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Looters!


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Another cache of ours has just been looted. Worse, we just got word that somebody has looted someone else's cache but left the log book with the last entry using our name and saying we did it!!!! We've never even been to the cache in question. This is burnin' us up and wrecking the game.

Is anybody doing anything about Looters? Tell us what we can do to identify and/or stop the bums-please!

 

Team Teasel [:)]

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It happens here too. Its one thing when a non Geocacher stumbles on a cache, sees this nice ammo box filled with stuff and takes it. But when someone using a GPS goes to a cache with the intent of looting, or tampering with it, that's disturbing.

 

Outside camping out by your cache, there isn't much you can do. Perhaps making your cache "Members Only" can help. Looters are less likely to shell out the bucks to become a member, just so they can loot a cache. But that also cuts down on the number of potential finders and IMHO takes the fun out of the sport.

 

One person I know suggested posting false coordinates and requesting that the potential finder e-mail him for the correct ones, then only giving them out to known Geocachers. This would cut down on plundering, but would also spoil the sport itself, which is the ultimate intent of these miscreants.

 

As more people get into this sport, you're going to get more bad apples. That's just a sad fact of life. You can cut down on plundering by accidental finders by hiding your cache well, and away from popular areas, but you can't stop those who misuse this website to get the coordinates specifically with the intent of robbing the cache

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Seeing as how it was one of my caches that your name was written in I figured that I should make a comment. I think it's horrible that the cache got looted, but it's even worse that your name got mentioned and now all this has happened. On the cache page I wrote why I thought your name got picked. Of course I had my name on the box and in the log book, but I guess they decided to use yours.

 

I like to think that it was just some kids that found the cache and took everything, not an actual geocacher. That would really be too bad, although I realize that it could happen.

 

I stayed up for a long time last night thinking about what to do. First I thought about pulling all of my caches, including one that I hid yesterday but haven't posted to the site yet. Unfortunately if everyone did that we wouldn't have this sport. I finally decided that I wouldn't hide many in popular city parks, instead I'm going to look for more rural locations. They won't get as many hits but they might be safer. I know, Team Teasel, that your cache was pretty far out in the country but maybe it will save some of them.

 

As far as geocachers looting caches, I'm starting to think that MOC are the way to go. There's probably no real solution, caches will always get stolen and we'll always have to replace them.

 

Sorry I was rambling everyone. I'm still sad about my cache, since it was my first to get looted. Team Teasel, I hope this passes over and you continue to enjoy caching. I'm sure I will since I still think geocaching is super fun!

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Hey Team:

 

Sorry to hear about the cache. You know, it's happened to me twice down here in Pasadena - on the same cache! I know it's happened to the Buffalo Gals as well, which prompted them to go into MOC mode. Personally, I've just tried to take it in stride. It's going to happen - in my case, it was clear whoever did it did not find the box by accident, but actually used a GPS to find it, which is pretty f**ked-up, when you think about it. But...

 

One thing is clear: the harder the find, the less likely the cache is to get plundered. Our latest caches have either been micros (which means nothing "good" to loot,) or ones that involve at least some kind of hill to climb, which I look at as a deterrent to someone lazy enough to consider blowing someone else's cache a good time...

 

Charlie

 

"One should never begin a journey by heading in the wrong direction."

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Someone here asked what we can do to stop the looting of our caches. I just learned recently that my second regular-sized cache has just been stolen as well as a friend's cache about 2 miles from mine. I only have three possible solutions to put a stop to this. The success of each solution is dependent on what parties are stealing our caches. These are just my ideas and yours will surely differ for your particular situation.

 

The first has already been mentioned and that is to join and make my caches "members only". This would help prevent people from fleecing all the coordinates for local caches from geocaching.com and then going out and stealing them. Also mentioned, it would also reduce the number of finds which would be very unfortunate. I don't think the cachers in my area are members...

