5 new country souvenirs

[+The A-Team]

In case anyone hasn't seen it yet:
Five new Geocaching country souvenirs

• Argentina
• Liechtenstein
• Malta
• Malaysia
• Namibia

All of these souvenirs have already been retroactively awarded if you found a cache there.

Personally, I'm happy to see one for Namibia, because I've cached there. Now the only country I've found a cache in and don't have a souvenir for is the Vatican.

[+cheech gang]

I'm happy to see Argentina and Liechtenstein added.   Vatican should be soon!

[+NYPaddleCacher]

11 hours ago, The A-Team said:

In case anyone hasn't seen it yet:
Five new Geocaching country souvenirs

• Argentina
• Liechtenstein
• Malta
• Malaysia
• Namibia

All of these souvenirs have already been retroactively awarded if you found a cache there.

Personally, I'm happy to see one for Namibia, because I've cached there. Now the only country I've found a cache in and don't have a souvenir for is the Vatican.

I hadn't seen this.  The only new one for me is the one for Malaysia. I was kinda surprised to see Namibia on the list.  There are several other African countries that are visited far more often.  I've got finds in South Africa (and the souvenir), Ethiopia (which already has souvenir artwork created), Zambia, and Tanzania but have never visited Namibia.  I'll most likely be going to Kenya (which has a pretty fair number of caches in Nairobi) and possibly Uganda in January.  At one point I had 12 countries in which I'd found a cache which did not have a souvenir available but that number is down to six now. 

[+SheepOnTrip]

How do they choose which countries get the souvenir? Because there are countries with much more caches than Malta that don't have souvenirs (in you're going on numbers) - like Taiwan, Hong Kong, Israel and so on. By size of the country? There are much bigger countries than tiny Liechtenstein (if you're going for huge size as last year with Russia and China) - like India, Indonesia and so on. And I do think it is time to put aside Europe-US-Canada (including territories) for a bit, and start giving more attention to other continents. If HQ thinks it is so necessary to award 2 European countries with less caches above other parts of the world, they can just issue more souvenirs per year. It is just designing 2 photos - I bet many cachers (including me) would be happy to volunteer making them if it is such a hassle. 

[+HHL]

Combining an image with a clipart frame is not rocket science, isn't it?

Hans

[+NYPaddleCacher]

43 minutes ago, HHL said:

Combining an image with a clipart frame is not rocket science, isn't it?

Hans

No, but there's more that goes into releasing a new souvenir beyond just creating the artwork and putting it on a page.

[+NYPaddleCacher]

59 minutes ago, SheepOnTrip said:

How do they choose which countries get the souvenir? Because there are countries with much more caches than Malta that don't have souvenirs (in you're going on numbers) - like Taiwan, Hong Kong, Israel and so on. By size of the country? There are much bigger countries than tiny Liechtenstein (if you're going for huge size as last year with Russia and China) - like India, Indonesia and so on. And I do think it is time to put aside Europe-US-Canada (including territories) for a bit, and start giving more attention to other continents. If HQ thinks it is so necessary to award 2 European countries with less caches above other parts of the world, they can just issue more souvenirs per year. It is just designing 2 photos - I bet many cachers (including me) would be happy to volunteer making them if it is such a hassle. 

How GS has chosen which countries get souvenirs has changed over time.  After the initial U.S. States, Canadian Provinces, and German Bundeslander the next set of country based souvenirs were actually based upon users voting in a thread on the forums.  The next set "appeared" to be based upon the number of caches in the country.  The criteria seemed to become much less based on a simple algorithm (counting the number of caches in the country) 2-3 years ago.  Iceland got a souvenir when there were quite a few countries which had more geocaches.  In the last couple of years, it seemed that that were trying to represent different areas in the world more equitably rather than simply choose the next country on the list based on the number of caches.  This year, I have no idea how the countries were chosen.  

Personally, choosing countries based on the number of finds for all caches would seem to be a better criteria than simply the number of caches in the country.  Vatican City State has very few caches but a lot of geocachers will visit the area and try to find them.  I also like the idea of souvenirs for countries that are rarely visited (Namibia) as it then become a "rare" souvenir, and thus to me, more collectable.  

[+Viajero Perdido]

This set appears to be chosen with a dartboard.

Hey, I got two new ones, just like that.  But in those two countries, I remember the caching being pretty dismal.  So I doubt it's based on quality.  Especially since the place I keep spending 13+ hours on a plane to go caching keeps being ignored.

And as people have mentioned, there seems to be no connection to quantity.

So it's gotta be the dartboard.

Okay fine.

[+The A-Team]

6 hours ago, NYPaddleCacher said:

In the last couple of years, it seemed that that were trying to represent different areas in the world more equitably rather than simply choose the next country on the list based on the number of caches.

That seems to be behind the choices this year too. There are two from Europe, one from South America, one from Africa, and one from southeast Asia. As far as how they selected the countries from within those regions, I don't know. If they were going to add one of the small European counties, I would have expected the Vatican to be first based on the number of visitors, or maybe Monaco. Maybe Liechtenstein gets more visitors/logs than I think? Or maybe Viajero Perdido is right and they threw darts at each continent (in which case, whoever threw the darts and hit Malta and Liechtenstein has really good aim!)?

[+hzoi]

I don't object to Malta and Liechtenstein, as I've cached in both, but I certainly didn't expect them.  When I get home, I'm looking them up on the cache by country list I referenced in this old "new souvenir" thread, as I'm curious.

[+SheepOnTrip]

Quote

Personally, choosing countries based on the number of finds for all caches would seem to be a better criteria than simply the number of caches in the country.  Vatican City State has very few caches but a lot of geocachers will visit the area and try to find them.  I also like the idea of souvenirs for countries that are rarely visited (Namibia) as it then become a "rare" souvenir, and thus to me, more collectable. 

If they want to give fair representative to different parts, they should choose other than 2 little countries with not much caches in a continent full of souvenirs (including area souvenirs for Germany). Basing it on a number of finds sounds good at first - but again, it feeds the attention back to the same area: Europeans and Americans, who visit the neighbors. I saw how little communities of cachers made a big change and started building a geocaching community and geo-trails and better caches from within, not relaying on tourist and adjacted countries, like they did in South Korea (which did get the souvenir in the end). You see little dots on a big empty map of their are, dost like Hong Kong. HQ is talking about a world game - so they should reward and support these efforts, even in tiny steps like a souvenir. It is a very little did, but from talking to cachers in my traveling to Asia, some do feel it is an American-European targeted game mostly. 

And "rare souvenir"??? Come on, it is nice to visit a rare PLACE. Even not for caching, as I went to all the really remote places before I knew the game (Antarctica!) and it is interesting to see completely different parts of the world from your daily sorounding. I would travel for that, not for a souvenir, as you get it retroactive anyway if they'll add it in the future. As Viajero Perdido said, who knows, maybe the dart will fall next year on Nauru, as it seems from this year's choices - that is much more "rare" than Namibia! (;

 

 

 

[+bflentje]

I'll join the brag-fest. I am holding out for Andorra.