Jump to content

Add a Social Network type feel!


RPatey219

Recommended Posts

 

Sure, not everyone will agree on things that improve geocaching. It's just hard to see how the mission of "go outside, do something" is accomplished by coding more things to see what other people are doing, taking time away from things that might encourage people to "go outside, do something".

 

If people want to be able to post on twitface every time they log a cache that's all well and good, I just don't see how it is going to "attract and retain" people by them seeing a list of what other people are doing, just because they are doing it.

 

...

If you want to share your every move with your friends you can do so with an abundance of social media sites...

 

I don't care to join any of those other social media sites. I don't want to need to figure out how those sites work, and I don't want to need to filter out all the crap that would inevitably result.

 

I just want to let my 'Friends' know I finally found that cache I DNFed six times. :)

Similarly, I just want to know that my 'Friend' finally found that cache they DNFed six times.

 

I'd say that's what email is there for. If your friend is a prolific cacher the one they found after not finding six times is likely to get lost among the dozens of other caches they found, and if anything I'd wonder whether having people able to see every single log you write in real time would just provide another excuse for people not to write DNFs in the first place.

 

Are you doing this intentionally, or are you simply obtuse? If you look closely, you'll see that several anti-social media folks see the benefit of this. We do not want our activities broadcast to the world on Twitter of Facebook. That is exactly what we do not want. We want our Geocaching.com activity to stay on Geocaching.com, so continuing to suggest that I tweet out my finds is just a distraction.

 

Which is why I suggest emailing friends you think will care about specific caches you think they will care about. You know, the friend in another country who caches might take a generic interest in the fact you've been out for the 14th time this month; the friend who you only meet up with once in a while to solve puzzles might be interested to see which of the puzzles you solved together you've been out to find while the friend who lives on the next street and who you cache with regularly might want to know every single cache you've found so they know to plan next weekend's caching somewhere neither of you has been. All can see that by clicking your profile and listing the caches you have found, or you could send an email to let them know anything over and above a list with specifics they might like.

 

A generic list just showing everything you've found and everything you failed to find is only a very marginal change to what's there now (i.e. adding the DNFs).

 

As has been mentioned, there are several different areas of GC.com and tools on the site where we can get this info. A process that compiles all of it and puts it in one spot where it could be quickly reviewed gets me out of the house quicker. I would spend less time gawking at the computer if such a thing were in place. Knowing my friends recent activities would allow me to not only plan my own future adventures but also coordinate new adventures and get togethers with them. It would promote our geocaching activities.

 

I'm not clear how knowing what other people have done helps you plan your own future adventures. Coordinating caching trips with other people seems to be the kind of thing that is best done by talking one-to-one rather than looking at generic feeds containing everything - I've been on a few caching trips with friends where we look for areas neither of us have cached before but I've also been on trips where one or another of us has decided that even though we've found just about everything in an area we liked the area enough to go back even if we don't stand to get any new finds.

 

If you want to plan a caching trip with one friend then you want to see what they have been doing - interspersing it with what all your other friends have been doing just adds more chaff to the pile. Which goes back to the idea that seems increasingly old-fashioned of communicating one-to-one rather than broadcasting everything to everyone and letting them filter a constant stream of stuff.

Link to comment

 

Sure, not everyone will agree on things that improve geocaching. It's just hard to see how the mission of "go outside, do something" is accomplished by coding more things to see what other people are doing, taking time away from things that might encourage people to "go outside, do something".

 

If people want to be able to post on twitface every time they log a cache that's all well and good, I just don't see how it is going to "attract and retain" people by them seeing a list of what other people are doing, just because they are doing it.

 

...

If you want to share your every move with your friends you can do so with an abundance of social media sites...

 

I don't care to join any of those other social media sites. I don't want to need to figure out how those sites work, and I don't want to need to filter out all the crap that would inevitably result.

 

I just want to let my 'Friends' know I finally found that cache I DNFed six times. :)

Similarly, I just want to know that my 'Friend' finally found that cache they DNFed six times.

 

I'd say that's what email is there for. If your friend is a prolific cacher the one they found after not finding six times is likely to get lost among the dozens of other caches they found, and if anything I'd wonder whether having people able to see every single log you write in real time would just provide another excuse for people not to write DNFs in the first place.

 

Are you doing this intentionally, or are you simply obtuse? If you look closely, you'll see that several anti-social media folks see the benefit of this. We do not want our activities broadcast to the world on Twitter of Facebook. That is exactly what we do not want. We want our Geocaching.com activity to stay on Geocaching.com, so continuing to suggest that I tweet out my finds is just a distraction.

 

Which is why I suggest emailing friends you think will care about specific caches you think they will care about. You know, the friend in another country who caches might take a generic interest in the fact you've been out for the 14th time this month; the friend who you only meet up with once in a while to solve puzzles might be interested to see which of the puzzles you solved together you've been out to find while the friend who lives on the next street and who you cache with regularly might want to know every single cache you've found so they know to plan next weekend's caching somewhere neither of you has been. All can see that by clicking your profile and listing the caches you have found, or you could send an email to let them know anything over and above a list with specifics they might like.