 

The second solution has been discussed here in the forums in the past and is called a "deer cam". It is a ruggedized housing that contains a camera and a passive infrared motion sensor. When it detects motion (deer, dogs, humans), it snaps a picture. I would later retrieve the film and post the culprits' pictures in a very prominent place on the web. This would help guard against any people that are stealing the caches, including "park managers" or those posing as such. The only problem with this idea is that it's rather pricy...about $260.00 for the setup and though it's meant to be secured to a tree with insulated cable and padlocks, there's no guarantee that the deer cam wouldn't get stolen.

 

The third solution (my personal favorite) would be extremely effective if the thieves are actually park manager types that are too cowardly to contact us to have us remove the caches. (Yes, we got permission but it wouldn't surprise me in this town if the head didn't know what the rear-end was doing in city government here...) So the third solution is to make a very, very widespread multi-cache with the last point being a virtual (only so there wouldn't be anything to steal). These people would probably waste the better part of a week with how widespread the multi would be and would have nothing to steal for it once they finished it. Oh, and it wouldn't be disclosed that the final point was a virtual until after they log it. I would e-mail all the local geocachers that I know personally in the area and let them know not to go looking for it unless they want a virtual at the end. Actually, it would be really effective against those just using the site to get caches to steal also.

 

After a couple of adventures like this and not finding anything to steal, it will force the city employee slugs (and any others) to either stop stealing the caches or at least e-mail someone (preferably ME) exactly what their problem is.

 

This is the second cache of mine in about 6 months that's been stolen and it's getting a little old now. The next one will be of the rubbermaid variety and will have 1 toy, a pen, a pencil and a logbook. I'm tired of buying ammo cans and painting them up nice just so some Bubba can go steal them. It will get wet in there, but I will be checking it often and can fix it up if need be.

 

Cheers! Feel free to use any of these ideas if you have like-minded people plundering caches in your area.

 

JM-99

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For the life of me I cannot figure out why a person would steal a couple of happy meal toys, or whatever may be in a cache? It seems so childish to me. However, I go to enjoy the outdoors and see new places, even if they are in my own town. It would be of no consequence to me if a cache only contained a pen and logbook. I enjoy logging caches, and I am sure that the hider of the cache enjoys seeing who has found the thing. I would probably miss snooping around the ammo can but I really don't need it. I just enjoy finding the cache

 

Regards

 

Timothius

 

An Irish Toast:

"May you be in heaven a half hour before

the Devil knows you're dead"

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quote:
posted August 06, 2002 02:14 PM

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The second solution has been discussed here in the forums in the past and is called a "deer cam". It is a ruggedized housing that contains a camera and a passive infrared motion sensor. When it detects motion (deer, dogs, humans), it snaps a picture. I would later retrieve the film and post the culprits' pictures in a very prominent place on the web.


 

I'd be pretty careful of this from a constitutional rights/invasion of privacy standpoint. My guess is, as unfair as it may be, it's more legal for someone to trash your cache then it is for you to publicize their picture!

 

Charlie

 

"One should never begin a journey by heading in the wrong direction."

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quote:
Originally posted by LarsThorwald:

 

I'd be pretty careful of this from a constitutional rights/invasion of privacy standpoint.


 

From my limited knowledge of law, I believe you can take a picture of anyone and publish it, as long as you don't profit from that person's likeness. Otherwise the newspapers would have a heck of a lot of lawsuits on their hands.

 

I doubt a photo of someone would deter them from taking a cache, unless you can give out particular's on the individual, like their name.

 

A fourth thought is to create permission style caches, where someone would have to ask permission from the owner before receiving access to their caches. After permission was granted, they could see all of that user's caches.

 

It beats the account-only cache idea, where you need to be logged into geocaching.com - which can be easily bypassed with a lame hotmail or yahoo account.

 

Jeremy

 

Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location

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quote:
I doubt a photo of someone would deter them from taking a cache, unless you can give out particular's on the individual, like their name.


