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Surely there has to come a point?


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14 minutes ago, Team Microdot said:

So presumably there IS a distance limit beyond which an explicit maintenance plan is required, yes?

Yes, but there is no limit like "You are not allowed to place a cache xxx km from your home coordinates". You claimed they were "flat-out refused solely on the basis of distance from (presumably) the prospective CO's home coordinates. ", which is not true.

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10 minutes ago, Team Microdot said:

 

Nothing tickles me more than the sort of person who does something while criticising others for doing the same thing :lol:

I'm not deciding any limits here - I'm hoping to find out what limits already exist - did you not get that?

No, I didn't get that. When you said:

Quote

Even a curtailment would be a good start

  • No more than X caches per CO
  • No more than X miles from home / their caching centroid

I took that to mean you were saying that new limits needed to be imposed on everyone in order to solve your problem of a rogue CO.

As far as I know, there's no hard limit on the number of caches that can be owned. There's no published numerical limit on distance from home, but the reviewers do assess on a case by case basis whether a proposed hide is within reasonable reach of the CO and if not, they require a documented maintenance plan. Local terrain, transport infrastructure and population density would be factors taken into account as well - a vacation for a city dweller might be just a "nip down the road" for someone in the outback where the nearest neighbour is 100km away.

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22 minutes ago, Team Microdot said:

So presumably there IS a distance limit beyond which an explicit maintenance plan is required, yes?

 

I'm sure there used to be something in the guidelines or Help Centre about the reviewer looking at the CO's caching distance when deciding whether a proposed hide is within their normal range or not, but I can't find that now.

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28 minutes ago, Team Microdot said:
40 minutes ago, barefootjeff said:

I'm pretty sure that CO in outback South Australia wouldn't be too happy if your number of hides limit forced them to immediately have to archive many hundreds of caches or be banned from placing any new hides until they did so.

Nothing tickles me more than the sort of person who does something while criticising others for doing the same thing :lol:

Huh? Is there something I'm missing here? Is there something I've done that I've criticised others for doing?

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49 minutes ago, Rebore said:
59 minutes ago, Team Microdot said:

So presumably there IS a distance limit beyond which an explicit maintenance plan is required, yes?

Yes, but there is no limit like "You are not allowed to place a cache xxx km from your home coordinates". You claimed they were "flat-out refused solely on the basis of distance from (presumably) the prospective CO's home coordinates. ", which is not true.

 I believe that there IS a limit UNLESS an explicit maintenance plan is documented.

So if there ISN'T a maintenance plan, presumably they ARE flat out refused - yes?

And presumably there is a set distance beyond which the question of an explicit maintenance plan is raised / an explicit maintenance plan is required if the placement isn't to be flat-out refused - yes?

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20 minutes ago, Team Microdot said:

 I believe that there IS a limit UNLESS an explicit maintenance plan is documented.

So if there ISN'T a maintenance plan, presumably they ARE flat out refused - yes?

And presumably there is a set distance beyond which the question of an explicit maintenance plan is raised / an explicit maintenance plan is required if the placement isn't to be flat-out refused - yes?

You didn't mention a maintainance plan in the post I replied to, hence my answer. I think the distance limit you would like to know is in the hands of the reviewer and varies, and I think that's a good thing

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9 hours ago, Team Microdot said:

At the outset of this thread I raised the spectre of vacation caches because they seem to be flat-out refused solely on the basis of distance from (presumably) the prospective CO's home coordinates.

I'd still like to know if that's the case or if other factors come into play and, if it does come down to distance alone, what that distance is.

I don't know of any vacation cache refused on grounds of distance alone.  I do know of vacation caches refused on the basis of lack of maintenance plan, which were subsequently accepted once a suitable plan was in place.  So, in answer to the second paragraph quoted, that is no longer the case, even if it ever was.

But, going right back to the start of your original post 

Quote

A CO flings out caches wherever they go - well outside any comfortable maintenance radius - usually in poor quality containers which will leak and in locations where a cache isn't likely to remain hidden and will soon go missing.

Evidence shows that CO almost never performs maintenance but instead threatens to archive caches and waits for someone to replace them just to claim a smiley, blaming other cachers for the state of the cache, or its absence, in the process.

Surely there is a straightforward solution to this:  Report it to the local reviewer. Even if the CO is deleting NM or NA logs, the reviewer can still see them.  Present the evidence to someone who can do something about it.

