sell our own TBs, if we like.

 

Hey, it's just an idea. I'd say that if TPTB cannot take any action when property is stolen and sold out in the open (by someone who is almost certainly a Geocacher), they definitely can't take any action against me for doing my little part to return some Trackables to their rightful owners.

Edited by kunarion
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Would you like me to tell you how many times I've been Thank'd verses the number of times I've bee told. Blah blah blah you f!@#$%67 cache cop get a @#$%^&* life.

 

Would you like me to tell you how many people care?

 

I can talk about it but watch...

 

 

bd

Edited by BlueDeuce
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It's a pretty sad situation. I found a "recovered" jeep a few weeks ago (TB12MW6) and not knowing there was anything special about it I treated it like any other TB and dropped it in what I thought was a safe cache on a trip to California. Of course it and several others I left went missing immediately.

Edited by ~windknot~
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It's a pretty sad situation. I found a "recovered" jeep a few weeks ago (TB12MW6) and not knowing there was anything special about it I treated it like any other TB and dropped it in what I thought was a safe cache on a trip to California. Of course it and several others I left went missing immediately.

What's funny is it was a recovered jeep. This does happen as well. The Seller on ebay wanted to sell me the jeeps at $40 each but I balked. I just sent 18 more recovered jeeps out into the world and a few have made it overseas already to Europe, South Africa, and the Middle East. Hope they last a while.

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And Once Again, there is another Jeep TB being auctioned on EBAY. How many of these TB's does this guy have....???

http://www.ebay.com/itm/RARE-trackable-Red-Jeep-/221152926655?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item337dbddbbf

It's weird how the story kept changing, yet this stayed the same in the ebay description:

"The jeeps were last seen at GeoWoodstock IV and not since."

 

There is no evidence that any of these TBs were "at GeoWoodstock IV", but there's ample evidence that those logs are fake (and that the Jeeps were in fact "seen" in play for a while after the date that Geowoodstock IV occurred). The most recently listed holder logged them into Geowoodstock IV a long time after the Event -- I'd bet that happened this year, just before these Jeeps began being sold. It sure is lucky for this guy who "bought the Jeeps in a bag in a thrift store and knows nothing about them" to have "Geowoodstock IV" for his sales pitch, ain't it?!

Edited by kunarion
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Just saw the red jeep for sale on E-bay. Unbelievable. The seller states if you are familiar with geocaching you are aware these are rare. You should be more aware that they do not belong to the seller. We have moved quite a few jeeps since they came out. We were lucky to have be sent a green and a red jeep to start their travels. Each was grabbed at originally log the jeep and placed in a cache. They were not activated and they never showed up in our trackables owned inventory. I guess if these can be sold we should start grabbing those Greshem gold coins - they have to be popular and could sell for over $20 each.

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I guess if these can be sold we should start grabbing those Greshem gold coins - they have to be popular and could sell for over $20 each.

With the precedent set, any coin or TB owned by anybody is subject to be stolen and sold. Basically held for ransom. The threat of the Jeep Guy was if he couldn't sell them he'd have to "just throw them away". That is one scary dude. I hope he eventually gets the help he craves.

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what I find interesting is that he says in his auction and I Quote " they are not Geocoins, or travel bugs " Yet when you look up a JEEP TB it says right on their page that they are Travel Bugs. By the way, the one he is selling is this one;

TB1NNVP

Have you seen any mention of the ebay sales, in these Jeep logs? The TBs were purchased by Geocachers, some to be returned into play, yet where are the logs about what happened? Stealing and selling Trackables is bad, but when Geocachers participate and let the entire incident go, that makes things worse. Am I the only one that understands how huge this is?

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what I find interesting is that he says in his auction and I Quote " they are not Geocoins, or travel bugs " Yet when you look up a JEEP TB it says right on their page that they are Travel Bugs. By the way, the one he is selling is this one;

TB1NNVP

Have you seen any mention of the ebay sales, in these Jeep logs? The TBs were purchased by Geocachers, some to be returned into play, yet where are the logs about what happened? Stealing and selling Trackables is bad, but when Geocachers participate and let the entire incident go, that makes things worse. Am I the only one that understands how huge this is?

I have contacted both Groundspeak and Ebay in the past regarding this, but got no response. Not sure where else to go.