 

A generic list just showing everything you've found and everything you failed to find is only a very marginal change to what's there now (i.e. adding the DNFs).

 

As has been mentioned, there are several different areas of GC.com and tools on the site where we can get this info. A process that compiles all of it and puts it in one spot where it could be quickly reviewed gets me out of the house quicker. I would spend less time gawking at the computer if such a thing were in place. Knowing my friends recent activities would allow me to not only plan my own future adventures but also coordinate new adventures and get togethers with them. It would promote our geocaching activities.

 

I'm not clear how knowing what other people have done helps you plan your own future adventures. Coordinating caching trips with other people seems to be the kind of thing that is best done by talking one-to-one rather than looking at generic feeds containing everything - I've been on a few caching trips with friends where we look for areas neither of us have cached before but I've also been on trips where one or another of us has decided that even though we've found just about everything in an area we liked the area enough to go back even if we don't stand to get any new finds.

 

If you want to plan a caching trip with one friend then you want to see what they have been doing - interspersing it with what all your other friends have been doing just adds more chaff to the pile. Which goes back to the idea that seems increasingly old-fashioned of communicating one-to-one rather than broadcasting everything to everyone and letting them filter a constant stream of stuff.

 

My friends are not "chaff".

 

I want to see what Fred and Ted and Tom and Bob and Joe have been up to. I don't want to click through five profiles to do so. I want the Friends feature to do what GC suggested that it might do over five years ago, aggregate it all together. You are not going to convince me that this would not benefit me.

 

I honestly would like to know why you are so dead set against this. I have a feeling that if I had started this thread instead of the other guy and had not used the toxic terms Social Network and Friends, the attitude would probably be much different.

Link to comment

 

Maybe I didn't word my post very well. What I was thinking was that if you wanted to tell me about a great cache you found you'd write me a quick email saying something like "Hey TT, long time no see, found an amazing cache today that really had me scratching my head - great container" or whatever. You'd be telling me about the cache you thought I'd be interested to hear about without mentioning the other 23 you found that day that were wet film pots behind signs because you know I don't care much for those. You might have another friend who loves numbers so you'd tell them how you had a great day caching and found 24 caches in an afternoon.

 

My primary objection with the trends in social media are the way nothing is personalised any more - it's just like walking into a room with your fingers in your ears and shouting an announcement to everybody. Sometimes that's appropriate, but for myself I'd rather have a more personal communication from someone that relates to common interests and based on the fact they thought I might be interested in what they had to say, as opposed to just posting something on the basis that someone somewhere might find it interesting.

 

And my point is: 'what if seventeen of my 'Friends' would possibly be interested in my log for the D4.5/T3.5 cache I found today?'

 

I would not be likely to send seventeen separate emails.

But perhaps all seventeen of them WOULD be interested in my exploits that day.

I click one checkbox, and all of them can vicariously share in my success.

 

Much like yourself, I would not care to hear how someone found 137 caches on a powertrail yesterday, and if that is what they see as relevant content I would certainly cancel seeing any more such drivel.

Link to comment
I'm not clear how knowing what other people have done helps you plan your own future adventures. Coordinating caching trips with other people seems to be the kind of thing that is best done by talking one-to-one rather than looking at generic feeds containing everything - I've been on a few caching trips with friends where we look for areas neither of us have cached before but I've also been on trips where one or another of us has decided that even though we've found just about everything in an area we liked the area enough to go back even if we don't stand to get any new finds.

 

If you want to plan a caching trip with one friend then you want to see what they have been doing - interspersing it with what all your other friends have been doing just adds more chaff to the pile. Which goes back to the idea that seems increasingly old-fashioned of communicating one-to-one rather than broadcasting everything to everyone and letting them filter a constant stream of stuff.

 

My friends are not "chaff".

 

I want to see what Fred and Ted and Tom and Bob and Joe have been up to. I don't want to click through five profiles to do so. I want the Friends feature to do what GC suggested that it might do over five years ago, aggregate it all together. You are not going to convince me that this would not benefit me.

 

I honestly would like to know why you are so dead set against this. I have a feeling that if I had started this thread instead of the other guy and had not used the toxic terms Social Network and Friends, the attitude would probably be much different.

 

Your friends might not be "chaff", my point was that if you're planning a trip with Fred and Ted then what Tom and Bob have been doing in the days leading up to it may count as "chaff" when you're looking for caches you'll enjoy doing. You know, if Fred and Ted live down the road and you go out caching with them a lot then the fact Tom and Bob from the other side of the country have found some cool puzzles doesn't help you focus on local caches you'll enjoy doing. So from the perspective my comment If you want to plan a caching trip with one friend then you want to see what they have been doing - interspersing it with what all your other friends have been doing just adds more chaff to the pile. it's perfectly true that for the purposes of your trip with Fred and Ted, the activities of Tom and Bob adds chaff to the pile. Of course if you're the other side of the country visiting Tom and Bob you'll want to know which caches are fun to find although the best ones might have been long buried under the endless updates from numbers man Joe who goes out caching every day and has found 463 film pots behind posts in the three weeks since Tom found the awesome 8-stage multi nightcache.

