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Fire Lookouts Peer Review!


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I've posted the hopeful new category 'Fire Lookouts' for Peer Review and looking forward to any comments /suggestions here. It took about a week of research and editing lots of copy to finally get to the final description submitted. I've been in touch with the officers of the Look-Out Towers category and a couple have been receptive of working together to cross-reference each others categories in our descriptions.

 

I hope this category becomes official soon! Happy Waymarking!

 

Doug

thebeav69

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I've posted the hopeful new category 'Fire Lookouts' for Peer Review and looking forward to any comments /suggestions here. It took about a week of research and editing lots of copy to finally get to the final description submitted. I've been in touch with the officers of the Look-Out Towers category and a couple have been receptive of working together to cross-reference each others categories in our descriptions.

 

I hope this category becomes official soon! Happy Waymarking!

 

Doug

thebeav69

 

Oh, boy, why don't you ask before you start such activity. This is 100% redundant category proposal, as all the Fire Lookouts fall under Lookout Towers category. All you needed to do is, to ask for for creation of sub-category (variable) in Lookout Towers. :tired:

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I've posted the hopeful new category 'Fire Lookouts' for Peer Review and looking forward to any comments /suggestions here. It took about a week of research and editing lots of copy to finally get to the final description submitted. I've been in touch with the officers of the Look-Out Towers category and a couple have been receptive of working together to cross-reference each others categories in our descriptions.

 

I hope this category becomes official soon! Happy Waymarking!

 

Doug

thebeav69

 

Oh, boy, why don't you ask before you start such activity. This is 100% redundant category proposal, as all the Fire Lookouts fall under Lookout Towers category. All you needed to do is, to ask for for creation of sub-category (variable) in Lookout Towers. :tired:

 

You are incorrect. This category is not a duplicate of lookout towers for a couple reasons. First the lookout categories must be publicly accessible and you must be able to climb it or go up in it by some means, fire lookout category does not require that, it just must be publicly accessible but not necessarily climbable and it must have been a fire lookout. Many fire towers are not open to climbing. Second not all fire lookouts are towers at all, some are just located high on a mountain.

 

Obviously those voting no on fire lookouts for being a duplicate do not know the requirements of the lookout tower category.

 

This was discussed in the forums prior to the category was posted.

Edited by BruceS
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I've posted the hopeful new category 'Fire Lookouts' for Peer Review and looking forward to any comments /suggestions here. It took about a week of research and editing lots of copy to finally get to the final description submitted. I've been in touch with the officers of the Look-Out Towers category and a couple have been receptive of working together to cross-reference each others categories in our descriptions.

 

I hope this category becomes official soon! Happy Waymarking!

 

Doug

thebeav69

 

Oh, boy, why don't you ask before you start such activity. This is 100% redundant category proposal, as all the Fire Lookouts fall under Lookout Towers category. All you needed to do is, to ask for for creation of sub-category (variable) in Lookout Towers. :tired:

 

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showtopic=302172

 

Why so insolent? thebeav69 is doing a great job for being relatively new in Waymarking.

 

-lumbricus

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I've posted the hopeful new category 'Fire Lookouts' for Peer Review and looking forward to any comments /suggestions here. It took about a week of research and editing lots of copy to finally get to the final description submitted. I've been in touch with the officers of the Look-Out Towers category and a couple have been receptive of working together to cross-reference each others categories in our descriptions.

 

I hope this category becomes official soon! Happy Waymarking!

 

Doug

thebeav69

 

Oh, boy, why don't you ask before you start such activity. This is 100% redundant category proposal, as all the Fire Lookouts fall under Lookout Towers category. All you needed to do is, to ask for for creation of sub-category (variable) in Lookout Towers. :tired:

 

You are incorrect. This category is not a duplicate of lookout towers for a couple reasons. First the lookout categories must be publicly accessible and you must be able to climb it or go up in it by some means, fire lookout category does not require that, it just must be publicly accessible but not necessarily climbable and it must have been a fire lookout. Many fire towers are not open to climbing. Second not all fire lookouts are towers at all, some are just located high on a mountain.

 

Obviously those voting no on fire lookouts for being a duplicate do not know the requirements of the lookout tower category.

 

This was discussed in the forums prior to the category was posted.

 

What can I add... Bruce said it all. It's sad to read the comments of this kind of people in the peer review. Again, it brings to my mind why Waymarking is such failure. The number of people who was attracted to Waymarking in first place just to be driven out by situations like these must be huge. Of course, senseless declination of waymarks and delayed review of submitted waymarks are other critical factors, but for now the focus is in this eagerness to refuse new categories. Sad. Even if I am not connected to this category submission, what I read in the peer review made me anger and frustrated for some hours.