Our community seems to be on top of this. We have a couple of cachers who started the year by searching for caches with outstanding NM logs and, when appropriate, writing NA logs for them.  Most of these are now temp disabled by the reviewer and will be archived soon.  The solution to your CO is for someone to actually do something about him.

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4 hours ago, Team Microdot said:

 I believe that there IS a limit UNLESS an explicit maintenance plan is documented.

So if there ISN'T a maintenance plan, presumably they ARE flat out refused - yes?

And presumably there is a set distance beyond which the question of an explicit maintenance plan is raised / an explicit maintenance plan is required if the placement isn't to be flat-out refused - yes?

I don't know, but I hope it's nothing so black and white. A maintenance plan is always required, of course, so the question is only at what point the reviewer starts to wonder what the maintenance plan will be because of the distances and starts to ask questions so that the plan needs to be spelled out. I assume that's not a fixed distance, just up to the reviewer. So I doubt there's any yes/no maintenance plan decision or X miles distance limits, just reviewers using their own judgement about when an explicit plan has to be given to convince the  reviewer the cache will be maintained.

Laying out a fixed number as you are hoping for doesn't really improve the process any, it just encourages people who want to plant vacation caches they don't plan to maintain to find a place one mile less than the limit from their home coordinates. Anyone that intends to maintain their cache can explain how they're going to do that, so the only question is at what point they should do that explicitly.

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6 hours ago, Team Microdot said:

 I believe that there IS a limit UNLESS an explicit maintenance plan is documented.

So if there ISN'T a maintenance plan, presumably they ARE flat out refused - yes?

And presumably there is a set distance beyond which the question of an explicit maintenance plan is raised / an explicit maintenance plan is required if the placement isn't to be flat-out refused - yes?

A bit of Googling found this old wording from the guidelines:

Quote

The region in which a cacher is considered able to maintain caches responsibly will vary from person to person. A cacher who has previously logged caches within a wide range of their home may be considered able to maintain a geocache 200 miles (322 km) away. However, someone whose geocaching activities have primarily been within 25 miles (40 km) of home may not be able to maintain a geocache this far from home. This factor is determined at the discretion of the cache reviewer or Groundspeak.

Assuming that's still how the system works, there's no fixed distance and it's up to the reviewer to determine on a case by case basis.

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16 hours ago, Team Microdot said:

So presumably there IS a distance limit beyond which an explicit maintenance plan is required, yes?

 

There may be a distance limit but it's not a specific number that applies to every geocacher.  A reviewer may take a look at a listing and see that the CO has never found a cache more than 10 miles from home  and ask for a maintenance plan for a submission of a cache 50 miles away.   The same reviewer might look at the submission form another CO, see that they frequently find caches 50-100 miles away and not ask for a maintenance plan.  A submission for a cache 50 miles awhile might not even cause a reviewer to ask for more information (and honestly answering a simple question from the reviewer might be enough).  500 miles is another story.  Most people don't regularly travel 500 miles away often enough to maintain a cache at that distance so it's understandable that a reviewer would want to know why they were an exception.  

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Sounds like the answer to the original question is get involved.  Don't hesitate to post a NM if the situation calls for one.  If you receive a nasty e-mail from a cache owner immediately report it to Ground Speak.  If you suspect foul play,  contact your reviewer and make the situation known.   I think terms like "Cache Cop" and the like have caused people to hesitate playing the game as it was meant to be played.  Somehow posting a NM on a cache is perceived as placing an unnecessary burden on the cache owner.   If you report a problem your a rat.   Nothing could be further from the truth.  All good cache owners welcome NM's.  Why?  Because they care about their caches.   If stopping a lazy or abusive cache owner means I'm a rat than so be it.

There must come a point when you put aside indifference and fear and stand up for what you believe in.  

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On 2/3/2018 at 5:28 PM, Gill & Tony said:
Quote

A CO flings out caches wherever they go - well outside any comfortable maintenance radius - usually in poor quality containers which will leak and in locations where a cache isn't likely to remain hidden and will soon go missing.

Evidence shows that CO almost never performs maintenance but instead threatens to archive caches and waits for someone to replace them just to claim a smiley, blaming other cachers for the state of the cache, or its absence, in the process.

Surely there is a straightforward solution to this:  Report it to the local reviewer. Even if the CO is deleting NM or NA logs, the reviewer can still see them.  Present the evidence to someone who can do something about it.

