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Reviewer is disabling my caches?


brendan714

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Aside from the clear implication that cache owners who hide difficult-to-reach caches will be punished for them, I am also concerned that these actions compromise the already-tenuous legal position of the reviewers. These actions certainly make it appear that they are acting as agents of geocaching.com, which is not allowed under US labor law.

 

Asking a cache owner to provide an update on a cache that has been inactive for eight years is not punishment.

 

First, "unfound" != "inactive."

 

Second, demanding that they undertake a 2-day trip to visit said cache is indeed punishment.

 

The cache owner assumed responsibility for maintaining those caches when he decided to seek out the original owner and adopt them. Whether the cache is a 2 minute walk or a 2 day trek is irrelevant. Cache ownership is voluntary, and cache owners agree to the guidelines when they place or adopt caches, and cache maintenance is a key responsibility. We all know that remote caches are a different beast, but asking for a check in after several years is entirely reasonable.

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Whether the cache is a 2 minute walk or a 2 day trek is irrelevant.

 

That is exactly the attitude I was referring to in my previous post about incentivizing bad caches. If the difficulty of getting to the cache hide is irrelevant to the amount of maintenance demanded, then hiding caches in difficult-to-reach places is effectively discouraged.

 

How does it feel to know your attitude contributes to the proliferation of lame urban micros?

 

Cache ownership is voluntary, and cache owners agree to the guidelines when they place or adopt caches, and cache maintenance is a key responsibility.

 

That statement is factually incorrect. Do you know why? If not, I suggest reading the guidelines in an effort to understand, and is a key to how geocaching.com does business.

Edited by fizzymagic
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Whether the cache is a 2 minute walk or a 2 day trek is irrelevant.

 

That is exactly the attitude I was referring to in my previous post about incentivizing bad caches. If the difficulty of getting to the cache hide is irrelevant to the amount of maintenance demanded, then hiding caches in difficult-to-reach places is effectively discouraged.

 

How does it feel to know your attitude contributes to the proliferation of lame urban micros?

 

Cache ownership is voluntary, and cache owners agree to the guidelines when they place or adopt caches, and cache maintenance is a key responsibility.

 

That statement is factually incorrect. Do you know why? If not, I suggest reading the guidelines in an effort to understand, and is a key to how geocaching.com does business.

 

The amount of maintenance required appears to be quite reasonable and in-line with the remoteness of the cache. Caches in this area are not allowed to go eight years without maintenance.

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The remotness of the cache should have no baring on the cache owner visiting the site at least once a year regardless of activity. If you cant at least do that than how are you going to respond to an actual problem?

Really? Why not save the effort for when there is an actual problem?

 

My Zephyr Creek cache was hidden eight years ago and gets found less than twice per year. It's an ammocan in a fairly remote location with a big enough logbook to last a century at this pace of finds. The cache very likely will outlive me. Checking in it every year "just because" isn't really worth it if you weigh the cost vs benefit. If someone reports a problem with it, THEN I'll invest the gas, the energy, and the time to do maintenance, but the once per year minimum you promote doesn't make sense in this case.

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The remotness of the cache should have no baring on the cache owner visiting the site at least once a year regardless of activity. If you cant at least do that than how are you going to respond to an actual problem?

Really? Why not save the effort for when there is an actual problem?

 

My Zephyr Creek cache was hidden eight years ago and gets found less than twice per year. It's an ammocan in a fairly remote location with a big enough logbook to last a century at this pace of finds. The cache very likely will outlive me. Checking in it every year "just because" isn't really worth it if you weigh the cost vs benefit. If someone reports a problem with it, THEN I'll invest the gas, the energy, and the time to do maintenance, but the once per year minimum you promote doesn't make sense in this case.

Exactly.

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The remotness of the cache should have no baring on the cache owner visiting the site at least once a year regardless of activity. If you cant at least do that than how are you going to respond to an actual problem?

Really? Why not save the effort for when there is an actual problem?

 

My Zephyr Creek cache was hidden eight years ago and gets found less than twice per year. It's an ammocan in a fairly remote location with a big enough logbook to last a century at this pace of finds. The cache very likely will outlive me. Checking in it every year "just because" isn't really worth it if you weigh the cost vs benefit. If someone reports a problem with it, THEN I'll invest the gas, the energy, and the time to do maintenance, but the once per year minimum you promote doesn't make sense in this case.

Exactly.

 

Not in your case. There is a world of difference between once a year and never ever.

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1471286919[/url]' post='5603434']
1471286455[/url]' post='5603433']
1471285260[/url]' post='5603426']
1471094158[/url]' post='5603005']

The remotness of the cache should have no baring on the cache owner visiting the site at least once a year regardless of activity. If you cant at least do that than how are you going to respond to an actual problem?

Really? Why not save the effort for when there is an actual problem?

 

My Zephyr Creek cache was hidden eight years ago and gets found less than twice per year. It's an ammocan in a fairly remote location with a big enough logbook to last a century at this pace of finds. The cache very likely will outlive me. Checking in it every year "just because" isn't really worth it if you weigh the cost vs benefit. If someone reports a problem with it, THEN I'll invest the gas, the energy, and the time to do maintenance, but the once per year minimum you promote doesn't make sense in this case.

Exactly.