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Lets take a step back here. I did vote against the creation of the new category, on the belief that it did duplicate the pre-existing "Lookout Tower" category. It seems that I was in error in believing that the two categories were near duplicates of each other. However, there is no need for anger or frustration. I have had category proposals declined, waymarks rejected, and been critiqued in the forum. This is all part of the democratic process.

 

There is a high bar for new categories. To have a good chance of success, one must answer all potential questions and objections. If the category does not pass the first time, but if you feel that the idea has merit, then re-write and try again.

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I'll ditto the guy up there. ^^^^^^^^.

 

Most Categories don't make it on the first submission. The Peer review process involves subjectivity, and you can never know what a person is thinking unless they share it with you. When you rewrite the category, take into account the feedback you were given, and try to clearly spell out anything that might not be clear. For example, you can tell us why this isn't a subcategory of towers, I'd even copy/paste from Bruce to start.

 

The more I read about it, the more I like it.

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I'm disappointed that the Fire Lookouts category was denied but I will definitely create a revised write-up and re-submit with a new take.

 

For example, the Fire Lookouts category CAN include destroyed/former lookouts, something the Look-Out Towers category does NOT allow. It's also been pointed out by fellow waymarkers that the Look-Out Towers category includes only publicly accessible towers whereas the Fire Lookouts category can include either publicly accessible OR non-accesible towers.

 

I consider the Fire Lookouts category as a specialized category, much like the U.S. National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) category. Why? Because there exists a U.S. and World Historic Lookout Register database, complete with Fire Lookout National category #s and State #s that work in much the same way as the NRHP category. The fact that there is a World Lookout Register database makes this category worldwide and not limited to just U.S. Fire Lookouts. A specific category for fire lookouts would be very beneficial in getting waymarkers to seek out any former, destroyed or current fire lookout to include in the National Historic Lookout Register, something that ALL officers of this category would be willing help waymarkers accomplish. I see this specialized category as very beneficial to the folks managing the Fire Lookouts database (www.nhlr.org) AND the folks at the former fire lookouts site (www.fflos.com).

 

If the current officers of the Look-Out Towers category are willing to include ALL of the U.S. and Worldwide Historic Register/database information as new variables in their category, then a separate category for Fire Lookouts is not needed. BUT... Are the officers willing to take on these additional duties and responsibilities for inclusion of former, destroyed, current and future fire lookouts into the National and Worldwide registers? If not, then myself and a list of other officers are willing to do it NOW and do it expeditiously!

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For a while, I had thought that there was a category for these already. I see them as two different categories. I didn't get to vote in peer review, but I feel that this would be a good category.

 

Look out towers are specifically set up for anyone to view a landscape; fire towers are set up specifically for an agency to view the landscape to look for smoke or fire. In the west and south Boston area I can think of at least 7 towers, so, etrapoloating, there have to be hundreds available where you can waymark a point near enough to the base.

 

Access to a fire tower depends on the land that it is placed on. In my area, the remaining fire towers that I know of are all on publicly accessible grounds - you may have to hike a ways in. Getting access to climb a tower depends. Most are not accessible, often surrounded by chain-linked fencing, but if someone is there and you ask nicely, they might let you up.

 

I view firetowers much like lighthouses - they are a sentinel station to guard against approaching danger. You can't always get close to a lighthouse, either, yet you can ask to post coordinates where the best view of the tower is - perhaps on a rock ledge nearby.

 

I perused entries in the Lookout Tower category. There was an entry for a lifeguard station with a tower. The description was so sparse that it was not clear whether it was publicly accessible. The others I saw on the first couple pages were clearly towers set up for the public to climb and get a view. Which is fine, and which is why I feel that fire towers deserve a category of their own.

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I've made an appeal to the officers of the Look-Out Towers category and explained to them what the issue is regarding my potential Fire Lookouts category proposal. The following is my letter to the officers and awaiting their responses:

 

Greetings,

 

I recently tried to send a potential new category, Fire Lookouts for peer review and it was denied due to redundancy issues. I've been told to re-write the category proposal and bring up any new points that weren't addressed in the last peer review and re-submit. Before I do, I wanted to ascertain as to what your opinion and desire is currently as a Look-Out Towers officer in regards to implementing some new variables that I've researched and am trying to include into either your category or into my own category proposal.

