Found a trackable but it’s just a laminated color copy

[+Tominphx]

Is this a thing now? Apparently the originator did not want to give up the collectible TMNT token, so he took a color picture of it, laminated it, wrote the tracking code on it. I was pretty let down to find that instead of the actual trackable. What are the ethics of this practice?

 

Edited May 30, 2020 by Keystone
removed photo of tracking code

[+TmdAndGG]

Yeah, that happens pretty often these days, sometimes when the trackable goes missing or, like you said, the owner doesn't want to give up the real thing. We just treat them like a regular trackable. By the way, please either remove the photos or at least blur out the tracking codes so the owner doesn't get any couch discoverys. 

Edited May 30, 2020 by TmdAndGG

[+TriciaG]

It's been a thing since I've been geocaching. (2012 - has it really been 8 years??)

 

It is a bit of a letdown when you're expecting the real thing, but with people stealing the real ones, I'm not at all surprised that proxies are out there instead.

 

The only ethics involved are those involved in folks stealing the real coins.

Edited May 30, 2020 by TriciaG
added my start year

[+cerberus1]

20 minutes ago, Tominphx said:

Is this a thing now? Apparently the originator did not want to give up the collectible TMNT token, so he took a color picture of it, laminated it, wrote the tracking code on it. 

I was pretty let down to find that instead of the actual trackable. What are the ethics of this practice?

 

Ethics ?  There aren't any ...

When we sign that form to get one, we agree that we'll send out that Trackable given to us for free (usually) within two weeks of receiving it.

We haven't found proxies for promotion Trackables in the field yet. 

I'd think if I complained to HQ, it's possible that person wouldn't receive another freebie to keep in the future...

[+cerberus1]

Curious what you meant by "Apparently the originator did not want to give up the collectible TMNT token, so he took a color picture of it, laminated it, wrote the tracking code on it."    Did you feel you could "collect" it ?     Thanks.   

 

The one we received came to us with "This is not collectible" right on the Trackable page when it's activated.

 - Same thing's written on the one you found.

 

[+RecipeForDisaster]

How do we know that the trackable owner hasn’t -already- had their trackable stolen? This could be the replacement. I know I’ll put proxies out once the original coin has been taken.

[+Goldenwattle]

5 minutes ago, RecipeForDisaster said:

How do we know that the trackable owner hasn’t -already- had their trackable stolen? This could be the replacement. I know I’ll put proxies out once the original coin has been taken.

I would not replace a stolen/missing trackable, as years later it could reappear again, and then you would have two trackables travelling with the same number, and that would be confusing, especially for the people with the numbers now. I had one go missing for about 1.5 years and I had marked it missing, but then it turned up again. https://www.geocaching.com/track/details.aspx?id=7098524 I have found trackables that have been missing much longer than that; for years. If I had then found it was getting logged in another part of the world as well, I would have been annoyed. Best not to send out a replacement. Start a new trackable instead.

As for sending out a reproduction (or something else) instead of the original tag, I have done that for some trackables. I wanted to keep the original tags as souvenirs; such as ones I was given for attending an event, a couple I was given for visiting HQ; that sort of thing. Trackables will go missing.

[+cerberus1]

2 hours ago, RecipeForDisaster said:

How do we know that the trackable owner hasn’t -already- had their trackable stolen? This could be the replacement. I know I’ll put proxies out once the original coin has been taken.

 

Well, it does only have three pages of movement, and easily read...

[+IceColdUK]

4 hours ago, Goldenwattle said:

I would not replace a stolen/missing trackable, as years later it could reappear again, and then you would have two trackables travelling with the same number, and that would be confusing, especially for the people with the numbers now.

Assuming you’ve left a reasonable amount of time and tried to contact the last person to hold your trackable / CO of last cache, etc., then that’s a pretty big ‘what if?’  I don’t have the stats, but I’d guess that the proportion of missing trackables that turn up after 18 months is fairly low.

 

And if it does show up, a message to the person holding the proxy, asking them to remove the piece from the game, should clear up any confusion.

Edited May 30, 2020 by IceColdUK
Tpyo

[+Goldenwattle]

8 minutes ago, IceColdUK said:

I’d guess that the proportion of missing trackables that turn up after 18 months is fairly low.

