GeoWoostock Violates Adventure Labs Guidelines

[+JL_HSTRE]

West Virginia AL-Art at highway rest area: https://www.geowoodstockxxi.com/guide/adventures

 

"Each of the 120 adventure labs highlight a unique piece of Appalachian culture. Whether it's highlighting a local celebrity, general trivia, or even pepperoni rolls, each lab has been carefully crafted to hopefully teach you something new about West Virginia. On average, it takes about 2 hours to complete all 600 multiple choice questions in the art."

 

Other than the geofencing, what about these ALs "requires players to physically visit the Adventure Locations"?

[+Max and 99]

Yikes!!

[+The Leprechauns]

I think that ship sailed long before GeoWoodstock XXI.  If the Adventures team at HQ wanted to put a stop to the many existing Adventure GeoArts and parking lot clusters, I think they would have done so by now.

 

I'd also point out that the 120 Adventures are owned by individual geocachers, not by the GeoWoodstock XXI organizing committee.  The linked page is only promoting what other individuals have put together.

 

I do not see how "GeoWoostock Violates Adventure Labs Guidelines."

 

My wife and I are looking forward to finding these Adventures, hopefully with a group of friends to make it more fun.  We expect to learn a lot about West Virginia in the process.  For us it will be more fun than lifting the equivalent number of lamp post skirts.

[+Max and 99]

Don't the new guidelines have a much shorter geofencing now? Meaning you do have to go there? I remember they made it not retroactive but I thought all new ones had to abide by the more limited geofencing.

Edit: 500 meters is the limit. That's quite a distance. 

Edited April 19 by Max and 99

[+The_Jumping_Pig]

1 hour ago, JL_HSTRE said:

"Each of the 120 adventure labs highlight a unique piece of Appalachian culture. Whether it's highlighting a local celebrity, general trivia, or even pepperoni rolls, each lab has been carefully crafted to hopefully teach you something new about West Virginia. On average, it takes about 2 hours to complete all 600 multiple choice questions in the art."

Well, living one city over (Pittsburgh), I've enjoyed all the new puzzles, geotrails, geoarts, geotours, etc being published in advance of geowoodstock -- I have many more trips I need to make down there than I can do on just one weekend. This geoart? Not so much. But hey, some cachers definitely aren't enjoying solving all the new puzzles while I am, so each to their own, I guess. Lots of local cachers that I know contributed to this geoart so I guess more people than I thought enjoy inflating their statistics...

 

(But again echoing the previous post that this is not by geowoodstock)

Edited April 19 by The_Jumping_Pig

[+JL_HSTRE]

2 hours ago, The Leprechauns said:

I think that ship sailed long before GeoWoodstock XXI.  If the Adventures team at HQ wanted to put a stop to the many existing Adventure GeoArts and parking lot clusters, I think they would have done so by now.

 

I'd also point out that the 120 Adventures are owned by individual geocachers, not by the GeoWoodstock XXI organizing committee.  The linked page is only promoting what other individuals have put together.

 

I do not see how "GeoWoostock Violates Adventure Labs Guidelines."

 

Groundspeak continues to technically disapprove them while tacitly endorsing them by their refusal to do anything about the widespread problem.

 

GeoWoodstock is prominently broadcasting the AL art as one of the main activity options for the event weekend and are therefore complicit with these ALs.

 

Adventure Labs Guidelines:

Make sure all Locations require players to physically visit Adventure Locations.

 

If I can stand a quarter-mile away and still answer the question, because it's a multiple-choice question unrelated to the GPS coordinates of the location, there is no need to physically visit that location.

[+The Leprechauns]

21 minutes ago, JL_HSTRE said:

If I can stand a quarter-mile away and still answer the question, because it's a multiple-choice question unrelated to the GPS coordinates of the location, there is no need to physically visit that location.

 

I expect that we'll be able to park in the rest area, which is "physically visiting the location."  I suppose that I could drive up and down the interstate multiple times, answering a few questions each time I'm in range of the GeoFence, but that seems inefficient.

 

I really liked the post by @The_Jumping_Pig.  There are lots of ways to have an awesome GeoWoodstock experience.  Ours will probably include the Adventures at the rest area along with some bike trail rides, and won't include solving puzzles that lead us to guardrail and road sign hides.  The beauty of this game is that everyone can enjoy it the way they choose to do so.

[+JL_HSTRE]

11 hours ago, The Leprechauns said:

The beauty of this game is that everyone can enjoy it the way they choose to do so.

 

Popularity of these ALs is irrelevant. They violate both the spirit and the letter of the rules.

 

Groundspeak needs to change the rules or stop the practice. As a business first, they will no doubt cave to popularity. But their silence and refusal to do either is shameful.

[+baer2006]

23 hours ago, JL_HSTRE said:

Other than the geofencing, what about these ALs "requires players to physically visit the Adventure Locations"?

(Emphasis by me)

 

Everyone here knows the elephant in the room, so I may just name it: Geofencing can be easily worked-around by GPS-spoofing, because GS doesn't even implement the most basic anti-spoofing algorithms in their AL app.

[+x7Kevin]

15 hours ago, baer2006 said:

Geofencing can be easily worked-around by GPS-spoofing, because GS doesn't even implement the most basic anti-spoofing algorithms in their AL app.

 

That's why I try to make sure the answers to all my ALs can't be found online or with Street View. I am pretty much only making one's that require an actual word/number and not multiple choice, and the answer for at least one of the stages is something you have to look very closely to find. 

 

That being said I did my first AL art a while ago and had fun.