 

Which makes me wonder why, if the reviewer is aware that the CO regularly flings out caches--because at least once a week that reviewer is posting that CO's new submissions, and knows the CO's track record of abandoning those caches--why we as a community need to accept that CO's crappy cache placements, put ourselves in a sometimes awkward "cache cop" situation, and clean up after those COs?

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44 minutes ago, L0ne.R said:

Which makes me wonder why, if the reviewer is aware that the CO regularly flings out caches--because at least once a week that reviewer is posting that CO's new submissions, and knows the CO's track record of abandoning those caches--why we as a community need to accept that CO's crappy cache placements, put ourselves in a sometimes awkward "cache cop" situation, and clean up after those COs?

Down here the new submissions are handled by a different reviewer to the one that handles NAs so the reviewer handling submissions will be unaware of the situation unless they do a detailed examination of the applicant COs account.

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8 hours ago, justintim1999 said:

Sounds like the answer to the original question is get involved.  Don't hesitate to post a NM if the situation calls for one.  If you receive a nasty e-mail from a cache owner immediately report it to Ground Speak.  If you suspect foul play,  contact your reviewer and make the situation known.   I think terms like "Cache Cop" and the like have caused people to hesitate playing the game as it was meant to be played.  Somehow posting a NM on a cache is perceived as placing an unnecessary burden on the cache owner.   If you report a problem your a rat.   Nothing could be further from the truth.  All good cache owners welcome NM's.  Why?  Because they care about their caches.   If stopping a lazy or abusive cache owner means I'm a rat than so be it.

There must come a point when you put aside indifference and fear and stand up for what you believe in.  

There's a lot to like about this post, but at the same time, I'm a little worried about this description of "get involved" being very close to "call in the cops". Yes, get involved, but first get involved with each other. If you receive a nasty response to an NM, the first thing you should do is ask the CO why he's being nasty when you're just trying to help him out. Our first goal should be to make bad COs better, not to immediately jump to calling in GS to spank them. I can't help but think that at least some of the shouts of "cache cop!" are caused by a CO having a bad day and being unnecessarily short with someone and finding themselves called on the carpet about it without any chance to talk it over with the hurt party.

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6 hours ago, L0ne.R said:

Which makes me wonder why, if the reviewer is aware that the CO regularly flings out caches--because at least once a week that reviewer is posting that CO's new submissions, and knows the CO's track record of abandoning those caches--why we as a community need to accept that CO's crappy cache placements, put ourselves in a sometimes awkward "cache cop" situation, and clean up after those COs?

If, as you suggest, the reviewer really is aware of the situation and has decided that there isn't a problem, then maybe we should just move on.  However, if nobody has contacted the reviewer and nobody is posting NM or NA logs, then the reviewer may just be seeing someone who puts out lots of caches with no problems reported.

Our community doesn't see someone who reports problems as a cache cop, so it is easy for me to suggest doing things.  If yours does, then it is harder, but it still needs someone to step up to the plate and do the right thing.

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16 hours ago, dprovan said:

There's a lot to like about this post, but at the same time, I'm a little worried about this description of "get involved" being very close to "call in the cops". Yes, get involved, but first get involved with each other. If you receive a nasty response to an NM, the first thing you should do is ask the CO why he's being nasty when you're just trying to help him out. Our first goal should be to make bad COs better, not to immediately jump to calling in GS to spank them. I can't help but think that at least some of the shouts of "cache cop!" are caused by a CO having a bad day and being unnecessarily short with someone and finding themselves called on the carpet about it without any chance to talk it over with the hurt party.

The statement "Get involved" was directed toward the geocaching community.   I do agree we should "call in the cops" but the cops need to be each and every geocacher out there who care about the game.  In some situations I'd directly contact the cache owner but typically that only escalates the situation.  Besides, if someone is rude enough to send a nasty response to a simple log how do you think they're going to react being called out on it?    If it turns out to be a one time lack of judgement than no harm no foul.    GS will probably remind them that it's just a game and behavior like that has no place in it.   If a pattern of bad behavior develops there will be some history to back up further actions.     

Bad day or not I can't think of any reason to insult or belittle anyone over a geocache.      

Edited by justintim1999
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3 hours ago, justintim1999 said:

In some situations I'd directly contact the cache owner but typically that only escalates the situation.  Besides, if someone is rude enough to send a nasty response to a simple log how do you think they're going to react being called out on it?