 

What'e even more frightening is that posting photos might actually encourage people!

 

Charlie

 

"One should never begin a journey by heading in the wrong direction."

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I don't know??? Not being an attorney I am not sure of that. It is an interesting question to figure out.

 

The situation that the individual(S) photographed are in a public place, say a park, forest... What expectation of privacy do they have when in public? If you use their image in a commercial way, I know there are issues. If you use their images in a bonefied news situation it is, I believe, fair game. I know if they are on their own private property that it would be a violation of their privacy and thus illegal. If they were tresspassing on your property and your hidden security camera photographs them what would your rights be to publish their pictures? You see that done all the time. Does having the camera so hidden on public property, as apposed to on your own property, including stores, banks, businesses..., change the situation from a situation where you were standing there taking pictures and the persons knowingly wandered into your shot?

 

Anyways, The deer camera sounds like a cool idea. Would also help to verify if any damage to or around your cache is being done by wildlife. It would even be cool just to see the people who visit.

 

quote:
Originally posted by LarsThorwald:

quote:
posted August 06, 2002 02:14 PM

--------------------------------------------------------------------------------

The second solution has been discussed here in the forums in the past and is called a "deer cam". It is a ruggedized housing that contains a camera and a passive infrared motion sensor. When it detects motion (deer, dogs, humans), it snaps a picture. I would later retrieve the film and post the culprits' pictures in a very prominent place on the web.


 

I'd be pretty careful of this from a constitutional rights/invasion of privacy standpoint. My guess is, as unfair as it may be, it's more legal for someone to trash your cache then it is for you to publicize their picture!

 

Charlie

 

"One should never begin a journey by heading in the wrong direction."


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quote:
Originally posted by Jeremy (Admin):

A fourth thought is to create permission style caches, where someone would have to ask permission from the owner before receiving access to their caches. After permission was granted, they could see all of that user's caches.

 

It beats the account-only cache idea, where you need to be logged into geocaching.com - which can be easily bypassed with a lame hotmail or yahoo account.


 

Thanks, Jeremy...I did not know we could do this. It does sound like the best solution to prevent looting, at least in my area...these people that stole these caches had to either have gone to geocaching.com to get the coordinates or they saw someone else go find it and followed later. I'm leaning toward thinking they went to geocaching.com to get the cache locations because they stole a buddy's cache about 2mi. away also.

 

How would this work? Are we able to give you guys the real coordinates but post on our cache page to e-mail me before I give the real coordinates to the cache?

 

Thanks again!!

 

JM-99

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quote:
I'd be pretty careful of this from a constitutional rights/invasion of privacy standpoint. My guess is, as unfair as it may be, it's more legal for someone to trash your cache then it is for you to publicize their picture!


quote:
From my limited knowledge of law, I believe you can take a picture of anyone and publish it, as long as you don't profit from that person's likeness.

I'm an attorney, albeit with only one year's experience out of law school - but Jeremy's notion is pretty much on target. There is no law against taking someone's picture and publishing it on the internet, with a few caveats: (1) As Jeremy noted, that proposition gets trickier if you make some kind of profit off using someone else's likeness. Of course, usually successful challenges using this as an argument happen when it is a famous person's likeness being used (e.g. Fred Astaire in the vaccuum cleaner commercials); (2) The proposition above also gets trickier when the camera is placed on private property. If you take a picture of a person in the public domain, and publish it, not only is there no privacy problem - but your photograph is also automatically copyrighted to you!

 

On the other hand, stealing items out of a cache without permission (either explicit or implicit) is exactly that - stealing (the taking and carrying away the property of another, without permission). One would be hard-pressed to argue that when the cache-owner gives permission to take an item from the cache in exchange for another item/log entry, that the cache owner also somehow impliedly gave permission to take the entire cache. I doubt that argument would fly. What argument would fly would be an abandonment argument - the time periods vary from jurisdiction to jurisdiction, but if an item is abandoned for a certain length of time, it cannot be "stolen" because it no longer belongs to the original owner. (Of course, if the cache owner makes regular checkups on the cache, I'd argue it hasn't been abandoned...)