 

I'm against it because I just don't see how putting all that information in one place is going to offer any benefit to anyone, whereas other features left to languish in this very suggestions list would make the game better and therefore, in my opinion, should take a higher priority.

Link to comment

 

Maybe I didn't word my post very well. What I was thinking was that if you wanted to tell me about a great cache you found you'd write me a quick email saying something like "Hey TT, long time no see, found an amazing cache today that really had me scratching my head - great container" or whatever. You'd be telling me about the cache you thought I'd be interested to hear about without mentioning the other 23 you found that day that were wet film pots behind signs because you know I don't care much for those. You might have another friend who loves numbers so you'd tell them how you had a great day caching and found 24 caches in an afternoon.

 

My primary objection with the trends in social media are the way nothing is personalised any more - it's just like walking into a room with your fingers in your ears and shouting an announcement to everybody. Sometimes that's appropriate, but for myself I'd rather have a more personal communication from someone that relates to common interests and based on the fact they thought I might be interested in what they had to say, as opposed to just posting something on the basis that someone somewhere might find it interesting.

 

And my point is: 'what if seventeen of my 'Friends' would possibly be interested in my log for the D4.5/T3.5 cache I found today?'

 

I would not be likely to send seventeen separate emails.

But perhaps all seventeen of them WOULD be interested in my exploits that day.

I click one checkbox, and all of them can vicariously share in my success.

 

Much like yourself, I would not care to hear how someone found 137 caches on a powertrail yesterday, and if that is what they see as relevant content I would certainly cancel seeing any more such drivel.

 

I suppose a lot would depend on the granularity on offer, I just don't see how it would be filtered in a way to make it useful.

 

You might be someone who is interested in the fact your buddy from the other side of the country finally found that multi-stage night cache he had been hunting for months. Truth be told I probably would be as well, especially if I'd joined in on one or more of the attempts. But what when that same friend went out with another one of their caching buddies because they fancied having a pop at a power trail, and then a week later went back to hunting the fiendish puzzles? You'd get the update you wanted, then 137 updates you considered to be drivel, and as soon as they came off your friends list they'd be out doing the kind of thing that would interest you.

 

The key thing I'm struggling to figure from your post is how to separate "I want to share this because 17 of my friends might be interested" from "I don't want my 17 friends to share everything because I might not be interested". So you end up with either a hideously complex user interface, or a choice between not broadcasting your finds and spamming your entire friends list with every one of the 137 film pots you found that day.

Link to comment

I'm against it because I just don't see how putting all that information in one place is going to offer any benefit to anyone, whereas other features left to languish in this very suggestions list would make the game better and therefore, in my opinion, should take a higher priority.

It may be that notification of what your friends are doing would not help you in searching for geocaches to find. In fact, it may be that nobody would use it for that.

 

You are certainly free to pooh-pooh the social networking sites because people tweet what they ate for breakfast or some other triviality. Apparently some people like to discuss such things.

 

Clearly these forums indicate that people like to discuss geocaching, even some aspects that others may find trivial. Most of the discussion at geocaching events is about caches people have found.

 

Notification, or some kind of feed, of what your geocaching friends have been doing lately geocaching wise, can serve to start conversations and in turn strengthen an individual's connection to the geocaching community as they discover that that others have had similar experiences. From Groundspeak's point of view these conversations can result in people geocaching more often or in sticking with geocaching instead or moving on to other activities.

Link to comment

I'm against it because I just don't see how putting all that information in one place is going to offer any benefit to anyone, whereas other features left to languish in this very suggestions list would make the game better and therefore, in my opinion, should take a higher priority.

It may be that notification of what your friends are doing would not help you in searching for geocaches to find. In fact, it may be that nobody would use it for that.

 

You are certainly free to pooh-pooh the social networking sites because people tweet what they ate for breakfast or some other triviality. Apparently some people like to discuss such things.

 

Clearly these forums indicate that people like to discuss geocaching, even some aspects that others may find trivial. Most of the discussion at geocaching events is about caches people have found.

 

Notification, or some kind of feed, of what your geocaching friends have been doing lately geocaching wise, can serve to start conversations and in turn strengthen an individual's connection to the geocaching community as they discover that that others have had similar experiences. From Groundspeak's point of view these conversations can result in people geocaching more often or in sticking with geocaching instead or moving on to other activities.

 

Yesterday I saw a message on my FB feed from a geocacher friend from North Carolina (who I've only corresponded with via FB and email). He is in Japan right now and I don't know why he couldn't look it up himself but he asked if any of his geocacher friends knew if there were any caches in a small town he would be traveling to today. I was able to do a quick search, add six caches to a bookmark, create a .loc file and send it to him via email. It could have been easier with a share bookmarks with friends feature but that's the kind of Geocacher social networking activity that better social networking integration could facilitate.

 

 

Link to comment

I'm against it because I just don't see how putting all that information in one place is going to offer any benefit to anyone, whereas other features left to languish in this very suggestions list would make the game better and therefore, in my opinion, should take a higher priority.