 

Not in your case. There is a world of difference between once a year and never ever.

 

Exactly.

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The remotness of the cache should have no baring on the cache owner visiting the site at least once a year regardless of activity. If you cant at least do that than how are you going to respond to an actual problem?

Really? Why not save the effort for when there is an actual problem?

 

My Zephyr Creek cache was hidden eight years ago and gets found less than twice per year. It's an ammocan in a fairly remote location with a big enough logbook to last a century at this pace of finds. The cache very likely will outlive me. Checking in it every year "just because" isn't really worth it if you weigh the cost vs benefit. If someone reports a problem with it, THEN I'll invest the gas, the energy, and the time to do maintenance, but the once per year minimum you promote doesn't make sense in this case.

 

+1 to the posters above--how is that the same as caches that haven't been found in years? Twice a year is plenty. Also in this case--the OP adopted these sight unseen, and he's never found them. Who knows if the caches are even still there?

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The remotness of the cache should have no baring on the cache owner visiting the site at least once a year regardless of activity. If you cant at least do that than how are you going to respond to an actual problem?

Really? Why not save the effort for when there is an actual problem?

 

My Zephyr Creek cache was hidden eight years ago and gets found less than twice per year. It's an ammocan in a fairly remote location with a big enough logbook to last a century at this pace of finds. The cache very likely will outlive me. Checking in it every year "just because" isn't really worth it if you weigh the cost vs benefit. If someone reports a problem with it, THEN I'll invest the gas, the energy, and the time to do maintenance, but the once per year minimum you promote doesn't make sense in this case.

 

+1 to the posters above--how is that the same as caches that haven't been found in years? Twice a year is plenty. Also in this case--the OP adopted these sight unseen, and he's never found them. Who knows if the caches are even still there?

Normally i'd say the reviewer jumped the gun on this one. There just doesn't seem to be enough "bad" history on it to be concerned about.

 

However, i do feel that the new owner is obliged to check on it anyways. Especially if it's one he has never found. I would think he would want to at least know some of the particulars of the cache. The first thing i've always done on adopted caches was to go check and make sure they were in good shape and ready to go.

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The remotness of the cache should have no baring on the cache owner visiting the site at least once a year regardless of activity. If you cant at least do that than how are you going to respond to an actual problem?

No bearing at all?

 

Curious, if you were, oh, let's say...the owner of 4.5lb walleye, you'd spend a week+ every year to do maintenance, whether it was accessed that year or not?

 

No idea what that means but yes, I check up on all my caches twice a year regardless of find count. If I couldn't access it quickly I wouldn't own it. I try not to wait till someone tells me one of my caches needs maintenance before I fix it. Besides, I like each and every one of the areas I've placed caches so maintenance is actually enjoyable for me.

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The remotness of the cache should have no baring on the cache owner visiting the site at least once a year regardless of activity. If you cant at least do that than how are you going to respond to an actual problem?

No bearing at all?

 

Curious, if you were, oh, let's say...the owner of 4.5lb walleye, you'd spend a week+ every year to do maintenance, whether it was accessed that year or not?

 

No idea what that means but yes, I check up on all my caches twice a year regardless of find count. If I couldn't access it quickly I wouldn't own it. I try not to wait till someone tells me one of my caches needs maintenance before I fix it. Besides, I like each and every one of the areas I've placed caches so maintenance is actually enjoyable for me.

Okay, you didn't answer the question, but I see where you're coming from...

 

BTW, 4.5lb Walleye is a multi-day trek just to get to.

Guess you didn't notice that thread.

 

To you it has no bearing, as you won't put one out you can't access quickly ... which is nothing like any of the caches the OP's referring.

 

You must realize that there are quite a few caches out that folks can't access quickly, many with 4-5 in terrain, or taking some time (even multiple days) to get to, right?

Just so we're on the same page...

Thanks. :)

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I check up on all my caches twice a year regardless of find count. If I couldn't access it quickly I wouldn't own it.

 

So, in other words, you are living proof that the guidelines encourage the hiding of lame urban easy-to-reach caches, and discourage hiding caches in difficult-to-reach locations.

 

I appreciate your honesty. You'll probably end up getting used as an example in the future; don't think it's personal. It's just that nobody else will admit it.

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I check up on all my caches twice a year regardless of find count. If I couldn't access it quickly I wouldn't own it.

 

So, in other words, you are living proof that the guidelines encourage the hiding of lame urban easy-to-reach caches, and discourage hiding caches in difficult-to-reach locations.

 

I appreciate your honesty. You'll probably end up getting used as an example in the future; don't think it's personal. It's just that nobody else will admit it.

 

That would seem to be the current theory. I have a number of hiking caches. Not long hikes. A mile or two. Several hundred feet of climb. I check them if there's a problem. On occasion, I'll check one that hasn't been found on five years. If I had to check on them twice a year, I'd archive most of them. I did check on my first hide after nine years, because people here said you shouldn't put bubbles in a cache. So I went back and removed them! I like to sped my weekends geocaching, not checking on caches that are in perfectly good condition.

I think the OP's problem was the transfer of ownership. "You're the new owner. Go check on them."

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I check up on all my caches twice a year regardless of find count. If I couldn't access it quickly I wouldn't own it.