 

The following excerpt is from the Groundspeak forum in regards to the Fire Lookouts Peer Review:

 

"For example, the Fire Lookouts category CAN include destroyed/former lookouts, something the Look-Out Towers category does NOT allow. It's also been pointed out by fellow waymarkers that the Look-Out Towers category includes only publicly accessible towers whereas the Fire Lookouts category can include either publicly accessible OR non-accesible towers.

 

I consider the Fire Lookouts category as a specialized category, much like the U.S. National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) category. Why? Because there exists a U.S. and World Historic Lookout Register database, complete with Fire Lookout National category #s and State #s that work in much the same way as the NRHP category. The fact that there is a World Lookout Register database makes this category worldwide and not limited to just U.S. Fire Lookouts. A specific category for fire lookouts would be very beneficial in getting waymarkers to seek out any former, destroyed or current fire lookout to include in the National Historic Lookout Register, something that ALL officers of this category would be willing help waymarkers accomplish. I see this specialized category as very beneficial to the folks managing the Fire Lookouts database (www.nhlr.org) AND the folks at the former fire lookouts site (www.fflos.com).

 

If the current officers of the Look-Out Towers category are willing to include ALL of the U.S. and Worldwide Historic Register/database information as new variables in their category, then a separate category for Fire Lookouts is not needed. BUT... Are the officers willing to take on these additional duties and responsibilities for inclusion of former, destroyed, current and future fire lookouts into the National and Worldwide registers? If not, then myself and a list of other officers are willing to do it NOW and do it expeditiously!"

 

From reading the above excerpt, are you willing to include this new information as variables into your category? If not, would you be willing to make me an officer so that I can administer these new additions myself and oversee any fire lookout waymark submission into the National Historic Register? If you and other officers are willing to accept this, then I won't pursue the re-submission of a Fire Lookouts category for Peer Review. If you're not willing to include these new variables at this time, please let me know and I'l continue pursuing this on my own.

 

I feel there are many fire lookouts worldwide that aren't getting the attention they deserve, whether they've been destroyed and need updating, or need to be included into the National and Worldwide Historic Registers and by Waymarking them, are providing a wonderful service to the folks that maintain/oversee these Registers.

 

V/R

 

Doug

thebeav69

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...are you willing to include this new information as variables into your category? If not, would you be willing to make me an officer so that I can administer these new additions myself and oversee any fire lookout waymark submission into the National Historic Register?

 

If the officers of the Lookout Category are not willing to include the new variables, it wouldn't do any good for you to become an officer since you can't make those admin changes on your own.

 

Keep us posted on the progress, and we look forward to seeing a re-write in the forums.

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Hello, I recently came home from a day of meandering and snapping pictures of everything and anything and included in my photos was the cutest little official fire tower I have ever seen.  I was sure there had to be a category to either log the find or post a new waymark but the closest I came was Lookout Towers which, as mentioned in this thread, requires that the tower be publicly accessible.  So I started to search for previous requests to add the fire tower category and found this thread which seems to have just died.  Was the idea of adding fire towers totally abandoned?  If so, is there any interest by anyone but me to make another attempt to add it as a category?

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31 minutes ago, Janila said:

Hello, I recently came home from a day of meandering and snapping pictures of everything and anything and included in my photos was the cutest little official fire tower I have ever seen.  I was sure there had to be a category to either log the find or post a new waymark but the closest I came was Lookout Towers which, as mentioned in this thread, requires that the tower be publicly accessible.  So I started to search for previous requests to add the fire tower category and found this thread which seems to have just died.  Was the idea of adding fire towers totally abandoned?  If so, is there any interest by anyone but me to make another attempt to add it as a category?

I thought fire towers were accepted into the Lookout towers category. But you're right on the accessibility issue!  But if it's not accessible, how can it be visited after it 's posted?

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9 minutes ago, Max and 99 said:

I thought fire towers were accepted into the Lookout towers category. But you're right on the accessibility issue!  But if it's not accessible, how can it be visited after it 's posted?

Like so many other waymarks, one can stand in front of them.  They are not unable to be visited, just not accessible for climbing.  

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Look-out towers have to be climbable to be accepted in the category, fire lookouts are usually not. 

 

Still, the majority of the voters wrongly stated a redundancy as their reason to turn the fire lookout category down in peer review. That was it, currently you cannot waymark fire lookouts.

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20 minutes ago, fi67 said:

Look-out towers have to be climbable to be accepted in the category, fire lookouts are usually not. 

 

Still, the majority of the voters wrongly stated a redundancy as their reason to turn the fire lookout category down in peer review. That was it, currently you cannot waymark fire lookouts.

There are a bunch of fire lookouts waymarked. They just have to meet the Look-out Towers category criteria.