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I understand why people want to purchase these to get them back into the wild. However, as others have hinted at, paying $40 or $80 (or more) will just incourage him and others to keep steeling these and selling them on e-bay. If someone had bid $5 for the first one, and no one else upbid him, the guy would probably have thought it was not worth the hassle, and sent them to Log Dawgs just to get us all off his back, but for $100 each, and e-Bay's complacency, why wouldn't he keep selling them.

 

The only solusion appears to be for either all cachers to stop paying this guy (and keep hassling him and E-Bay via email and reporting auctions), or for Groundspeak to contact E-Bay. Unfortunatly, neither situation looks likely.

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I agree this guy keeps coming with them and now has coins for sale. I love this quote "This GeoCoin was made by a GeoCacher with the handle of Worker of Wood. It is handmade out of various colored clays. Worker of Wood is known for his ingenious caches, which are always VERY well camo'd. He personally made this Geocoin In mint condition." This is an old cacher for sure. I am about 99.99 % sure I know who it is.

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I agree this guy keeps coming with them and now has coins for sale. I love this quote "This GeoCoin was made by a GeoCacher with the handle of Worker of Wood. It is handmade out of various colored clays. Worker of Wood is known for his ingenious caches, which are always VERY well camo'd. He personally made this Geocoin In mint condition." This is an old cacher for sure. I am about 99.99 % sure I know who it is.

...and the seller's story changes yet again?! No longer is he a non-cacher who happened to "buy a bag of Trackables in a thrift store" without knowing what they are. Now he's a seasoned Geocacher selling unactivated Geocoins with background history on the coins.

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I agree this guy keeps coming with them and now has coins for sale. I love this quote "This GeoCoin was made by a GeoCacher with the handle of Worker of Wood. It is handmade out of various colored clays. Worker of Wood is known for his ingenious caches, which are always VERY well camo'd. He personally made this Geocoin In mint condition." This is an old cacher for sure. I am about 99.99 % sure I know who it is.

...and the seller's story changes yet again?! No longer is he a non-cacher who happened to "buy a bag of Trackables in a thrift store" without knowing what they are. Now he's a seasoned Geocacher selling unactivated Geocoins with background history on the coins.

If people keep paying significant money for these items, he will likely start "Harvesting" trackables from caches. If this becomes a trend, this could be really bad for trackables.

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This certainly explains why there are so few of these promotional TBs out in the wild anymore. If you can sell one for $100 a few years after they come out, why bother releasing it once it hits your mailbox? Why not head out and grab as many as you can from caches and save them for a rainy day sale? If a clamp isn't put down by ebay, the sponsors, or Groundspeak, this is a sad precedent, indeed. :sad:

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If people keep paying significant money for these items, he will likely start "Harvesting" trackables from caches. If this becomes a trend, this could be really bad for trackables.

It's a trend.

 

Yes, it has become a trend imo. As long as folks can sell most anything on ebay, their best sellers are the ones that cost them $-0- to put in their 'inventory'. There's nothing wrong with wanting to find a 'niche', but becoming a cache/TB bandit for profit isn't the answer.

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This certainly explains why there are so few of these promotional TBs out in the wild anymore. If you can sell one for $100 a few years after they come out, why bother releasing it once it hits your mailbox? Why not head out and grab as many as you can from caches and save them for a rainy day sale? If a clamp isn't put down by ebay, the sponsors, or Groundspeak, this is a sad precedent, indeed. :sad:

That, and many people just kept them when they found one. A couple of years ago, someone on this forum mentioned that they had a Jeep TB they kept. When I suggested they had stolen it, they were offended and said that 'everyone does it'.

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A couple of years ago, someone on this forum mentioned that they had a Jeep TB they kept. When I suggested they had stolen it, they were offended and said that 'everyone does it'.

That's the mindset of that ebay seller. I emailed to ask him how could sell a Trackable item he does not own, and he replied only "You obviously don't know the history of these Jeeps" (a guy that supposedly found them "in a bag", knows the special background history that allows these to be sold?). AND he never posted any question/answer in any listing! That's quite the scam Ebay's running there -- concealing legitimate issues related to items for sale.

Edited by kunarion
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... When I suggested they had stolen it, ...

 

But are they stolen and from whom? Only the owner can declare them stolen; and the owner is apparently non-caring. Liken it to a cache owner that hasn't activated their email. If geocaching<dot>com would set up a way for promotional trackables to be adopted after a promotion is over, it may take care of part of this problem.