 

So, in other words, you are living proof that the guidelines encourage the hiding of lame urban easy-to-reach caches, and discourage hiding caches in difficult-to-reach locations.

 

I appreciate your honesty. You'll probably end up getting used as an example in the future; don't think it's personal. It's just that nobody else will admit it.

 

That would seem to be the current theory. I have a number of hiking caches. Not long hikes. A mile or two. Several hundred feet of climb. I check them if there's a problem. On occasion, I'll check one that hasn't been found on five years. If I had to check on them twice a year, I'd archive most of them. I did check on my first hide after nine years, because people here said you shouldn't put bubbles in a cache. So I went back and removed them! I like to sped my weekends geocaching, not checking on caches that are in perfectly good condition.

I think the OP's problem was the transfer of ownership. "You're the new owner. Go check on them."

+1 Yep.

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I check up on all my caches twice a year regardless of find count. If I couldn't access it quickly I wouldn't own it.

 

So, in other words, you are living proof that the guidelines encourage the hiding of lame urban easy-to-reach caches, and discourage hiding caches in difficult-to-reach locations.

 

I appreciate your honesty. You'll probably end up getting used as an example in the future; don't think it's personal. It's just that nobody else will admit it.

 

So a quality cache in the woods that is regularly maintained is "lame" and a cache that was planted 8 years ago (found twice the first year and never again since), never maintained by the original owner and never visited by the adopted owner, also located in the woods but at a higher elevation is "awesome". Let me guess, the old GC code makes it awesome. Qualifies for a fizzy and jasmer challenge?

Edited by L0ne.R
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I check up on all my caches twice a year regardless of find count. If I couldn't access it quickly I wouldn't own it.

 

So, in other words, you are living proof that the guidelines encourage the hiding of lame urban easy-to-reach caches, and discourage hiding caches in difficult-to-reach locations.

 

I appreciate your honesty. You'll probably end up getting used as an example in the future; don't think it's personal. It's just that nobody else will admit it.

You've attempted to "other word" his post into support for your "guidelines encourage the hiding of lame urban easy-to-reach caches" agenda, but justintim1999 didn't mention the guidelines as being the reason that he chooses to place caches in locations that meet his personal criteria for properly maintaining a cache. If his quote gets used as an example of something in the future, I hope it is only as an example of a proper attitude towards hiding and maintaining a cache - only place caches that you are sure you can properly maintain.

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You've attempted to "other word" his post into support for your "guidelines encourage the hiding of lame urban easy-to-reach caches" agenda, but justintim1999 didn't mention the guidelines as being the reason that he chooses to place caches in locations that meet his personal criteria for properly maintaining a cache. If his quote gets used as an example of something in the future, I hope it is only as an example of a proper attitude towards hiding and maintaining a cache - only place caches that you are sure you can properly maintain.

You make a good point that fizzymagic wants to blame the guidelines and GS's actions for the decline in hiking caches, but the post he's responding to is actually an example of a cacher's personal attitude preventing him from hiding hiking caches. And, furthermore, you echo that attitude yourself in that your closing statement makes me wonder if you'd consider it possible to properly maintain any deep woods cache that, by design, requires a great deal of effort to get to.

 

I still think there's some validity to fizzymagic's point, but you've made me realize that, to some degree, GS is itself reacting to the changing culture as much as it's causing that change.

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And, furthermore, you echo that attitude yourself in that your closing statement makes me wonder if you'd consider it possible to properly maintain any deep woods cache that, by design, requires a great deal of effort to get to.

I know for certain that it is possible (and not uncommon) to properly maintain caches that require a "great deal of" (and every cache hider has their own criteria for this) effort to get to.

 

My only point was that justintim1999 clearly did not say that his what-makes-a-good-location decision to place caches was based on some hidden "don't hide hiking caches" agenda in the guidelines. I was simply objecting to what I saw as an unfortunate mischaracterization of justintim1999's position in fizzymagic's post.

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My only point was that justintim1999 clearly did not say that his what-makes-a-good-location decision to place caches was based on some hidden "don't hide hiking caches" agenda in the guidelines. I was simply objecting to what I saw as an unfortunate mischaracterization of justintim1999's position in fizzymagic's post.

 

I will certainly cop to some exaggeration to make my point; however, I maintain that, at least in the context of this thread, justintim1999 was indeed presenting his standards as the result of accommodation to the guidelines. He was, at least to my reading, presenting his standards as an ideal to be emulated.

 

I think dprovan is not incorrect when he says that the changes in the rules for cache maintenance are following the lead of the community, not vice-versa. I believe both sides (cachers and gc.com) are to blame for the noticeable decline in average cache quality and maintenance I've observed over the past few years.

 

My main point is that holding gc.com blameless for the changes is not very defensible. They have had many opportunities to put in place carefully-thought-out guidelines that don't have the side effect of encouraging urban micro spew, and they have not taken them.

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My main point is that holding gc.com blameless for the changes is not very defensible. They have had many opportunities to put in place carefully-thought-out guidelines that don't have the side effect of encouraging urban micro spew, and they have not taken them.

 

I agree in respect to their decision to do away with the old power trail guideline and allowed hiders to hide a large number of caches along a path every .1 miles to allow finders to easily increase their find count. That was the tipping point.