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11 minutes ago, Max and 99 said:

There are a bunch of fire lookouts waymarked. They just have to meet the Look-out Towers category criteria.

they wouldn't accept mine because neither I nor a visitor could climb up. It must be accessed by anyone.  I doubt many currently in-use fire towers are accessible.

 

from the Look-out Towers category:

Description:
Publicly accessible towers or other structures where people can climb on and enjoy a great view.
Expanded Description:
Climb up as many look-out structures (towers preferred) as possible throughout the world and take a photo of the scenic view from the top.

Any kind of artificial tower where anybody could go up by foot, lift, rope, ladder etc... Could be a classical look-out tower as well as "rebuilt" natural things like trees etc... Doesn't matter whether they are in the woods, towns or deserts of this world.

 

Edited by vulture1957
added category description
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47 minutes ago, vulture1957 said:

Description:  Publicly accessible towers or other structures where people can climb on and enjoy a great view.

 

I have two fire towers in my photo collection and both have wire fences around them with locks.  Both are easily viewed but not accessible.  Maybe it is time to try a new category.

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The fact that a small portion of fire towers can be waymarked as Lookout Towers (because those few are available to be used by the public AS lookout towers) does not rendered a dedicated category as redundant. I'm 100% in favor of a fire tower category and would be willing to be an officer.

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22 minutes ago, Bon Echo said:

The fact that a small portion of fire towers can be waymarked as Lookout Towers (because those few are available to be used by the public AS lookout towers) does not rendered a dedicated category as redundant. I'm 100% in favor of a fire tower category and would be willing to be an officer.

I agree with that. 

I do not remember how I voted when this was in peer review previously, but I'd probably be in favor of it now.

Edited by Max and 99
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If the description of the new category would exclude accessible fire towers, the chances of passing Peer Review would increase. I personally would love to see ALL fire towers in one category and could well live with a few crosspostings, but if redundancy was a reason for not passing the Peer Review, excluding the climbable ones might do the trick.

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1 minute ago, PISA-caching said:

If the description of the new category would exclude accessible fire towers, the chances of passing Peer Review would increase. I personally would love to see ALL fire towers in one category and could well live with a few crosspostings, but if redundancy was a reason for not passing the Peer Review, excluding the climbable ones might do the trick.

I agree, I was just doing some research and found that there are actually fire towers that are vacation destinations.  Since these are accessible, these and other accessible fire towers would qualify for the Look Out Tower category.  I am working on getting something set up for peer review.

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14 hours ago, PISA-caching said:

If the description of the new category would exclude accessible fire towers, the chances of passing Peer Review would increase. I personally would love to see ALL fire towers in one category and could well live with a few crosspostings, but if redundancy was a reason for not passing the Peer Review, excluding the climbable ones might do the trick.

Why should it excluded those? they are being waymarked because they are fire towers. If they are now being used as a lookout tower, then it should be wayamrked as both - it is a fire tower that is also a lookout tower. There are many categories where a structure/building falls under more than one category, because of what it was and what it now is are two different things. The CN Tower in Toronto is a lookout tower but as also a  Radio and TV Transmitting tower (and I string suspect that more than a few lookout towers also used for TV or radio transmission). Should the newly formed Radio and Television Transmitter Towers category have excluded the CN Tower because it is also a lookout tower?

http://www.Waymarking.com/waymarks/WMVFAM_CN_Tower_Toronto_Ontario

I think the key here is educating the "Waymarking public" about the distinction between a lookout tower and a fire tower (as well described already in this post).

 

Edited by Bon Echo
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The overlap was not the problem. The problem was misinformation.

 

You cannot completely get rid of that. It helps to make clear what the differences between the categories are, but only for people who do actually read the long description.

 

There is no objective reason against this category and I think they are interesting. I have never seen one and I could not find any hints they have ever existed in my home country, but I support the idea.

 

I guess you have a fair chance to pass Peer Review with a clear description and a good officer team. The community has changed since the last time. Yes, statistically, most Peer Reviews fail, but it's worth a try.

 

Just do not exclude accessible ones. Arbitrary excusions are always a bad idea. It would not increase Yea votes, I could even be tempted to vote against a chopped version, and maybe I am not the only one.

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I'm for this category, with the only exclusion being those that are already allowed in the existing category - the publicly accessible ones.  No reason for overlap with that.  [You can think of this new potential category as the typical "catch all" (such as Signs of History) to make up for too strict requirements for similar existing categories(s).]

 

I know of two such fire towers that has the aforementioned fencing all around the base, both within a short drive of me.  There would have been a third less than a half mile from me! except that the land owner was too nervous of folks climbing it (fence or not) and suing them; so it was removed in 1992.