It may be that notification of what your friends are doing would not help you in searching for geocaches to find. In fact, it may be that nobody would use it for that.

 

You are certainly free to pooh-pooh the social networking sites because people tweet what they ate for breakfast or some other triviality. Apparently some people like to discuss such things.

 

I don't have a problem with people discussing whatever they want, my problem is the way such trivia is broadcast to everyone universally. Telling Great Aunt Maude that you tried her new eggy toast recipe for breakfast is more relevant than telling your boss that you had eggy toast for breakfast, yet the social media approach increasingly appears to focus on telling everyone the same things at the same time.

 

Clearly these forums indicate that people like to discuss geocaching, even some aspects that others may find trivial. Most of the discussion at geocaching events is about caches people have found.

 

Notification, or some kind of feed, of what your geocaching friends have been doing lately geocaching wise, can serve to start conversations and in turn strengthen an individual's connection to the geocaching community as they discover that that others have had similar experiences. From Groundspeak's point of view these conversations can result in people geocaching more often or in sticking with geocaching instead or moving on to other activities.

 

Indeed, the forums are great for discussing geocaching and related things, as are events. The key difference is that in a forum I can see what everyone has to say regardless of whether they are on my friends list or not and at an event I can talk with one or two people or with a larger group rather than shouting at everybody all at once. To take an example, I've never met you so you aren't on my friends list, and yet here I am in a forum discussing the relative merits of an idea with you.

 

Seeing what my geocaching friends have been doing might start some conversations but only with people I've already had enough interactions with to put on my friends list in the first place. And if someone is a "friend" it's not unreasonable to assume I know a bit about the kind of caching they are doing. For example I know one of my friends doesn't cache a lot since his first child was born, another loves puzzles I consider too difficult but doesn't do high terrain caches because he's not very good at climbing, while another doesn't get much time to cache because of family commitments but when he does get out likes to do more extreme caches involving caving and climbing. Sometimes I'll team up with one or another of them to solve a particularly tricky puzzle. I genuinely don't see how a feed of their activity would help with any part of this - they'll already talk to me in the course of normal communication when they've solved a puzzle or found a difficult cache so there's still no "start conversations" to be done and "strengthening connection to the community" won't happen as I won't get anything in my feed unless someone is already a friend.

 

So I end up back where I started, wondering how to get a feed containing things I might find interesting (e.g. Arnold Underpants found that cache you and he solved together after six months) while avoiding an endless stream of dross (e.g. Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 001, Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 002, through to Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 635) that would bury the useful parts in a tidal wave of chaff. Throw in the way people are more likely to do power trails with one or more others and those 635 caches turn into 1,270 updates on my feed - maybe somewhere in the middle of that lot is a lurking update that says "Billy Fizz found that 5/5 cache on his 18th attempt".

Link to comment

 

So I end up back where I started, wondering how to get a feed containing things I might find interesting (e.g. Arnold Underpants found that cache you and he solved together after six months) while avoiding an endless stream of dross (e.g. Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 001, Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 002, through to Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 635) that would bury the useful parts in a tidal wave of chaff. Throw in the way people are more likely to do power trails with one or more others and those 635 caches turn into 1,270 updates on my feed - maybe somewhere in the middle of that lot is a lurking update that says "Billy Fizz found that 5/5 cache on his 18th attempt".

 

Pertaining to my vision of how this could be implemented:

 

I think maybe you have missed the part where Arnold needs to decide to check the box that will send the message (his log) that he found the challenging puzzle to his friends who have subscribed to his feed.

 

Not every log would automatically be sent to the feed.

 

If in fact Arnold decides that everyone needs to know about his every find on the 'Soggy Filmpot Powertrail', you could (and I certainly would) unsubscribe from his feed. I would probably also send a PM expressing my disappointment in the content of his feed.

 

In any case:

 

I heartily agree that there are a generous number of much more pressing functionality issues that should concern the site developers.

 

The chance that anything like this will ever be implemented is about the same as for me finding a winning lottery ticket on the sidewalk.

Link to comment

I think Geocaching.com should implement part of the website that allows you to follow your friends and other people in the geocaching community, to see their activity, and even activity to premium members when caches are enables and stuff.

What do you guys think?

I don't like the idea, as a whole, but I do like the idea of a news feed with local (50km or so radius?) caches when they have been enabled/disabled/archived/unarchived - any log that isn't a 'found it' 'didn't find it' or 'write note'.

The feature may not exist in that form, but there are workarounds -notifications of new caches and watchlists for specific caches. Doesn't give the comprehensive info you want, though.

 

An obvious associated solution would be to replace the tangled mess that is the notification option and let us have an "all cache types" option. Setting up a different notification for each individual cache type is one of the worst designs I've seen in a while.

I agree. Another option, which might be even nicer, would be to select multiple (not necessarily all) types to come under one notification, just like you do with log types.

Link to comment

 

So I end up back where I started, wondering how to get a feed containing things I might find interesting (e.g. Arnold Underpants found that cache you and he solved together after six months) while avoiding an endless stream of dross (e.g. Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 001, Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 002, through to Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 635) that would bury the useful parts in a tidal wave of chaff. Throw in the way people are more likely to do power trails with one or more others and those 635 caches turn into 1,270 updates on my feed - maybe somewhere in the middle of that lot is a lurking update that says "Billy Fizz found that 5/5 cache on his 18th attempt".