 

Disclaimer: This is with absolutely no caselaw research in your particular jurisdiction, so caveat emptor! (or, rather, non-buyer beware! icon_wink.gif)

 

[This message was edited by Texas-Gal on August 06, 2002 at 06:59 PM.]

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quote:
Originally posted by LarsThorwald:

_Hey Team:_

 

 

One thing is clear: the harder the find, the less likely the cache is to get plundered. Our latest caches have either been micros (which means nothing "good" to loot,) or ones that involve at least some kind of hill to climb, which I look at as a deterrent to someone lazy enough to consider blowing someone else's cache a good time...

 

Charlie

 

"One should never begin a journey by heading in the wrong direction."


 

A lot is being said about people finding a cache with the purpose of looting it... but in our area there is a HUGE homeless population. (Must be the weather!) The parks where a lot of the caches are placed can be literally crawling with them. One cache was plundered before the first finder even got there!! icon_eek.gif The point being that THAT area is particularly inundated with homeless persons. The encampment is right down the river from it.

 

The caches aren't terribly difficult in degree and this leaves them open to someone stumbling upon them.

 

Another micro that was stolen was in an area where young kids hang out. You know... where they can go to sneak a smoke, etc., etc. I was surprised it lasted as long as it did.

 

Well, enough said. It's not always the fault of some depraved sicko with a GPSr.

 

quote:
Even if you're on the right track, you'll get run over if you just sit there. - Will Rogers (1879-1935)
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Hey gang-thanks for so much imput. I am really flattered by your effortful and thoughtful responses. Especially Nice to hear from Jeremy, Charles and Precocious!!!!

A note to Jeremy; I had was wondering if Groundspeak would be interested/willing to run a page for folks to log plundered caches-patterns can lead to prevention...

In the mean time thanks to you good folks, I am back in the game. Just reading all your enteries was so refreshing I got pumped to cache all over again. In fact I recent replaced the Troll cache now Teasel's Troll Treasure Trove II-same park, new location.

On another thought, I was imagining the poverty of the soul(s) that felt they needed or wanted to plunder caches. No offense to anyone, but my realizing there has been no cache I have seen that I wanted it all, brought it home to me once again, to how good I got it and well, perhaps, how bad those that steal, don't. But, my goodness there does seem to be an uncomfortably lot of those souls about. It seems like everyone has had a cache plundered. Tends to make me wonder how often it really is happening.

Another idea I had was to lock my cache container in place and lock it closed. You find it, give me the cache code # on the container by email and I will give you the combo to open it. Yeah it is a 2 step process, but...but...but! Sure they could still steal it but, the less than charitable side of me says that at least they would have to work really, really hard at it...and for what?

I am definately feeling better about all this you guys. You are the Best! Keep on Cachin'-I am! This is Easel of Teasel signing off!!!

Eek

 

Team Teasel [:)]

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Kidding aside, I personally wouldn't invest any time or money on a five or ten dollar cache. My caches are faily remote odds are greater that they may be burned in a brush fire than looted.I'm not going to fireproof them either. If its some morons idea of fun remove them and wait awhile he'll move on or be killed when he decides that doing a jackass video is more fun....:)

 

Support PETA: Please Eat Tasty Animals

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My first cache ever placed was plundered. I doubt it was found by accident, so I made it a virtual cache and gave false coordinates. The description asks people to e-mail me for the coordinates. I've gotten several requests, and no complaints. I only give the coordinates if the person has an established presence already on this site, meaning several caches already found.

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Is there an existing web cam in your area?

One that archives photos over a period of time?

Maybe a "honeypot" cache can be placed within it's sights?

If this looter is quite active, and you are also active in keeping up with the photos and checking on the cache, you stand a chance.