Edited by MountainWoods
Changed word order in bracketed sentence to avoid confusion.
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I'm in favour of this category, with or without the exclusion. There are several in Australia with the majority off-limits to the casual climber. Some are very tall others short but on the top of mountains. Geocaching Australia has a Locationless cache Firetowers GA2654 which has 63 entries.

 

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I have listed a new group called Fire Towers and am desperately in need of help and advice since I have never done this before. 

1. Do I need to personally invite those of you who said you would like to be an officer or can you just go in and add yourself.  I did turn enrollment on. 

 

2. I am not sure how much detail to include in the description.  I did not limit it to non-accessible fire towers only because after thinking about it, I agree with Bon Echo's comment that some waymarks can be listed in more than one category.  I do think that there needs to be proof that the tower was established to be a fire tower though and included that requirement.

 

3. Silly thing, but where do the icons come from?  I tried entering several different free clipart pics but they all showed up with the blue checkered background.

 

Thank you to everyone for the discussion and advice.

 

Edited by Janila
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3 hours ago, Janila said:

I have listed a new group called Fire Towers and am desperately in need of help and advice since I have never done this before. 

1. Do I need to personally invite those of you who said you would like to be an officer or can you just go in and add yourself.  I did turn enrollment on. 

 

2. I am not sure how much detail to include in the description.  I did not limit it to non-accessible fire towers only because after thinking about it, I agree with Bon Echo's comment that some waymarks can be listed in more than one category.  I do think that there needs to be proof that the tower was established to be a fire tower though and included that requirement.

 

3. Silly thing, but where do the icons come from?  I tried entering several different free clipart pics but they all showed up with the blue checkered background.

 

Thank you to everyone for the discussion and advice.

 

 

I joined the group (thanks for the invitation) but also want to point out that there already is a group and a category for Fire Towers;

 

http://www.Waymarking.com/groups/details.aspx?f=1&guid=69a74836-85ce-46fc-a98c-01d96e477f5d

The Fire Tower category went to peer review (in 2012?) but it did not pass.

I cannot find the category (maybe it was deleted?), but you might want to check with NW_history_buff (who also started this thread) since it might be better to revamp what is already written, vs starting over from scratch. (also to not step on anyone's toes)

 

But assuming you plan to move forward with a new group and a new category:

Good to hear that you turned enrollment on so others can join. Next is to appoint some members to be officers (usually 3 or 4 officers but there is no set number). You can also set what level of "control" officers will have to do things such as;

Edit Category
Edit Waymarks
Edit Content
Edit Logo
Recruit New Members
Review Waymarks
Send Group Emails

 

All officers should be able to Recruit New Members, Review Waymarks, and Send Group Emails. You might want to limit the Edit Category, Edit Waymarks, Edit Content, and Edit Logo to the leader while the category details are worked out and wind through the peer review process. This way to maintain some control over the category you are trying to create. You can always adjust the office roles as a later time.

 

As for the icons, don't even worry yourself with that at this stage. There are some talented graphic artists here that usually prepare them after a category has passed peer review.

Edited by Bon Echo
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2 hours ago, Janila said:

I have listed a new group called Fire Towers and am desperately in need of help and advice since I have never done this before. 

1. Do I need to personally invite those of you who said you would like to be an officer or can you just go in and add yourself.  I did turn enrollment on. 

 

2. I am not sure how much detail to include in the description.  I did not limit it to non-accessible fire towers only because after thinking about it, I agree with Bon Echo's comment that some waymarks can be listed in more than one category.  I do think that there needs to be proof that the tower was established to be a fire tower though and included that requirement.

 

3. Silly thing, but where do the icons come from?  I tried entering several different free clipart pics but they all showed up with the blue checkered background.

 

Thank you to everyone for the discussion and advice.

 

Yes, waymarks can be cross-referenced, but they should not be cross-referenced in categories so closely aligned.  My thought is that if accessible Fire Towers were removed from Lookout Towers accepted list then I would be absolutely for this category.   Right now, though, all you have is a subcategory of lookout towers where a further smaller subset of that category get denied because they are not accessible for the public to climb.   You really have a mostly redundant category - the only part that is not redundant is the part of non-accessibility.  If you keep ALL Fire Towers, are you jeopardizing the approval process. 
If it were me, I would work with the leader of the Lookout Towers group on an acceptable definition of a Fire Tower where his officers will deny any submissions of a Fire Tower and mine would approve once the Fire Towers category goes live, with both categories making entries about the acceptability/unacceptability in each category.  That way, any claims of redundancy that might (and will come up the way the category is currently being worked) can be dispelled during the Peer Review Process.   