I have found several missing for more than 18 months; too many for me to chance it. I personally would be annoyed to pick up a TB and find someone also logging it on the other side of the world; making a joke of the distance covered. I would dump it in the next cache I found (whether this met my normal standards or not for a good place for a TB) and likely delete all my logs on it. I might also place a warning on it for the next finder that this is also being logged elsewhere and it has more than one TB travelling under that number. I know that if I saw that notice I would likely not pick up the TB.

Why not just get a new TB number and save all this potential bother.

[+cerberus1]

24 minutes ago, Goldenwattle said:

I have found several missing for more than 18 months; too many for me to chance it.

Veering OT...

We have too, and most times the "twin" is in Europe already. 

We figure it's simply because I head to caches that are rarely found.  I don't always take them, but will if they sat over six months.

 - That's the norm, sat in a cache longer than six months.  Not sure why someone thought it a great idea to leave it there in the first place...

[+IceColdUK]

1 hour ago, Goldenwattle said:

I have found several missing for more than 18 months; too many for me to chance it. I personally would be annoyed to pick up a TB and find someone also logging it on the other side of the world; making a joke of the distance covered. I would dump it in the next cache I found (whether this met my normal standards or not for a good place for a TB) and likely delete all my logs on it. I might also place a warning on it for the next finder that this is also being logged elsewhere and it has more than one TB travelling under that number. I know that if I saw that notice I would likely not pick up the TB.

Why not just get a new TB number and save all this potential bother.

While I was holding a proxy, the original reappeared elsewhere.  Yes, initially surprised when the trackable disappeared from my inventory, but any confusion was soon cleared up.  Checked with the TO, and they asked me to remove the proxy from the game.  Left it up to the TO to sort out any logging / mileage issues.  No drama.

[+TriciaG]

19 hours ago, cerberus1 said:

Curious what you meant by "Apparently the originator did not want to give up the collectible TMNT token, so he took a color picture of it, laminated it, wrote the tracking code on it."    Did you feel you could "collect" it ?     Thanks.   

 

The one we received came to us with "This is not collectible" right on the Trackable page when it's activated.

 - Same thing's written on the one you found.

 

Oh! I didn't realize that the TMNT giveaways had any stipulation about sending 'em out. My bad! Please read my post above about geocoins in general, not the special "we'll send this to you if you promise to release it" ones.

[+Max and 99]

19 hours ago, cerberus1 said:

We haven't found proxies for promotion Trackables in the field yet. 

I'd think if I complained to HQ, it's possible that person wouldn't receive another freebie to keep in the future...

Yep. 

[+Goldenwattle]

8 hours ago, cerberus1 said:

Veering OT...

We have too, and most times the "twin" is in Europe already. 

We figure it's simply because I head to caches that are rarely found.  I don't always take them, but will if they sat over six months.

 - That's the norm, sat in a cache longer than six months.  Not sure why someone thought it a great idea to leave it there in the first place...

If I went to a cache that was rarely found I would remove any trackable there; feeling I was rescuing them. Most caches in that category here are out of mobile phone range and I wouldn't be able to find out how long the trackables had been there, until I got home and could check them on the internet.

From memory, I seem to remember reading that someone had picked up a bunch of them in a remote cache, and they had been there for about six years.

[+TmdAndGG]

9 hours ago, Goldenwattle said:

Why not just get a new TB number and save all this potential bother.

They're expensive!

[+Goldenwattle]

25 minutes ago, TmdAndGG said:

They're expensive!

A car sticker doesn't cost much; it's very cheap. Then you can attach that number to a metal tag (once I saw the number carved in wood), or less durable, a laminated card with the number, and send it travelling, as I have done several times for souvineer TBs I have wanted to keep. I have bought a car sticker for my car. The price of a coffee; might have been less. All of my other TBs I have got for free. Three from attending MEGAs and found in the sample bags, two given to me during a visit to HQ (the standard HQ TB and a lackey one), one number sent from HQ, and two found unregistered in caches (one for a charity and the other a lackey one).

[+cerberus1]

13 hours ago, Goldenwattle said:

If I went to a cache that was rarely found I would remove any trackable there; feeling I was rescuing them.

 

Most caches in that category here are out of mobile phone range and I wouldn't be able to find out how long the trackables had been there, until I got home and could check them on the internet.

 

I'd think that way if I cached more.  Some times it'd be just as long.   I've only gone caching twice this year.    

For example, my only "Visit" log was because I held on to a trackable for more than a month, with an inactive owner, and felt guilty.

 

No offense, this is the funny side of starting a little early.    

The other 2/3rds was the only person in our area using a phone when we started., using a blackberry with the Trimble app in '05. 