 

The power trail mentality has seeped in to the rest of the pastime. And it has had a lasting effect on cache ownership. Many (if not most) cache hiders expect others to maintain their caches for them (replace them when they go missing). I suspect that the OP had that intention in mind when he adopted the distant caches. He knew his circumstances when he adopted them (5 hour drive away, grad student, busy life). .

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For those not following on the watch list...

 

The Mount Chester Summit cache was indeed still in place and in perfect condition eight years after the last find, and the CO just posted proof. He really did climb the mountain before having said in passing, it's fine. Which the reviewer apparently didn't believe.

 

I see a few logs have disappeared, so the drama is gone from the cache page.

 

Didn't I say it? Mountain caches need less maintenance. But if you're gonna insist (sigh), here's an example of quality maintenance.

Edited by Viajero Perdido
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Glad to hear that this cache owner is trying to meet his responsibilities so that these unique geocaches can remain active. Remote caches are awesome, but cache owners need to understand that placing a cache in an extremely remote place is not a substitute for maintenance. It is also good to note that the reviewers do have a sense of the difference between a remote cache and a non-remote cache. Eight years is a good run and asking for maintenance roughly once in a decade is completely reasonable. Good work, cache owner and reviewer.

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Glad to hear that this cache owner is trying to meet his responsibilities so that these unique geocaches can remain active. Remote caches are awesome, but cache owners need to understand that placing a cache in an extremely remote place is not a substitute for maintenance. It is also good to note that the reviewers do have a sense of the difference between a remote cache and a non-remote cache. Eight years is a good run and asking for maintenance roughly once in a decade is completely reasonable. Good work, cache owner and reviewer.

 

+1

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I check up on all my caches twice a year regardless of find count. If I couldn't access it quickly I wouldn't own it.

 

So, in other words, you are living proof that the guidelines encourage the hiding of lame urban easy-to-reach caches, and discourage hiding caches in difficult-to-reach locations.

 

I appreciate your honesty. You'll probably end up getting used as an example in the future; don't think it's personal. It's just that nobody else will admit it.

 

So a quality cache in the woods that is regularly maintained is "lame" and a cache that was planted 8 years ago (found twice the first year and never again since), never maintained by the original owner and never visited by the adopted owner, also located in the woods but at a higher elevation is "awesome". Let me guess, the old GC code makes it awesome. Qualifies for a fizzy and jasmer challenge?

 

I'm not fizzymagic but I guess that also for him it's not about how old a GC code is. There are no such challenge caches in my area and I'm not working actively towards challenge cache qualification at all.

 

The most perfectly maintained cache that is hidden at a drive in location or only involves a short walk is not attractive to me - I do not care about aspects like hideout, creativity and swag. What I care about is the experience in getting to the cache location and the route I'me sent along.

 

The big majority of caches which are very easy to get to (and typically fall into the category that the cache hiders can easily visit them several times per year) are boring for me.

 

I rather have a cache container with a damp log sheet hidden up at the summit of a mountain with a perfect view than a perfect cache container linked to an almost drive in cache.

 

I remember a quite emtional discussion I had with a cacher some years ago who argued that one should hide caches only close to places one can visit every day so to allow to immediately visit a cache location after a single DNF. That is in sharp contrast to my point of view. I neither expect a maintenance visit after a single DNF (except in exceptional cases) nor do I mind to wait several weeks or months for a maintenance visit if it concerns a cache that is worth the waiting time and where one cannot expect the same response time than for caches close to everyday locations.

I'm not losing anything if I delay a certain hike for some time and go for other hikes instead in the meantime.

I lose a lot however if such caches do not get hidden any longer at all and it's definitely the case in my experience that caches that are harder to reach get hidden less frequently nowadays than in earlier times.

 

I think it's bad if everything gets dominated by the expectations of those who are not going for remote caches anyway.

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Man.

From reading this thread alone, and the comments posted in it (without profile creeping) I had no doubt the OP was a responsible owner. I didn't see the issue at all about him being a responsible owner and doing reasonable cache maintenance - on caches placed or adopted. But that wasn't his point - the point was about the two caches that did not appear to have any reasonable problem being disabled. Not about the caches he knew had maintenance issues.

 

I can understand the perspective of having new owners of adopted caches at least visit the cache once as the owner... but I think that also has to balance with the required task of getting to the cache, and the chance that a cache may actually have an issue; because technically the condition of a cache doesn't change merely if the name beside "Owner" changes. It should be that in time, at some point, the adopted owner should get to the cache - but that shouldn't be a condition for it being disabled on such terms.

 

I would however have said that the reviewer disbaling it without perhaps having posted a note or sent a private communication first asking the owner to pay it some attention was jumping the gun, but admittedly apparently there was the initial private email and it probably was a mistake to ignore that -- lesson learned. Same with the pushback.

 

I think the situation just progressed unfortunately to a rough status, needlessly.

I also think there's no need to be patronizing in seeing him do any maintenance, because it's exactly what (by my impression) is his standard.

 

So the question still remains - why were remote high-effort rarely-found caches disabled and requiring a maintenance run?

 

On a much more general level, I can understand the threshold for a checkup run being lower on rural caches than on urban caches, despite it seeming contradictory (to allow easy caches that clearly need maintenance to exist without disabling, moreso than much more difficult caches that most likely don't need maintenance being disabled to force a checkup).