 

Pertaining to my vision of how this could be implemented:

 

I think maybe you have missed the part where Arnold needs to decide to check the box that will send the message (his log) that he found the challenging puzzle to his friends who have subscribed to his feed.

 

Not every log would automatically be sent to the feed.

 

If in fact Arnold decides that everyone needs to know about his every find on the 'Soggy Filmpot Powertrail', you could (and I certainly would) unsubscribe from his feed. I would probably also send a PM expressing my disappointment in the content of his feed.

 

I certainly would feel disappointed if Arnold felt the desire to share every single one of his 635 soggy filmpot powertrail finds, but if his normal caching activity were hunting 5/5 extreme caches, solving difficult puzzles, and doing the kind of caches that involve hiking for silly distances into the back end of nowhere to find a single ammo trail then I'd have to decide between losing the updates I would find interesting or tolerating a tidal wave of drivel any time he decided he was going to pick off a trail of soggy filmpots. Which is the problem I don't see how to overcome in the first place - using something like email means Arnold could tell me about the 5/5 cache he found and casually mention that on the same day he found 635 wet film pots on a powertrail, and could tell someone else about every single one if he thought they'd be interested.

 

In principle it seems to me that the "social media" type feed could be as simple as adding a cacher to a watch list, in which case we'd get an email any time they wrote any log on anything. It doesn't address the question of how to determine which caches are of interest and which are not but in principle it should be easy enough to do.

 

I heartily agree that there are a generous number of much more pressing functionality issues that should concern the site developers.

 

The chance that anything like this will ever be implemented is about the same as for me finding a winning lottery ticket on the sidewalk.

 

:)

Link to comment

I'm against it because I just don't see how putting all that information in one place is going to offer any benefit to anyone, whereas other features left to languish in this very suggestions list would make the game better and therefore, in my opinion, should take a higher priority.

It may be that notification of what your friends are doing would not help you in searching for geocaches to find. In fact, it may be that nobody would use it for that.

 

You are certainly free to pooh-pooh the social networking sites because people tweet what they ate for breakfast or some other triviality. Apparently some people like to discuss such things.

 

I don't have a problem with people discussing whatever they want, my problem is the way such trivia is broadcast to everyone universally. Telling Great Aunt Maude that you tried her new eggy toast recipe for breakfast is more relevant than telling your boss that you had eggy toast for breakfast, yet the social media approach increasingly appears to focus on telling everyone the same things at the same time.

 

Clearly these forums indicate that people like to discuss geocaching, even some aspects that others may find trivial. Most of the discussion at geocaching events is about caches people have found.

 

Notification, or some kind of feed, of what your geocaching friends have been doing lately geocaching wise, can serve to start conversations and in turn strengthen an individual's connection to the geocaching community as they discover that that others have had similar experiences. From Groundspeak's point of view these conversations can result in people geocaching more often or in sticking with geocaching instead or moving on to other activities.

 

Indeed, the forums are great for discussing geocaching and related things, as are events. The key difference is that in a forum I can see what everyone has to say regardless of whether they are on my friends list or not and at an event I can talk with one or two people or with a larger group rather than shouting at everybody all at once. To take an example, I've never met you so you aren't on my friends list, and yet here I am in a forum discussing the relative merits of an idea with you.

 

Seeing what my geocaching friends have been doing might start some conversations but only with people I've already had enough interactions with to put on my friends list in the first place. And if someone is a "friend" it's not unreasonable to assume I know a bit about the kind of caching they are doing. For example I know one of my friends doesn't cache a lot since his first child was born, another loves puzzles I consider too difficult but doesn't do high terrain caches because he's not very good at climbing, while another doesn't get much time to cache because of family commitments but when he does get out likes to do more extreme caches involving caving and climbing. Sometimes I'll team up with one or another of them to solve a particularly tricky puzzle. I genuinely don't see how a feed of their activity would help with any part of this - they'll already talk to me in the course of normal communication when they've solved a puzzle or found a difficult cache so there's still no "start conversations" to be done and "strengthening connection to the community" won't happen as I won't get anything in my feed unless someone is already a friend.

 

So I end up back where I started, wondering how to get a feed containing things I might find interesting (e.g. Arnold Underpants found that cache you and he solved together after six months) while avoiding an endless stream of dross (e.g. Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 001, Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 002, through to Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 635) that would bury the useful parts in a tidal wave of chaff. Throw in the way people are more likely to do power trails with one or more others and those 635 caches turn into 1,270 updates on my feed - maybe somewhere in the middle of that lot is a lurking update that says "Billy Fizz found that 5/5 cache on his 18th attempt".

 

You really should set your social media/Facebook bias aside and consider what I was actually proposing, which is similar, but slightly different from AZ's ideas. It is nothing like the "broadcast everything to the world" Facebook model and would be highly configurable. Each person would have control over who sees their activity as well as the content of the others' activity that they see.