Didn't work anything near like phones/apps today, but she found many low D/T hides.

From FTF notifications to trackable goals, nothing was known until you got home.  We didn't see that really change until around '09.

[+Goldenwattle]

2 hours ago, cerberus1 said:

From FTF notifications to trackable goals, nothing was known until you got home.

Still is for me mostly, as I cache with a GPS and don't log until I get home to my computer. The only exception almost, would be for a FTF. Then I would fish out my phone from my backpack, turn on data and log the FTF to save others from rushing there.

[+cerberus1]

2 hours ago, Goldenwattle said:

The only exception almost, would be for a FTF.

Then I would fish out my phone from my backpack, turn on data and log the FTF to save others from rushing there.

OT...

That doesn't make sense to me, and (I feel) it's part of the new entitled thinking we're seeing for a while now.

Guess if someone was part of this new generation, and received "participation trophies" their whole life it does, but I don't get it.

If FTF is a "side game", like any other game there's winners and losers.     Part of the fun is wondering if you are...

This "Nobody logged they found it and I stopped here for nothing..." wah-wah  carp is one reason we stopped playing that side-game.

[+Goldenwattle]

5 hours ago, cerberus1 said:

OT...

That doesn't make sense to me, and (I feel) it's part of the new entitled thinking we're seeing for a while now.

Guess if someone was part of this new generation, and received "participation trophies" their whole life it does, but I don't get it.

If FTF is a "side game", like any other game there's winners and losers.     Part of the fun is wondering if you are...

This "Nobody logged they found it and I stopped here for nothing..." wah-wah  carp is one reason we stopped playing that side-game.

A friend and I shared a FTF recently and he logged the FTF with his phone. I waited until I got home to log mine, as my friend had logged. It was the first FTF I had got since 2017. Unless the cache is close to home, as this one was, I no longer bother trying for FTF. I can't compete with those people who always have their phone with them to tell them of a new cache publication. I don't live and sleep with my phone like some other people. As I mentioned, to log, I need to turn data on. Data is usually off on my phone. I happened to be sitting on my computer when that cache close to me came through as being published, and decided to give that one a go. As I said, first FTF for me since 2017.

[+Rikitan]

I'm releasing "proxies" for years. I'd love to see original geocoins and tags still traveling .. unfortunately all of them have been lost or stolen

I use to wait couple of years, then create and release batch of laminated copies, always attached to some little souvie. 

 

As example .. this is one of my latest batch. 

 

 

I spent lot of money to buy originals, so I'd like to see them alive and moving. I'm sorry that originals are stolen, that's how the world works and we can't change it. This is the best I can do to fill the geocaches up and show my geocoins to others - how they looked before they were taken by someone.

It's better than nothing.

 

Oh, by the way - it is yet to happen should original trackable to resurface after years. 2 copies traveling at the same moment - this never happened to me yet. If it will, I will just contact geocacher who is holding the copy to keep it, or discard it.

 

 

 

 

[+cerberus1]

14 minutes ago, Rikitan said:

I'm releasing "proxies" for years. I'd love to see original geocoins and tags still traveling .. unfortunately all of them have been lost or stolen

 

This thread is about keeping promotion trackables, and releasing proxies instead.

A lot of people send out proxies of their own trackables...

[+Rikitan]

3 minutes ago, cerberus1 said:

This thread is about keeping promotion trackables, and releasing proxies instead.

A lot of people send out proxies of their own trackables...

 

Maybe it was lost too. Not a big deal.

[+Max and 99]

3 hours ago, Rikitan said:

I'm releasing "proxies" for years. I'd love to see original geocoins and tags still traveling .. unfortunately all of them have been lost or stolen

I use to wait couple of years, then create and release batch of laminated copies, always attached to some little souvie. 

 

As example .. this is one of my latest batch. 

 

 

I spent lot of money to buy originals, so I'd like to see them alive and moving. I'm sorry that originals are stolen, that's how the world works and we can't change it. This is the best I can do to fill the geocaches up and show my geocoins to others - how they looked before they were taken by someone.

It's better than nothing.

 

Oh, by the way - it is yet to happen should original trackable to resurface after years. 2 copies traveling at the same moment - this never happened to me yet. If it will, I will just contact geocacher who is holding the copy to keep it, or discard it.

 

 

 

 

Nice proxies!

[+Tominphx]

A big THANK YOU to all for the informative replies. I'm seeking a token to attach to this proxy and I'll send it on its way.