 

I have bought several Jeep trackables, as has been posted in this thread. I get them moving again. I wouldn't mind if someone would do the same with my, more than 100, missing trackables.

 

A side note to those that think I'm making matters worse, one of the Jeeps I bought on eBay was previously "recovered" and sent on it's way as a "proxy"; neither the Jeep nor the Tag was original. So you can say to me, what goes around comes around!

 

I am amazed, though, by the many cachers that are having fun logging the Jeeps as "discovered" when they did not. Shame on you!

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But are they stolen and from whom? Only the owner can declare them stolen; and the owner is apparently non-caring. Liken it to a cache owner that hasn't activated their email. If geocaching<dot>com would set up a way for promotional trackables to be adopted after a promotion is over, it may take care of part of this problem.

The problem is nobody's telling the whole story. If this is a legitimate deal, be honest about it. Make a decent log on every Jeep purchased, about how it was found in "a thrift store by a non-geocacher, who threatened to throw them away if not purchased", how much you paid, and what happened since. Include a link to the ebay listing. It's all justified and perfectly OK, so there's no need for the secrecy... RIGHT?!! These Jeeps have a strange Ebay story, yet the logs gloss over that. Can't the seller nor the buyers be honest about this "promotional" deal?

 

It's at the very least, the property of all Geocachers. They're stolen from US. Activated Trackables are NOT kept* and definitely NEVER to be sold. If someone owns a Trackable and doesn't care, they can sell it themselves, unactivated.

 

Many people, unfortunately including Geocachers (such as the ebay seller), use Geocaching as a way to enrich themselves by taking. Some people place a nice item, and it becomes removed from the game. Trackables, swag, containers, whatever. It's all justified by "they can't/won't do anything directly to me if I take this". That's NOT an issue with the game piece, it's a character flaw.

 

In the ebay case, people bought the Jeeps, kind of as a ransom payment. I would prefer they didn't do that, but I'd also prefer they don't then release the Jeeps again to be stolen and sold again. Please keep it, but make the proper logs.

 

*The Trackable Owner may specify that it can be kept, sold, destroyed, whatever. In the lack of this specification, the item is intended to be properly logged -- if It's stolen and sold, THAT MUST BE LOGGED (why if it's legitimate, can't the logs say so?!), it's part of the story -- and it must continue to travel forever, regardless of who cares about it.

Edited by kunarion
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And Once Again, there is another Jeep TB being auctioned on EBAY. How many of these TB's does this guy have....???

http://www.ebay.com/itm/RARE-trackable-Red-Jeep-/221152926655?pt=LH_DefaultDomain_0&hash=item337dbddbbf

Is there a way to find out what the trackables number is? I found a red jeep a long time ago...curious if it could be the same one.

Yes, if you have the info on the one you found. All of the stolen Jeeps were back-dated and logged into Geowoodstock IV, in preparation to sell them on ebay (and in an attempt to hide the name of the Geocacher selling them).

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Man, if we put this kind of passion and energy into the corporations that rob us blind every day instead of some poor schlep making $40 off of a toy car and a tag.....

Go place all your Trackables into Geocaches to travel. The poor schlep can make some money off you.

 

The issue is Trackables having entirely faked logs in order to sell them (plus selling them at all). The Jeeps were sent to each cacher directly from Jeep, so back-dating to "Geowoodstock IV" before the first cacher received it from Jeep is completely wrong and needs to be undone. Those logs can be corrected in 5 minutes by Geocachers, or certainly by TPTB. The very fact that it's a minor issue means we shouldn't have to ever reach this point, but it's worthwhile to get it fixed anyway. I'm not ignoring that there are world problems bigger than Trackables. Sorry for the confusion.

Edited by kunarion
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You know, this linksays a lot about how these Jeeps should be handled. The issue here is that Jeep isn't actively maintaining their TB pages (nor are any of the other promotional folks... <_< ), and this ebay user can just do as he pleases.

 

But, so long as there is a specific icon that people can collect for finding a Jeep TB or whatever, there will be a higher demand for finding it. It would be best, unfortunately, if the sales of promotional TBs were ignored and the item went to the graveyard in geocacheland. But we all know that someone will be anxious to get that icon, and to keep a certain TB going for sentimental reasons or whatever.

 

Too bad we can't ignore rewards like special icons and souveniers. Ooooh...shiny!

Edited by NeverSummer
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