 

Curious though, if it's a bad idea that you wouldn't use, how would you manage to see 1,270 updates on your feed?

Link to comment

I'm against it because I just don't see how putting all that information in one place is going to offer any benefit to anyone, whereas other features left to languish in this very suggestions list would make the game better and therefore, in my opinion, should take a higher priority.

It may be that notification of what your friends are doing would not help you in searching for geocaches to find. In fact, it may be that nobody would use it for that.

 

You are certainly free to pooh-pooh the social networking sites because people tweet what they ate for breakfast or some other triviality. Apparently some people like to discuss such things.

 

I don't have a problem with people discussing whatever they want, my problem is the way such trivia is broadcast to everyone universally. Telling Great Aunt Maude that you tried her new eggy toast recipe for breakfast is more relevant than telling your boss that you had eggy toast for breakfast, yet the social media approach increasingly appears to focus on telling everyone the same things at the same time.

 

Clearly these forums indicate that people like to discuss geocaching, even some aspects that others may find trivial. Most of the discussion at geocaching events is about caches people have found.

 

Notification, or some kind of feed, of what your geocaching friends have been doing lately geocaching wise, can serve to start conversations and in turn strengthen an individual's connection to the geocaching community as they discover that that others have had similar experiences. From Groundspeak's point of view these conversations can result in people geocaching more often or in sticking with geocaching instead or moving on to other activities.

 

Indeed, the forums are great for discussing geocaching and related things, as are events. The key difference is that in a forum I can see what everyone has to say regardless of whether they are on my friends list or not and at an event I can talk with one or two people or with a larger group rather than shouting at everybody all at once. To take an example, I've never met you so you aren't on my friends list, and yet here I am in a forum discussing the relative merits of an idea with you.

 

Seeing what my geocaching friends have been doing might start some conversations but only with people I've already had enough interactions with to put on my friends list in the first place. And if someone is a "friend" it's not unreasonable to assume I know a bit about the kind of caching they are doing. For example I know one of my friends doesn't cache a lot since his first child was born, another loves puzzles I consider too difficult but doesn't do high terrain caches because he's not very good at climbing, while another doesn't get much time to cache because of family commitments but when he does get out likes to do more extreme caches involving caving and climbing. Sometimes I'll team up with one or another of them to solve a particularly tricky puzzle. I genuinely don't see how a feed of their activity would help with any part of this - they'll already talk to me in the course of normal communication when they've solved a puzzle or found a difficult cache so there's still no "start conversations" to be done and "strengthening connection to the community" won't happen as I won't get anything in my feed unless someone is already a friend.

 

So I end up back where I started, wondering how to get a feed containing things I might find interesting (e.g. Arnold Underpants found that cache you and he solved together after six months) while avoiding an endless stream of dross (e.g. Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 001, Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 002, through to Arnold Underpants found Power Trail Cache 635) that would bury the useful parts in a tidal wave of chaff. Throw in the way people are more likely to do power trails with one or more others and those 635 caches turn into 1,270 updates on my feed - maybe somewhere in the middle of that lot is a lurking update that says "Billy Fizz found that 5/5 cache on his 18th attempt".

 

You really should set your social media/Facebook bias aside and consider what I was actually proposing, which is similar, but slightly different from AZ's ideas. It is nothing like the "broadcast everything to the world" Facebook model and would be highly configurable. Each person would have control over who sees their activity as well as the content of the others' activity that they see.

 

It's got nothing to do with my dislike of facebook, I just don't see how the proposal adds any value to anything. Highly configurable means either endless options to select when writing a log (in which case they'll be set to the default in most cases, especially for the growing numbers of mobile phone users who can't be bothered to write anything more than "." or "tftc") or making changes will involve fiddling with profile settings (in which case Arnold Underpants in my example above will end up spamming the world with Soggy Filmpot Powertrail 001 - 635, as he probably can't be bothered to fiddle with all the settings)

 

"Highly configurable" usually also means "intricate to develop" which increases the likelihood that Groundspeak are going to get something wrong along the way. Given their recent track records of "improvements" I wouldn't hold out much hope they'll get a "highly configurable user interface" right.

 

Curious though, if it's a bad idea that you wouldn't use, how would you manage to see 1,270 updates on your feed?

 

Can't I look at ways the feed might be helpful or unhelpful? It's, you know, part of the process of considering whether or not I like an idea. And I have to say I still don't like this one.

Link to comment

I think Geocaching.com should implement part of the website that allows you to follow your friends and other people in the geocaching community, to see their activity, and even activity to premium members when caches are enables and stuff.

What do you guys think?

I don't like the idea, as a whole, but I do like the idea of a news feed with local (50km or so radius?) caches when they have been enabled/disabled/archived/unarchived - any log that isn't a 'found it' 'didn't find it' or 'write note'.

The feature may not exist in that form, but there are workarounds -notifications of new caches and watchlists for specific caches. Doesn't give the comprehensive info you want, though.

 

An obvious associated solution would be to replace the tangled mess that is the notification option and let us have an "all cache types" option. Setting up a different notification for each individual cache type is one of the worst designs I've seen in a while.