 

- I don't agree that the CO's caching career indicates irresponsibility.

- I don't agree that the two caches he's asking about prompted disabling due to their (potential?) state.

- I do agree that ignoring the automated email may have been a mistake that prompted a disabling.

- I do agree that pushback rather than rational exchange with the reviewer was quite likely a mistake. But if the latter had taken place, then I do agree that the reviewer was being annoyingly stringent.

- I do agree that automated disabling (or disabling based on automated notifications) based on limited DNFs of a very difficult/remote cache can certainly dissuade people from placing such potentially amazing geocaches if it means being required to make potentially expensive (money/time) trips just to check that it's still active every year, two, or three.

 

But this is all based on what I take from this thread, so my opinions could easily be based on unfact reports :laughing:

Edited by thebruce0
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I have seen many get disabled even with few finds and dnfs by inexperienced cachers. But think of nature. Weather, fires, animals and natural changes can make a cache disappear or be more hidden.

 

I went for a cache once in Washington. It was suppose to be near a waterfall with a nice path taking you there. But when I got there, there had been a super storm the year before. Which caused a very large amount trees to have been weakened and fell like matchsticks over miles of wilderness. The road I was suppose to take was no longer there and I had to take another road for another 9 miles to get close enough. Some loggers were blasting trees in the area. I had to climb over big fallen trees. No path left to go on, and I could hear the falls but couldn't see it through the avalanche of trees. I got to what might be a drop off into emptiness but I was still about 50ft to go. If the cache was there still, it would be impossible to get to it let alone find it through that many trees.

 

My suggestion is, if you put the cache out there, then you shouldn't have a problem checking on it and sometimes you will need to check on it if it was sitting for that long. You just don't know if it is there or not.

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I have seen many get disabled even with few finds and dnfs by inexperienced cachers. But think of nature. Weather, fires, animals and natural changes can make a cache disappear or be more hidden.

 

Of course that can happen but I still see no reason why a cache owner should regularly visit a cache without any evidence that there might be an issue. In what I wrote above I stressed the part where I talked about the non-exceptional cases.

 

In the case you describe below

 

I went for a cache once in Washington. It was suppose to be near a waterfall with a nice path taking you there. But when I got there, there had been a super storm the year before. Which caused a very large amount trees to have been weakened and fell like matchsticks over miles of wilderness. The road I was suppose to take was no longer there and I had to take another road for another 9 miles to get close enough. Some loggers were blasting trees in the area. I had to climb over big fallen trees. No path left to go on, and I could hear the falls but couldn't see it through the avalanche of trees. I got to what might be a drop off into emptiness but I was still about 50ft to go. If the cache was there still, it would be impossible to get to it let alone find it through that many trees.

 

It would suffice to temporarily disable the cache and go have a look when it fits. What you experienced can always happen and I do not see it as an issue that needs to be avoided upfront.

What some people here seem to suggest is that they wish that cache owners regularly check their caches just to reduce the risk that someone will fail as much as possible. In my opinion, failures are part of geocaching.

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I have seen many get disabled even with few finds and dnfs by inexperienced cachers. But think of nature. Weather, fires, animals and natural changes can make a cache disappear or be more hidden.

 

Of course that can happen but I still see no reason why a cache owner should regularly visit a cache without any evidence that there might be an issue. In what I wrote above I stressed the part where I talked about the non-exceptional cases.

 

In the case you describe below

 

I went for a cache once in Washington. It was suppose to be near a waterfall with a nice path taking you there. But when I got there, there had been a super storm the year before. Which caused a very large amount trees to have been weakened and fell like matchsticks over miles of wilderness. The road I was suppose to take was no longer there and I had to take another road for another 9 miles to get close enough. Some loggers were blasting trees in the area. I had to climb over big fallen trees. No path left to go on, and I could hear the falls but couldn't see it through the avalanche of trees. I got to what might be a drop off into emptiness but I was still about 50ft to go. If the cache was there still, it would be impossible to get to it let alone find it through that many trees.

 

It would suffice to temporarily disable the cache and go have a look when it fits. What you experienced can always happen and I do not see it as an issue that needs to be avoided upfront.

What some people here seem to suggest is that they wish that cache owners regularly check their caches just to reduce the risk that someone will fail as much as possible. In my opinion, failures are part of geocaching.

 

Failures are part of geocaching.

 

Checking on your geocaches is also part of geocaching. It had been eight years. Stop pretending that this cache owner has been asked to trot out there three times a week.

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I check up on all my caches twice a year regardless of find count. If I couldn't access it quickly I wouldn't own it.

 

So, in other words, you are living proof that the guidelines encourage the hiding of lame urban easy-to-reach caches, and discourage hiding caches in difficult-to-reach locations.

 

I appreciate your honesty. You'll probably end up getting used as an example in the future; don't think it's personal. It's just that nobody else will admit it.

 

Why don't you take a look at my caches and judge whether or not they're lame. If the requirement of a cool cache is to travel further than 5 miles to reach it than yes, all my caches are lame.

 

As far as using me as an example, by all means please do. But first take the time to know who I am and what I believe in first. I would hope that people wouldn't use me as an example soley on your uneducated opinion.