Might be fun to have in any case! To log the cache, you must smile and wave at the appropriate time, copy the picture from the webcam page and post it on the cache page icon_smile.gif

Oh yeah, but that makes the cache too easy to find. Oh well, different sport I guess.

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quote:
Originally posted by Jumpmaster on August 06, 2002 02:14 PM:

The second solution has been discussed here in the forums in the past and is called a "deer cam".......


 

quote:
Originally posted by Steak N Eggs:

Put a "GAME CAMERA" nearby, so that it takes a pic of the people getting into the cache.....


 

What a novel idea...

 

JM-99

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I just found one of my caches has gone missing. It was put in a fairley remote area, although it was a park. 1.25 mile walk to get to it. i am sure it was not taken by a fellow geocacher.

The thing that makes me angry is the fact that the log book and all the comments made are gone forever. I archived the cache.

I will be putting another one in this park but in a different location.

I use ammo boxes and they are cheap enough that I dont mind it and the contents are gone, but I still get pissed over the log book when I think about it.

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Who can say what the heck is going on these days. I am 3 for 3 in the stolen cache business. I am beginning to think that it is almost as big a game to steal and collect caches as it is to just find them. I agree about the sense of loss over the log books-therein lies the biggest bite for me in all this. And, once again just as I think ah, rats I'm chuckin' this game cause someone came along and stole my cache-same day I get an email that my puttin' out a new cache at The Troll site inspired someone else to renew one of their plundered sites. That inspires me to do it again...one more time.. icon_rolleyes.gif What will be, will be

 

Team Teasel [:)]

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i would say that all efforts to prevent this are useless!

if someone goes through the effort to find coordinates of caches, and locate them, they will certainly do the same if it is members only. the result will be that people will not become members. im not a member yet but the easy access to the site is a big factor in my participation. i can use a chart to find a remote location, but i would rather chase travel bugs and the like.

just a side point that i hate to admit! i had my dogs out the other day and they zeroed in on the cache faster than my gps did? are the looters posibly small game hunters using dogs (canadian terminology-please correct) and stumbling upon caches?

anyway, i doubt that moc is the solution, i doubt that virtual caches are the solution, i doubt that any kind of restriction can eliminate looting. i would say that you give local cachers a treasure to find and that the individual responible for looting your cache is probably reading this thread and to him i would say

**** YOU!!!

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Posted: June 22 2002,09:34 am on the "other site" by Upinyachit

icon_smile.gif

 

To all of you geotrashers out there,

here is a message for you.

We're sick and tired of your "existence",

and the awful things you do.

We will find out who you are

see, our members stick together.

You'll never know when we'll pop up,

in any type of weather.

So, please leave our caches alone;

don't be an S.O.B.!

No one knows who you are

or what your point might be.

It might be that you like the box,

or you just might like the stuff;

But remember, one thing is for sure,

carma can sure be tough!

 

icon_smile.gif

 

Our feet go where the caches are! feet.gif

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I strongly believe in many cases there are environmental extremeists removing caches and the word may be getting out among "them" to cover their own areas and remove caches. I personally wish you all would leave the cordinates posted. I like to visit the places anyhow cache or not and the greenie wont stop me by removing the cache. If a problem exists I think you have to just replace it often with a cheap tupperware untill you wear them down.

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Several assumptions have been made regarding the looters.. (1) they use GPSr to locate posted caches. (2) they read these posts. (3) they are greenies. etc. We won't know anything about them untin they are caught in the act. The Deer Camera may be the solution if we can prevent them from destroying it. Outing a looter is the best remedy. while not looters, examples are: Boblog3 [a troll] - outed 7/27 no further posts; MrGigabyte [posting false finds] - outed 8/27 no further posts. In both of these cases we may have lost valuable members of our community because of objectionable habits, but it did provide some remidy to the problem. Let's make an effort to catch them in the act and expose them.