My humble opinion - remember, the quality of the writeup you provide for your category description will determine the quality of the waymarks submitted.
 
 

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1 minute ago, Bon Echo said:

 

I joined the group (thanks for the invitation) but also want to point out that there already is a group and a category for Fire Towers;

 

http://www.Waymarking.com/groups/details.aspx?f=1&guid=69a74836-85ce-46fc-a98c-01d96e477f5d

The Fire Tower category went to peer review (in 2012?) but it did not pass.

I cannot find the category (maybe it was deleted?), but you might want to check with NW_history_buff (who also started this thread) since it might be better to revamp what is already written, vs starting over from scratch. (also to not step on anyone's toes)

 

 

I emailed NW_history_buff on 10/25 to ask if he wanted to reopen his request but have not heard back from him.

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8 minutes ago, iconions said:

If it were me, I would work with the leader of the Lookout Towers group on an acceptable definition of a Fire Tower where his officers will deny any submissions of a Fire Tower and mine would approve once the Fire Towers category goes live, with both categories making entries about the acceptability/unacceptability in each category.  That way, any claims of redundancy that might (and will come up the way the category is currently being worked) can be dispelled during the Peer Review Process.   

My humble opinion - remember, the quality of the writeup you provide for your category description will determine the quality of the waymarks submitted.
 
 

 

Just took your advice and emailed the Leader of the Fire Towers group for his thoughts on eliminating Fire Towers or even including Fire Towers if they are not accessible.  He hasn't logged on in a month so I hope that we hear back from him.

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1. Everyone can join to be a member, you can invite people as well, then they can join by clicking a link in the invitation email. They are all just members. The leader can select the officers from the pool of the members.

 

2. I completely agree with Bon Echo's comment that the exclusion would be a bad idea. The excusion of accessible (climbable) towers does weaken the catogory in almost every respect I can think of, without any singe advantage. Get rid of that idea as soon as possible!

 

3. The icons are created by community members. We have some very talented people here. But you can think about that later.

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31 minutes ago, iconions said:

 Right now, though, all you have is a subcategory of lookout towers where a further smaller subset of that category get denied because they are not accessible for the public to climb.   You really have a mostly redundant category - the only part that is not redundant is the part of non-accessibility.  .
 
 

 

Can you provide any empirical data to support this? Do you know what percentage of existing fire towers are currently used as public lookouts? The suggestion from your comment it that the majority are accessible. What is that based on? My (albeit limited) experience is the opposite.

 

If we're looking at 3 out 4 fire towers are accessible, that's what I would consider a "mostly redundant category"; if it's more like 1 out of 4, I personally don't consider that to be redundant.

 

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12 minutes ago, Bon Echo said:

 

Can you provide any empirical data to support this? Do you know what percentage of existing fire towers are currently used as public lookouts? The suggestion from your comment it that the majority are accessible. What is that based on? My (albeit limited) experience is the opposite.

 

If we're looking at 3 out 4 fire towers are accessible, that's what I would consider a "mostly redundant category"; if it's more like 1 out of 4, I personally don't consider that to be redundant.

 

Thanks for the reply.  I'm sorry, I was trying to give some ideas on how to get this previously denied category approved.   
I made no assumptions if the majority of Fire Towers are or are not accessible - all I stated was that Fire Towers are a definite subset of Lookout Towers.  I gave no definite percentages on purpose as I am no expert on the accessibility of Fire Towers.  I'm also not going to research Fire Tower accessibility - that was a rather a silly request and one made to basically make all of my comments moot.  

Remember, this category has already been denied once because the majority of people in peer review believe that this is a redundant category.  If you are going to resubmit it, you are going to have to convince people that it isn't a redundant category.  The desire to get multiple waymarks on a single set of pictures and a writeup is going to need to be balanced by the desire to get the category approved.  Personal opinion on redundancy really only matters as one vote when the peer review comes around.  You really have to think about the voting Waymarking population in general.  If you are able to go and not only get a waymark in Fire Towers, but in Lookout Towers both, then you aren't really dispelling the redundancy factor, are you?

Again, just my opinions.
 

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That's the problem. Fire Lookouts are a subset of lookout towers (as a general term), but they are not a subset of the Lookout Towers Waymarking category as it is defined in the category description.

There is an overlap, no doubt, and I have no idea about the numbers, but I have reason to believe it's small and neglectable.

The category was not denied because of the overlap, it was denied because many voters wrongly thought it was a 100% redundancy. Thus, an exclusion does not help much. What it needs is to make clear that the existing category has limitations and does NOT cover the majority of the fire lookouts.