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The remotness of the cache should have no baring on the cache owner visiting the site at least once a year regardless of activity. If you cant at least do that than how are you going to respond to an actual problem?

No bearing at all?

 

Curious, if you were, oh, let's say...the owner of 4.5lb walleye, you'd spend a week+ every year to do maintenance, whether it was accessed that year or not?

 

No idea what that means but yes, I check up on all my caches twice a year regardless of find count. If I couldn't access it quickly I wouldn't own it. I try not to wait till someone tells me one of my caches needs maintenance before I fix it. Besides, I like each and every one of the areas I've placed caches so maintenance is actually enjoyable for me.

Okay, you didn't answer the question, but I see where you're coming from...

 

BTW, 4.5lb Walleye is a multi-day trek just to get to.

Guess you didn't notice that thread.

 

To you it has no bearing, as you won't put one out you can't access quickly ... which is nothing like any of the caches the OP's referring.

 

You must realize that there are quite a few caches out that folks can't access quickly, many with 4-5 in terrain, or taking some time (even multiple days) to get to, right?

Just so we're on the same page...

Thanks. :)

 

Nope. I haven't hid any of those yet. The point here is whether or not accessibility is an excuse for not maintaining your caches in a timely manor. I don't care how cool or old or favorited a cache is, If you cant maintain it properly than than you shouldn't place it to begin with.

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I check up on all my caches twice a year regardless of find count. If I couldn't access it quickly I wouldn't own it.

 

So, in other words, you are living proof that the guidelines encourage the hiding of lame urban easy-to-reach caches, and discourage hiding caches in difficult-to-reach locations.

 

I appreciate your honesty. You'll probably end up getting used as an example in the future; don't think it's personal. It's just that nobody else will admit it.

 

That would seem to be the current theory. I have a number of hiking caches. Not long hikes. A mile or two. Several hundred feet of climb. I check them if there's a problem. On occasion, I'll check one that hasn't been found on five years. If I had to check on them twice a year, I'd archive most of them. I did check on my first hide after nine years, because people here said you shouldn't put bubbles in a cache. So I went back and removed them! I like to sped my weekends geocaching, not checking on caches that are in perfectly good condition.

I think the OP's problem was the transfer of ownership. "You're the new owner. Go check on them."

 

Ok. You preform maintanance according the the guidelines which is perfictly fine. I check mine often because many are custom containers with no history of being in the outdoors. After they've proven they can handle mother nature I don't worry about them as much. I also check them often because I live relitivly close to them and I enjoy the areas their in.

 

As long as your willing and able to preform maintanance in a reasonable amount of time than it really dosn't matter to me where you put them.

 

I'm getting the sense that the distance needed to travel to maintain some of these caches is somehow relevent and it's being used as an excuse.

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My only point was that justintim1999 clearly did not say that his what-makes-a-good-location decision to place caches was based on some hidden "don't hide hiking caches" agenda in the guidelines. I was simply objecting to what I saw as an unfortunate mischaracterization of justintim1999's position in fizzymagic's post.

 

I will certainly cop to some exaggeration to make my point; however, I maintain that, at least in the context of this thread, justintim1999 was indeed presenting his standards as the result of accommodation to the guidelines. He was, at least to my reading, presenting his standards as an ideal to be emulated.

 

I think dprovan is not incorrect when he says that the changes in the rules for cache maintenance are following the lead of the community, not vice-versa. I believe both sides (cachers and gc.com) are to blame for the noticeable decline in average cache quality and maintenance I've observed over the past few years.

 

My main point is that holding gc.com blameless for the changes is not very defensible. They have had many opportunities to put in place carefully-thought-out guidelines that don't have the side effect of encouraging urban micro spew, and they have not taken them.

 

Than please use GS as the example.

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The point here is whether or not accessibility is an excuse for not maintaining your caches in a timely manor. I don't care how cool or old or favorited a cache is, If you cant maintain it properly than than you shouldn't place it to begin with.

 

One of the key points is that timely manner should not mean the same thing for a cache which is very easy to reach and one that is hard to reach. I rather wait longer for maintenance of hard to reach caches than to have no caches at such locations at all (which is the only alternative as noone can promise and keep up the same response times than for easily reachable caches).

 

While your main point seems to be timely maintenance, my preference goes towards memorable caches that I enjoy. I rather wait longer for their maintenance than being left with caches that are maintained very quickly but are not attractive to me.

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The point here is whether or not accessibility is an excuse for not maintaining your caches in a timely manor. I don't care how cool or old or favorited a cache is, If you cant maintain it properly than than you shouldn't place it to begin with.

The point here is What does "maintain it properly and timely" mean?

 

There are some obvious personal opinions illustrated here and some room for discussion, however it is intuitively obvious that maintenance requirements differ between caches, cache containers, cache locations, number of visits, local environments, time of year...

 

Edit

So getting back to the OP, if there are no issues reported on the cache page what are the immediate maintenance requirements? Is not the purpose of a "needs maintenance log" to alert the owner that there may be an issue? Wherein the absence of which we can nominally assume everything is ok?

Edited by MKFmly
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The point here is whether or not accessibility is an excuse for not maintaining your caches in a timely manor. I don't care how cool or old or favorited a cache is, If you cant maintain it properly than than you shouldn't place it to begin with.