I agree. Another option, which might be even nicer, would be to select multiple (not necessarily all) types to come under one notification, just like you do with log types.

 

Still another option would be to automatically add any cache to a "friends feed" when it was given a favorite point. I wouldn't be interested in every cache a friend found but I might like to see caches my friends deemed to be a favorite.

 

As far as "making better mistakes goes" we have 31 days of caches souvenirs coming our way.

 

 

Link to comment

I think Geocaching.com should implement part of the website that allows you to follow your friends and other people in the geocaching community, to see their activity, and even activity to premium members when caches are enables and stuff.

What do you guys think?

I don't like the idea, as a whole, but I do like the idea of a news feed with local (50km or so radius?) caches when they have been enabled/disabled/archived/unarchived - any log that isn't a 'found it' 'didn't find it' or 'write note'.

The feature may not exist in that form, but there are workarounds -notifications of new caches and watchlists for specific caches. Doesn't give the comprehensive info you want, though.

 

An obvious associated solution would be to replace the tangled mess that is the notification option and let us have an "all cache types" option. Setting up a different notification for each individual cache type is one of the worst designs I've seen in a while.

I agree. Another option, which might be even nicer, would be to select multiple (not necessarily all) types to come under one notification, just like you do with log types.

 

Still another option would be to automatically add any cache to a "friends feed" when it was given a favorite point. I wouldn't be interested in every cache a friend found but I might like to see caches my friends deemed to be a favorite.

 

That sounds a lot better - in my example somewhere above if Arnold Underpants goes and finds 635 caches on Soggy Filmpot Powertrail he's unlikely to mark them all as favourites, and if I like his caching approach enough to mark him as a friend the chances I'll be interested in what he considers the best caches are increased. If someone marks soggy filmpots on powertrails as favourites regularly I'd want to turn off their feed.

 

As far as "making better mistakes goes" we have 31 days of caches souvenirs coming our way.

 

I can hardly wait. Maybe when they've finished they can do something reckless, like maybe reading this forum and implementing something people say they want.

Link to comment

As far as "making better mistakes goes" we have 31 days of caches souvenirs coming our way.

 

My find count is certainly not impressive, but I am on a personal record pace right now. I am quite certain I can log ZERO caches in August. Avoid ALL their stupid for no reason souvenirs, and still set a personal high annual find count in 2013. Oh wait, I should not have put that in writing. They might get the idea to issue personal annual high find count souvenirs.

 

If they ever make a Groundspeak movie, we are going to discover that Jeremy has been taken hostage by the alien race that is now running the company in his name.

Link to comment

 

I can hardly wait. Maybe when they've finished they can do something reckless, like maybe reading this forum and implementing something people say they want.

 

Afterwards, they could put a banana in the refrigerator. :)

 

Or better still get geocachers to upload a photo of them putting a banana in the fridge in order to earn a souvenir. We could call it "national banana geocaching day" or something.

Link to comment

If they ever make a Groundspeak movie, we are going to discover that Jeremy has been taken hostage by the alien race that is now running the company in his name.

Ooooooooooo.... that 'splains what may be going on.

Souvenirs, Favorite Points, Challenges (always hated that term when it was already used in another aspect) arriving and then leaving very abruptly, lackadaisical and/or confusing (mixed signals?) trackable do's & dont's; but still no real site improvement functionality.

 

I remember a little ol' lady sayin', "Where's the beef?"

Link to comment

I think Geocaching.com should implement part of the website that allows you to follow your friends and other people in the geocaching community, to see their activity, and even activity to premium members when caches are enables and stuff.

What do you guys think?

I don't like the idea, as a whole, but I do like the idea of a news feed with local (50km or so radius?) caches when they have been enabled/disabled/archived/unarchived - any log that isn't a 'found it' 'didn't find it' or 'write note'.

The feature may not exist in that form, but there are workarounds -notifications of new caches and watchlists for specific caches. Doesn't give the comprehensive info you want, though.

 

An obvious associated solution would be to replace the tangled mess that is the notification option and let us have an "all cache types" option. Setting up a different notification for each individual cache type is one of the worst designs I've seen in a while.

 

It still is not a workaround. If I want to see the activities of friends A-F, I would need to have a notification of every cache in the world, and then have to filter out the millions of notifications that don't involve friends A-F.

 

It would work remarkably well given the idea that prompted it was "I do like the idea of a news feed with local (50km or so radius?) caches when they have been enabled/disabled/archived/unarchived - any log that isn't a 'found it' 'didn't find it' or 'write note'."

 

I'd rather let caching friends suggest caches directly to me if they thought I'd enjoy them (as a few already do) than have an automatic feed telling me every single time they logged a find. It would appear more relevant and, you know, more personal. Cacher A talking to me (anyone remember talking to people?) or even emailing me and telling me about the caching run they did and how much they enjoyed a particular cache or a circuit would be far more useful than just getting a notification that cacher A found 17 caches today and listing every single one of them.

Not quite like that- a news feed of Archivals, Enable/Disable, and Friends' logs

Link to comment

No thank you. If your friends want to know what you've been doing, they can click on your profile. Better keep your logs up to date. Agree with others, this is a listing site. Don't overuse the resources.