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As I've heard before, member only caches have not been looted so far (though I am aware at least on one occasion that the coordinates have been stolen and posted to other web sites). Not only do you lose your anonymous status through a member-only cache (since you have to register to play), as the cache owner you also have an audit list of who saw your cache.

 

One recommendation in the past was to make caches registration-only, but since people can create throw-away hotmail accounts this doesn't work too well.

 

The other suggestion has been a cacher rating system, like with eBay. You get a percentage rating and people can indicate a threshold rating where if you are above a certain percentile, you can see the cache coordinates. An interesting idea, to be sure. Your rating would be based on other people rating you (and their own rating).

 

I'd have to figure out the math on that, so it would be fair. People out of spite could rate you down, but if their own rating is low than it wouldn't affect you.

 

Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location

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The last one (which I like too) is a permission-only cache where you have to ask to view it. Folks on your "buddy list" can see the cache, since you trust them to see it. People you don't know can request via email access to your cache.

 

Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location

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While most stolen caches are likely the result of a non Geocacher stumbling on it, there are a significant number that appear to be targeted by

GPS users.

 

An easy way around this would be to give cache owners the option to hide the coordinates when they post the cache. This could be a simple check off box on the form.

 

When the page is displayed, instead of the coordinates being shown, there could be a message saying "contact owner for coordinates". They would still have to enter the coordinates for Admin purposes (so they can determine if its in a National Park, etc...), but the coordinates just won't be displayed on the page.

 

This could be a pain for the seeker...esp. if the owner is away when you want to look for the cache, but at least give the owner the option.

 

"Life is a daring adventure, or it is nothing" - Helen Keller

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quote:
Originally posted by Jeremy (Admin):

quote:
Originally posted by LarsThorwald:

 

I'd be pretty careful of this from a constitutional rights/invasion of privacy standpoint.


 

From my limited knowledge of law, I believe you can take a picture of anyone and publish it, as long as you don't profit from that person's likeness. Otherwise the newspapers would have a heck of a lot of lawsuits on their hands.

 

I doubt a photo of someone would deter them from taking a cache, unless you can give out particular's on the individual, like their name.

 

A fourth thought is to create permission style caches, where someone would have to ask permission from the owner before receiving access to their caches. After permission was granted, they could see all of that user's caches.

 

It beats the account-only cache idea, where you need to be logged into geocaching.com - which can be easily bypassed with a lame hotmail or yahoo account.

 

Jeremy

 

Jeremy Irish

Groundspeak - The Language of Location


 

I just got around to reading this thread, and noticing the comments about photo legality.

 

Technically, you can only publish an identifiable image of individual, (in the US, other jurisdictions vary,) either with their prior consent, or because the image shows them in a newsworthy endeavor.

 

Newspapers do, from time to time, get sued for photos that identify people, and sometimes lose because the image wasn't deemed newsworthy.

 

what's been suggested in the early parts of this thread is legally risky. You'd better be able to prove in a court of law that the person really was doing what you're accusing them of, or they'll be able to successfully sue you for libel.

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quote:
Originally posted by BrianSnat:

While most stolen caches are likely the result of a non Geocacher stumbling on it, there are a significant number that appear to be targeted by

GPS users.


 

I agree 110%

 

quote:

An easy way around this would be to give cache owners the option to hide the coordinates when they post the cache. This could be a simple check off box on the form.

 

When the page is displayed, instead of the coordinates being shown, there could be a message saying "contact owner for coordinates". They would still have to enter the coordinates for Admin purposes (so they can determine if its in a National Park, etc...), but the coordinates just won't be displayed on the page.


 

I would like to have the choice of hiding coordinates with a checkbox from non-registered users and take my chances with the throw-away emailers. That chance is better than no chance, and it wouldn't have to be mandatory, just a choice.