The point here is What does "maintain it properly and timely" mean?

 

There are some obvious personal opinions illustrated here and some room for discussion, however it is intuitively obvious that maintenance requirements differ between caches, cache containers, cache locations, number of visits, local environments, time of year...

 

Your exactly right. A cache that gets 3 visits a year and is a day or two hike dosn't need to be maintained as often or as quickly. One that gets 50 or 100 visits a year needs more attention.

My point is you need to be willing and able to make that two day hike if the need arises.

 

I think you should visit your caches at least once a year regardless. Right off the bat the "long distance hiking" cachers and the "set it and forget it" cachers are ready to burn me at the stake for even hinting at such an idea.

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Your exactly right. A cache that gets 3 visits a year and is a day or two hike dosn't need to be maintained as often or as quickly. One that gets 50 or 100 visits a year needs more attention.

My point is you need to be willing and able to make that two day hike if the need arises.

 

I think you should visit your caches at least once a year regardless. Right off the bat the "long distance hiking" cachers and the "set it and forget it" cachers are ready to burn me at the stake for even hinting at such an idea.

Sort of, but only do to your hardline "once a year regardless" perspective. They don't disagree with maintenance or the sentiment, they disagree with the schedule. The inherent purpose of a "needs maintenance" log is well, to say the cache needs maintenance. Yes, it is a reactive system but that is what Groundspeak created because anything else would not work.

 

You are responsible for occasional visits to your cache to ensure it is in proper working order, especially when someone reports a problem with the cache (missing, damaged, wet, etc.), or posts a Needs Maintenance log.

Emphasis Mine. Occasional in many definitions means "occurring, appearing, or done infrequently and irregularly" and that's what many here advocate for...like when there is a potential problem identified through a found it, a DNF, or NM log... as you say "the need arises".

 

So back to the OP,

Again if there are no issues reported on the cache page what are the immediate maintenance requirements? Why is the reviewer arbitrarily imposing a maintenance visit?

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So back to the OP,

Again if there are no issues reported on the cache page what are the immediate maintenance requirements? Why is the reviewer arbitrarily imposing a maintenance visit?

 

One of the caches hadn't had any activity in eight years, and was recently adopted by a new owner. That's not "arbitrary."

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One of the caches hadn't had any activity in eight years, and was recently adopted by a new owner. That's not "arbitrary."

So the forced maintenance visit criteria are documented somewhere?

 

Nothing is forced. Cache ownership is entirely voluntary. When you place a cache or adopt a cache, you agree to adhere to the cache placement guidelines.

 

The guidelines do not specify that visits are only required when someone reports a problem. The word used is "especially."

 

In the case of a very remote cache, it is wholly reasonable that eight years of inactivity and a new owner calls for a maintenance visit in accordance with the guidelines.

 

You are responsible for occasional visits to your cache to ensure it is in proper working order, especially when someone reports a problem with the cache (missing, damaged, wet, etc.), or posts a Needs Maintenance log.
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One of the caches hadn't had any activity in eight years, and was recently adopted by a new owner. That's not "arbitrary."

So the forced maintenance visit criteria are documented somewhere?

 

Nothing is forced. Cache ownership is entirely voluntary. When you place a cache or adopt a cache, you agree to adhere to the cache placement guidelines.

 

The guidelines do not specify that visits are only required when someone reports a problem. The word used is "especially."

 

In the case of a very remote cache, it is wholly reasonable that eight years of inactivity and a new owner calls for a maintenance visit in accordance with the guidelines.

 

You are responsible for occasional visits to your cache to ensure it is in proper working order, especially when someone reports a problem with the cache (missing, damaged, wet, etc.), or posts a Needs Maintenance log.

So, instead of disabling the cache, a note or warning could have been posted. If disabled, anyone looking at it may believe there is a problem with the cache, not merely that it's time for a periodic checkup. Disabling in this case (no reported problem) is a little much. The CO has demonstrated (at least IMO from what I read in this thread) that they are willing to, and do, reasonable and responsible maintenance.

 

They are complaining that two caches which have no reported issues are being disabled (implying problems) requiring (ie, forcing) a maintenance run for it to continue to be listed in good order.

Edited by thebruce0
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Whenever an effort is made to correct a situation by applying a certain criteria there will be a few that will get caught in the net that maybe shouldn't. Like the occasional dolphin when tuna fishing. The "unmaintained cache" issue has come up many times and taking action is long over due. I notice it when download a PQ and filter for caches with the last two logs DNF's and it runs 5% to 10%. Now that doesn't mean that all are need in of a owner visit they may be hard to find but a great majority are. I look at the ones where it shows the last 4 are DNF and almost 100% need to be maintained or archived. Many of them are owned by people who haven't been on the site or found a cache in over a year while the others are owned by people with huge number of caches and obviously only care about placing and not maintaining.

 

Heck if I wanted to build my count I could filter for them and then log thwm all with one button click and if the CO wakes up and deletes a log so what?

 

So if a few are inconvenienced so that the situation can be fixed so be it.

 

The needs of the many not the few.

Edited by Walts Hunting
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One of the caches hadn't had any activity in eight years, and was recently adopted by a new owner. That's not "arbitrary."