I always assume the best in people, so I would always expect them to react pleasantly and apologize when I told them their reaction seemed nastier than they intended. I'm not often disappointed, but when I am, I know that at least I showed them how it could be done, so maybe someday they'll start to understand the advantages of being friendly.

I'm not sure how it could escalate. Naturally I'm not going to continue the conversation if it doesn't head in a better direction. I always know there's at least one adult in the conversation.

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38 minutes ago, dprovan said:

I always assume the best in people, so I would always expect them to react pleasantly and apologize when I told them their reaction seemed nastier than they intended. I'm not often disappointed, but when I am, I know that at least I showed them how it could be done, so maybe someday they'll start to understand the advantages of being friendly.

I'm not sure how it could escalate. Naturally I'm not going to continue the conversation if it doesn't head in a better direction. I always know there's at least one adult in the conversation.

My point was don't simply ignore it.  If you feel comfortable contacting the cache owner directly to clear up the issue than by all means do so.  Working out any issues one on one is always the best course of action.    If you are a new cacher or don't feel comfortable doing that,  don't hesitate to contact Ground Speak with your concerns.  Let The powers to Be decide if any action is necessary.

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On 02/02/2018 at 8:19 AM, mr.jonesy said:

Well.. that depends what you class as degrading . Anyhow, back on the subject matter, hows this for a time line of events...

 

16th October - User finds cache, mentions log book is becoming paper mache

16th October - CO requests 'can someone replace log book'

13th November - user finds cache

28th December - I find the cache report that it's soggy and basically shredded

28th December - Posts NM log

31st December - CO performs a cursory Owner maintenance note to clear log, promptly deletes this log, posts the following note..."Can someone please replace the logbook? This is a very wet winter and without help I will be having a mass archive in the spring. Any help is appreciated. Unfortunately logs like those left recently inspire me to press archive which is a shame as this is actually a nice hide in the ruins of the old church garden, long forgotten. As a driveby it would be so easy for someone to help out so if anyone could swap the logbook rather than having a moan this would be great. This is one of the wettest parts of the country, unfortunately caches do get wet sometimes. Otherwise I will tend to it when I can."

2nd Feb - No further visits to date, cache has probably rotted down even futher, meanwhile the CO has been busy finding 400 + caches in January and yet seems to have no time to maintain their estate

So, is this acceptable? issues for over 3+ months, wrench clearing without actually doing any maintenance.... let me just go check the GS placement / ownership guidelines again I might have missed a paragraph or two somewhere....

 

There's a little bit of info missing from your timeline!

Attached to this post is a picture of the "rotten, unsignable and unsuitable soggy wet log" that caused you so much issue.

The CO went and did the maintenance you demanded after you went crying to the local reviewer.

What a surprise you wasted his and the reviewer's time! The logbook was perfectly dry and signable if a bit tatty. but still signable and of which you HADN'T. 

I thought the one rule of geocaching was to sign the log.

Drops mic... 

 

bf6d0ace-78a1-4d6a-950c-9bd082262934_l.jpg

Edited by The Magna Defender
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16 hours ago, The Magna Defender said:

The CO went and did the maintenance you demanded after you went crying to the local reviewer.

What a surprise you wasted his and the reviewer's time!

You're absolutely right - a waste of the reviewer's time.

I expect though that this waste of reviewers time arises from unfavourable / aggressive  responses from cache owners to news they don't want to hear.

After all - who would dream of troubling a reviewer if they believed that the CO would respond in a civil manner?

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I believe in caching decently and fairly and being polite to others. What I deem unacceptable is a scenario when any instance of contacting a cacher results in abuse. I've encountered nasty comments here in the UK and the US which quite frankly nearly caused me to quit. Thankfully cachers in my local caching community supported me and encouraged me to stick it out. I hear accounts from fellow cachers that contacting others could result in gunk thrown your way. In fact said cachers have been rude to folks I know who are the most loveliest and friendliest people you could ever hope to meet. This gets my goat up as it takes a special kind of person to do that, and that person as far as I am concerned does caching a great disservice. If anyone disagrees with anything I say then fine, but I believe in the above and aint noone gonna convince me otherwise.

 

Ps thankfully my local cacher does a great deal of work and doesn't often get the credit that he deserves. Reviewers are always on a sticky wicket as pleasing one cacher annoys another which is a shame really.