 

I'd like to see the whole logbook now. It's gone, and now I have to add another step to get to it. But did you see? You can click on the "Your friends logs" tab, to see if any of your friends logged it.

It reminds of me the recent gmail update, which I could do without as well. I wish all websites would not make change for the sake of change. Make changes we need. But I figure someone must have asked for that feature for it to be implemented. It wasn't me, that's for sure. I liked the cache page logbook just the way it was.

Link to comment

Are you doing this intentionally, or are you simply obtuse?

 

 

Sorry -- clearly I am not busy at work today.

 

Have a great weekend!

 

I think that video gets posted on every message board on the internet, every time someone uses the word Obtuse in a sentence. Not that I wouldn't have done it, you just beat me to it. :ph34r:

Link to comment

 

I'd like to see the whole logbook now. It's gone, and now I have to add another step to get to it. But did you see? You can click on the "Your friends logs" tab, to see if any of your friends logged it.

What I saw this morning was weird. There were no logs, just a link to click on the view logbook. Now the logs are there, as well as the link to view the logbook. So, all is well.

 

As Emily Litella would say: "Never mind :) "

 

Edited by Planet
Link to comment

No thank you. If your friends want to know what you've been doing, they can click on your profile. Better keep your logs up to date. Agree with others, this is a listing site. Don't overuse the resources.

 

I'd like to see the whole logbook now. It's gone, and now I have to add another step to get to it. But did you see? You can click on the "Your friends logs" tab, to see if any of your friends logged it.

It reminds of me the recent gmail update, which I could do without as well. I wish all websites would not make change for the sake of change. Make changes we need. But I figure someone must have asked for that feature for it to be implemented. It wasn't me, that's for sure. I liked the cache page logbook just the way it was.

 

Yet, it took you two years to notice?

 

Sorry, I thought that you were talking about changes that happened two years ago. What happened is that your Internet Explorer got set to compatibility mode. This disables the maps, logs and hints.

Edited by Don_J
Link to comment

No thank you. If your friends want to know what you've been doing, they can click on your profile. Better keep your logs up to date. Agree with others, this is a listing site. Don't overuse the resources.

 

I'd like to see the whole logbook now. It's gone, and now I have to add another step to get to it. But did you see? You can click on the "Your friends logs" tab, to see if any of your friends logged it.

It reminds of me the recent gmail update, which I could do without as well. I wish all websites would not make change for the sake of change. Make changes we need. But I figure someone must have asked for that feature for it to be implemented. It wasn't me, that's for sure. I liked the cache page logbook just the way it was.

 

Yet, it took you two years to notice?

 

Sorry, I thought that you were talking about changes that happened two years ago. What happened is that your Internet Explorer got set to compatibility mode. This disables the maps, logs and hints.

 

Internet Explorer, huh?
He'll deal with this! Edited by redants
Link to comment

I don't think we need an additional Facebook, but I totally agree with PRatey219.

 

I think Geocaching.com should implement part of the website that allows you to follow your friends and other people in the geocaching community, to see their activity, and even activity to premium members when caches are enables and stuff.

What do you guys think?

 

I just want all the information already existing on geocaching.com (plus some extra) at one place.

I suggest a news feed which could contain:

  • Findings by friends
  • Findings by geocachers you follow (by now it's not possible to follow other geocachers)
  • Findings of your own geocaches
  • Favourites of your own geocaches
  • Findings of geocaches that you follow/have listed etc.
  • Notifications of newly published geocaches (in your defined area)
  • Notification when your friends publish new geocachers
  • Notification when your friends earn badges/belts/milestones/achivements/souvenirs etc.

 

Of course with the possibility to check what information you want/don't want in your feed.

 

And for those of you concerned about the stalking: It is possible to stalk other geocachers at the moment, so a feed like this wont invent the stalking.

Edited by Henrikvd
Link to comment

Of course with the possibility to check what information you want/don't want in your feed.

 

If implemented, it should start out with a default of "none" and take if from there, but the one thing that I might remotely be interested in is not on your list. I might be interested in knowing (or sharing) is when a new photo is posted by certain cachers (or when I post one). Similar to what flickr does. I really do not care when a friend logs a cache, but there are some people I know who are very good photographers and I periodically look at their gallery.

 

Still, I can't help but wonder if resources on this site could be spent on other projects. I would prioritize it somewhere behind updatiing and improving Wherigo.

Edited by geodarts
Link to comment

Of course with the possibility to check what information you want/don't want in your feed.

 

If implemented, it should start out with a default of "none" and take if from there, but the one thing that I might remotely be interested in is not on your list. I might be interested in knowing (or sharing) is when a new photo is posted by certain cachers (or when I post one). Similar to what flickr does. I really do not care when a friend logs a cache, but there are some people I know who are very good photographers and I periodically look at their gallery.

 

Still, I can't help but wonder if resources on this site could be spent on other projects. I would prioritize it somewhere behind updatiing and improving Wherigo.

 

Which would mean never.

Link to comment

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
×
×
  • Create New...