So the forced maintenance visit criteria are documented somewhere?

 

Nothing is forced. Cache ownership is entirely voluntary. When you place a cache or adopt a cache, you agree to adhere to the cache placement guidelines.

 

The guidelines do not specify that visits are only required when someone reports a problem. The word used is "especially."

 

In the case of a very remote cache, it is wholly reasonable that eight years of inactivity and a new owner calls for a maintenance visit in accordance with the guidelines.

 

You are responsible for occasional visits to your cache to ensure it is in proper working order, especially when someone reports a problem with the cache (missing, damaged, wet, etc.), or posts a Needs Maintenance log.

So, instead of disabling the cache, a note or warning could have been posted. If disabled, anyone looking at it may believe there is a problem with the cache, not merely that it's time for a periodic checkup. Disabling in this case (no reported problem) is a little much. The CO has demonstrated (at least IMO from what I read in this thread) that they are willing to, and do, reasonable and responsible maintenance.

 

They are complaining that two caches which have no reported issues are being disabled (implying problems) requiring (ie, forcing) a maintenance run for it to continue to be listed in good order.

 

It's an unusual scenario. Most caches do not go eight years without a visit before being adopted by a cacher who has never visited them.

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In the case of a very remote cache, it is wholly reasonable that eight years of inactivity and a new owner calls for a maintenance visit in accordance with the guidelines.

You're welcome to your opinion, but I disagree completely.

 

Mountain caches need less maintenance by nature of their location, and ownership change isn't felt at all up on the lonely mountaintop.

 

For a rarely visited spot (eg under the snowpack on Mount Temple), I think "occasional" could mean every decade or two. Or say, every 20 cacher visits, who cares about elapsed time?

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In the case of a very remote cache, it is wholly reasonable that eight years of inactivity and a new owner calls for a maintenance visit in accordance with the guidelines.

You're welcome to your opinion, but I disagree completely.

 

Mountain caches need less maintenance by nature of their location, and ownership change isn't felt at all up on the lonely mountaintop.

 

For a rarely visited spot (eg under the snowpack on Mount Temple), I think "occasional" could mean every decade or two. Or say, every 20 cacher visits, who cares about elapsed time?

 

It might be interesting to see someone make a case for this using actual data from these remote caches around the world.

 

Do they really need less maintenance? The owner of the caches being discussed here has openly admitted that visitors to remote caches simply bring containers with them so the owners don't have to maintain them. In that regard, a mountain cache doesn't seem any different than a vacation cache. Drop it and forget it appears to be the mantra here.

 

While it's nice to romanticize about these extremely remote geocaches, perhaps there's an inherent incompatibility with the basic expectations of this particular listing site.

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perhaps there's an inherent incompatibility with the basic expectations of this particular listing site.

I think so.

 

It seems the basic expectations are: As many T1.5 dots as possible on the screen of an intro app, to sell premium memberships during the initial rush of excitement, and again every year until the users figure out how to turn off the blasted auto-renewal.

 

Wilderness caches are an edge case that I'm not sure Groundspeak cares about at all.

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perhaps there's an inherent incompatibility with the basic expectations of this particular listing site.

I think so.

 

It seems the basic expectations are: As many T1.5 dots as possible on the screen of an intro app, to sell premium memberships during the initial rush of excitement, and again every year until the users figure out how to turn off the blasted auto-renewal.

 

Wilderness caches are an edge case that I'm not sure Groundspeak cares about at all.

 

I have always had the impression that wilderness caches are treated with much less rigidity than caches closer to urban centres. This situation does not change that impression.

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While it's nice to romanticize about these extremely remote geocaches, perhaps there's an inherent incompatibility with the basic expectations of this particular listing site.

 

For many years it never has been and it worked out very well.

 

In my experience it's rather the set of expectations that have been brought along by many newer cachers who think that what holds for their style of geocaching should be used everywhere.

 

Moreover as the example of the OP is regarded, I'm not convinced that the disabling happened because the new owner has not yet visited the caches. As someone else wrote I do not object against the need of the new owner to once visit the caches he adopted but I think that disabling them is completely unnecessary. The message that is sent along in this manner is something like the reviewer needs to reduce the risk that someone might fail at a cache. The other option would be to assume that everyone who goes for such a cache checks the cache page anyway and does not need to be saved from going for a trip to such a cache.

 

If we had some evidence that what happened just happened to the exceptional case here (which I do not think to be true also due to other stories we have heard), I guess the concerns of some of us would be much smaller.

Edited by cezanne
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A couple of thoughts after reading through the thread.

 

A new cacher logging a DNF does not create a need for maintenance. If this trend of disabling caches due to a DNF and long time frame since finds continues, hikers are going to find themselves with fewer caches requiring long hikes.

 

However, if the point of placing such a cache is to give the seeker an enjoyable experience hiking in a majestic location, then it seems to me that an owner wouldn't mind returning to the location once or twice. And if someone adopts such a cache but has not yet visited it, then they should be happy to go check on it and experience the area for themselves.

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assume that everyone who goes for such a cache checks the cache page anyway and does not need to be saved from going for a trip to such a cache

 

If we make this assumption, then perhaps we should also make the assumption that such a cache should not be listed as an active cache.

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