Edited by fi67
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5 hours ago, iconions said:

Thanks for the reply.  I'm sorry, I was trying to give some ideas on how to get this previously denied category approved.   
I made no assumptions if the majority of Fire Towers are or are not accessible - all I stated was that Fire Towers are a definite subset of Lookout Towers.  I gave no definite percentages on purpose as I am no expert on the accessibility of Fire Towers.  I'm also not going to research Fire Tower accessibility - that was a rather a silly request and one made to basically make all of my comments moot.  

Remember, this category has already been denied once because the majority of people in peer review believe that this is a redundant category.  If you are going to resubmit it, you are going to have to convince people that it isn't a redundant category.  The desire to get multiple waymarks on a single set of pictures and a writeup is going to need to be balanced by the desire to get the category approved.  Personal opinion on redundancy really only matters as one vote when the peer review comes around.  You really have to think about the voting Waymarking population in general.  If you are able to go and not only get a waymark in Fire Towers, but in Lookout Towers both, then you aren't really dispelling the redundancy factor, are you?

Again, just my opinions.
 

Sorry I did not mean to imply that your comments were moot - your comments are valued and usually very insightful. But you comments also seemed to imply that there is a major overlap between fire towers and lookout towers. Indeed fire towers are one type of lookout tower, but as I will show there are many other types of lookout tower  so this whole argument just seems to be lost on me.

 

I just looked over 24 pages of "Lookout Towers" = 600 waymarks, roughly half of the 1210 published waymarks in that category. I did my best to identify how many of those approved lookout towers were fire towers. Of 600, I found  19 that were fire towers*, and of those as many as 5 did not appear to meet the "accessible" requirements (a few even stated as much). Anyway, I would think it is safe to say that the lookout tower category is not saturated with fire towers. Of course this does not fully address the perception of redundancy, because I still cannot tell you what percentage of fire towers could be considered lookout towers - but I can say that only a small percentage of the waymarked lookout towers are fire towers.

 

I also found (in 600 lookout towers) 8 lighthouse, numerous skyscrapers, monuments, church towers, skyscrappers, ... I wasn't keeping a count, but it seems that only about 1/2 or maybe 2/3 of the 600 lookout towers appeared to be constructed solely as a public lookout - many appear to be multi-purpose and would be waymarkable in multiple categories. And upon reflection, I think many of the lighthouses that I've visited could be toured - including a view from the top - making then lookout tower - and yet it would be absurd to deny a category for lighthouses (if it wasn't already a category that is) just because those lighthouses could be waymarked as lookout towers. They are both, and should be waymarkable as both. And they are. So why the resistance with fire towers? If we want to exclude fire towers from the lookout tower category, should we not also exclude lighthouses, bridges, skyscrapers, TV transmitting towers, bell towers, shot towers, water towers, monument, and probably more from the lookout tower category since those too all have their own category as well?

 

*I may have missed some due to language difficulties, but tried to catch them all

 

I hope this all makes some sense. After sitting here over an hour, trying to write this out, I start to loose sight of what I'm even trying to say. time for a break...

But I will try to summarize my thoughts on this

Fire Tower: a structure built for the sole purpose of detecting forest fires. Manned by authorized trained professional. Today many are no longer used as originally intended. Some have been repurposed as publicly-accessible lookout towers, and as such they can be waymarked as a lookout tower.

Lighthouse: a structure built for the sole purpose of.. okay, we all know what a lighthouse is. Manned by authorized trained professional. Today many are no longer used as originally intended (my impression). Some have been repurposed as publicly-accessible lookout towers, and as such they can be waymarked as a lookout tower. But they can all be waymarked as lighthouses.

See what I'm going for there?

 

 

Edited by Bon Echo
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12 hours ago, Bon Echo said:

Sorry I did not mean to imply that your comments were moot - your comments are valued and usually very insightful. But you comments also seemed to imply that there is a major overlap between fire towers and lookout towers. Indeed fire towers are one type of lookout tower, but as I will show there are many other types of lookout tower  so this whole argument just seems to be lost on me.

 

I just looked over 24 pages of "Lookout Towers" = 600 waymarks, roughly half of the 1210 published waymarks in that category. I did my best to identify how many of those approved lookout towers were fire towers. Of 600, I found  19 that were fire towers*, and of those as many as 5 did not appear to meet the "accessible" requirements (a few even stated as much). Anyway, I would think it is safe to say that the lookout tower category is not saturated with fire towers. Of course this does not fully address the perception of redundancy, because I still cannot tell you what percentage of fire towers could be considered lookout towers - but I can say that only a small percentage of the waymarked lookout towers are fire towers.