 

Here's a by-product if it were to become mandatory, and it may not be perfect, but humor me. This site is extremely slow, partly because of the increased popularity, but I'm guessing it's from numerous hits by bots gathering waypoints and cache descriptions. If the site were to go registered users only, then the administrators can set a limit on how many cache pages can be viewed in one day. Let's say 100 per account. I don't know anyone who has found that many in one day, not even BruceS. By not showing the information, then there would be nothing to harvest. The site would run faster.

 

Charter members might be able to have unlimited viewing, and if incredible harvesting is being done by them, then perhaps a warning could be issued, or an explanation demanded. Now I haven't thought it all out but I'm sure some will see reasons why this won't work, so lets hear them. icon_smile.gif

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There is always the possibility that someone with motives unlike ours has found the website and is using online maps to locate and loot caches. You might try doing what we did on my son’s first cache. The lat-long posted on the cache page only gets you to the trailhead. Once there you have to search around for the cache coordinates. In this particular case they’re written on the back of a sign with a sharpie marker. If someone wanted to loot this cache using the above mentioned method, they’d have to write down the lat-long and go back home and punch it all into their computer, then go back. Probably too much trouble

 

The problem we’re having with this cache is that it’s being looted by GEOCACHERs!

 

Magicman’s motto was “Trade up”. I’d like it if everybody would at least trade evenly.

 

http://www.geocaching.com/seek/cache_details.asp?ID=24813

 

><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><><

What is the price of experience, do men buy it for a song,

Or wisdom for a dance in the street.................

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quote:
Originally posted by Marty Fouts:

Technically, you can only publish an identifiable image of individual, (in the US, other jurisdictions vary,) either with their prior consent, or because the image shows them in a newsworthy endeavor.


Marty, this may be true, but we're not publishing anything. By publishing, one assumes a profit is generated.

 

If I'm just out with my camera and take pictures of people in public, I'm not breaking any law, but if I try to sell those pictures without consent of the people in the picture, that's where I can run into trouble.

 

A webcam shot of someone looting a cache is not going to be published anywhere where any money is generated, so I think we'd be safe with that tactic.

 

Jamie

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quote:
Originally posted by Jamie Z:

quote:
Originally posted by Marty Fouts:

Technically, you can only publish an identifiable image of individual, (in the US, other jurisdictions vary,) either with their prior consent, or because the image shows them in a newsworthy endeavor.


Marty, this may be true, but we're not publishing anything. By publishing, one assumes a profit is generated.

 

If I'm just out with my camera and take pictures of people in public, I'm not breaking any law, but if I try to _sell_ those pictures without consent of the people in the picture, that's where I can run into trouble.

 

A webcam shot of someone looting a cache is not going to be published anywhere where any money is generated, so I think we'd be safe with that tactic.

 

Jamie


 

Legally, a profit motive is not required for publication, and there have been cases about the circumstances under which photos are allowed on web sites. Case law on the net is, at the best of times, tricky, but people have lost libel suits involving publishing photos on web sites.

 

I would be very wary of posting photos along with assertions of guilt unless I was very certain I could convince a jury of guilt, because I'm not at all interested in losing a libel suit.

 

For an interesting (but unrelated) take on how complicated the issue of web publication is, check into the law suits around Kurt Vonnegut's electronic publication rights.

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I just don't see how some of you maintenance more than 10 hidden caches. I went to one of our hidden caches today to pick up an unofficial travel bug and couldn't believe that my cache was almost empty after I just stocked it full of goodies. I have no clue how some geocachers manage 20, 50, or even 100 hidden caches. I would lose my mind. Anyways, I have come to the conclusion that most geocachers are cool people and have that geocaching conscience, but some just go around taking goods

out of the caches without signing the log book or the online log. I guess that's the way the world works. For now though, I will deal with it and only hide micro caches in cool spots and continue to maintenance the ones we do have hidden . I just needed to vent a little. Thanks.

 

Duane

Upinyachit

icon_smile.gif

 

Our feet go where the caches are! feet.gif

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