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34 minutes ago, Hitman9956 said:

I believe in caching decently and fairly and being polite to others. What I deem unacceptable is a scenario when any instance of contacting a cacher results in abuse. I've encountered nasty comments here in the UK and the US which quite frankly nearly caused me to quit. Thankfully cachers in my local caching community supported me and encouraged me to stick it out. I hear accounts from fellow cachers that contacting others could result in gunk thrown your way. In fact said cachers have been rude to folks I know who are the most loveliest and friendliest people you could ever hope to meet. This gets my goat up as it takes a special kind of person to do that, and that person as far as I am concerned does caching a great disservice. If anyone disagrees with anything I say then fine, but I believe in the above and aint noone gonna convince me otherwise.

 

Ps thankfully my local cacher does a great deal of work and doesn't often get the credit that he deserves. Reviewers are always on a sticky wicket as pleasing one cacher annoys another which is a shame really.

People like that do a great disservice to humanity my friend.   Always stick up for what's right and never be afraid to fight for those who can't or won't fight for themselves.

I respect that and I salute you for sharing those beliefs with me.        

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17 hours ago, justintim1999 said:

I hear accounts from fellow cachers that contacting others could result in gunk thrown your way. In fact said cachers have been rude to folks I know who are the most loveliest and friendliest people you could ever hope to meet. This gets my goat up as it takes a special kind of person to do that, and that person as far as I am concerned does caching a great disservice.

I'm confused by the above - who is contacting who and who is abusing who here?

It seems to read that the fellow cachers in the first sentence, the ones who have experienced gunk being thrown their way are also the ones being rude to the folks who you consider the most loveliest and friendliest people you could ever hope to meet. In the third sentence you seem to be referring to one person rather than a group.

If the fellow cachers first referenced are the ones being rude to the folks who you consider the most loveliest and friendliest people you could ever hope to meet I'm not massively surprised that the are getting gunk thrown their way.

confused.com :unsure:

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26 minutes ago, Team Microdot said:

I'm confused by the above - who is contacting who and who is abusing who here?

It seems to read that the fellow cachers in the first sentence, the ones who have experienced gunk being thrown their way are also the ones being rude to the folks who you consider the most loveliest and friendliest people you could ever hope to meet. In the third sentence you seem to be referring to one person rather than a group.

If the fellow cachers first referenced are the ones being rude to the folks who you consider the most loveliest and friendliest people you could ever hope to meet I'm not massively surprised that the are getting gunk thrown their way.

confused.com :unsure:

I read it as a group of cachers Hitman9956 knows of that are particularly rude to other cachers.     If that's true than context isn't important here.  There's no reason to be rude and disrespectful to anyone especially when were talking about Geocaching.

Do you have any reason not to believe Hitman9956 when they say these are lovely people who don't deserve the treatment they're getting?

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13 minutes ago, Team Microdot said:

To be honest I was just trying, for starters, to comprehend what he was trying to tell us.

I hear ya.  I assumed I read it right when they didn't correct me.  Usually when I'm wrong I get correct immediately and by multiple sources. :D

I just think it's a good thing when people are willing to stick up for others regardless of the personal consequences.   It sounded like Hitman9956 was trying to do just that.  

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21 hours ago, justintim1999 said:

People like that do a great disservice to humanity my friend.   Always stick up for what's right and never be afraid to fight for those who can't or won't fight for themselves.

I respect that and I salute you for sharing those beliefs with me.        

Thank you - it did put me off going to social events for a while and it took a great deal of persuading from friends to encourage me out once more. Now I focus on the good folk and try to avoid the nasty folks. There is a bad side to caching which I aim to avoid as better things in life to worry about! Oh and I meant say my local reviewer oops gets a lot of flak from a load of folks, but he has more than been fair to me. Everything above is 100% true and real with nothing confusing in anything I have said.

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31 minutes ago, Hitman9956 said:

Thank you - it did put me off going to social events for a while and it took a great deal of persuading from friends to encourage me out once more. Now I focus on the good folk and try to avoid the nasty folks. There is a bad side to caching which I aim to avoid as better things in life to worry about! Oh and I meant say my local reviewer oops gets a lot of flak from a load of folks, but he has more than been fair to me. Everything above is 100% true and real with nothing confusing in anything I have said.

I think you'll agree that there are good and bad in any activity.  The key is to do exactly what your doing.   Ignore the static (when you can)  and focus on the aspects of geocaching you enjoy.

Sometimes people forget that reviewers are people too.  They like us are just trying to live in-between the lines.  

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