 

I also found (in 600 lookout towers) 8 lighthouse, numerous skyscrapers, monuments, church towers, skyscrappers, ... I wasn't keeping a count, but it seems that only about 1/2 or maybe 2/3 of the 600 lookout towers appeared to be constructed solely as a public lookout - many appear to be multi-purpose and would be waymarkable in multiple categories. And upon reflection, I think many of the lighthouses that I've visited could be toured - including a view from the top - making then lookout tower - and yet it would be absurd to deny a category for lighthouses (if it wasn't already a category that is) just because those lighthouses could be waymarked as lookout towers. They are both, and should be waymarkable as both. And they are. So why the resistance with fire towers? If we want to exclude fire towers from the lookout tower category, should we not also exclude lighthouses, bridges, skyscrapers, TV transmitting towers, bell towers, shot towers, water towers, monument, and probably more from the lookout tower category since those too all have their own category as well?

 

*I may have missed some due to language difficulties, but tried to catch them all

 

I hope this all makes some sense. After sitting here over an hour, trying to write this out, I start to loose sight of what I'm even trying to say. time for a break...

But I will try to summarize my thoughts on this

Fire Tower: a structure built for the sole purpose of detecting forest fires. Manned by authorized trained professional. Today many are no longer used as originally intended. Some have been repurposed as publicly-accessible lookout towers, and as such they can be waymarked as a lookout tower.

Lighthouse: a structure built for the sole purpose of.. okay, we all know what a lighthouse is. Manned by authorized trained professional. Today many are no longer used as originally intended (my impression). Some have been repurposed as publicly-accessible lookout towers, and as such they can be waymarked as a lookout tower. But they can all be waymarked as lighthouses.

See what I'm going for there?

 

 

I totally understand what you are saying, but I'm going back to the original reason why this category was denied.  Waymarkers are going to see Fire Towers as a subset Lookout Towers and unless you make a VERY, VERY, STRONG distinction between the two categories, you are going to be denied again.  This is why I made the suggestion that you cooperate with the Lookout Towers group to have them deny any Fire Towers that come their way.  Like you said, you aren't talking that many that overlap and doing that assures that you have absolutely covered the redundancy factor.  A true Fire Tower would not be accessible to the general public for viewing purposes - people would get in the way of firespotting and professionals trying to get their work done.  This is absolutely why there should be no overlap.  A repurposed fire tower is no longer a fire tower - it is just a lookout tower with a little history.  Is that previous history worth getting the category denied?  This is a decision you have to make because six years ago the Waymarking community said no to this category as it is currently being written.  

 

 

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9 minutes ago, Torgut said:

 

Doesn't say much good about the brains of the "waymarkers" as you put it. Oh well, it explains a lot, though. :-)

 

I disagree. It really depends on where you live. We don't have fire towers in my part of the world or at least I can't find any information about active fire towers online. What I found are some towers that once were used as fire towers, but today are lookout towers or bell towers of churches or whatever. So, if former fire towers will be allowed in the new category, it will (in my part of the world) be a subset of lookout towers with maybe one or two active fire towers (although I doubt that I will find one). And if they are not allowed, the new category will be underprevelant (in my part of the world). This will not make me deny the new category, but I will astain, because I can't estimate how much redundancy OR underprevelance we will see.

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BTW, I do not have an issue with the proposed category including fire towers that would also be allowed in the existing FT category.  My opinion (and it's just mine) is that the WM community has gone a bit overboard in insisting on mutual exclusion in every potential category.

However, there is the consideration of getting the new category (no matter how wonderful it is) past the increasingly obstinate WM community.

 

To use an analogy, it's kind of like a prosecutor wondering if they should take a murderer to trial on skimpy evidence; knowing that if the jury thinks that there is reasonable doubt, then the prosecutor has failed miserably - double jeopardy, you know!  They can never try the murderer again.

 

If you submit the category for peer review a second time with the inclusion of all lookout towers (including acceptable Fire Towers), and it fails, then a third attempt (excluding the FTs) might be looked at by those who don't carefully read the description (about 80% of folks) as just a third attempt to put through a category that has already been rejected twice.  Is that unfair?  You bet it is!  But it's an uphill battle trying to get folks to look deeper than just the surface in any case.

 

On the other hand, if you eliminate the acceptable FTs on the second peer review and it passes, then you have a category that is not all that you really wanted it to be.

 

I've already said I'm for the overlap.  But the above is just some thoughts for you to scratch your head with....

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