Geocache Fraud

February 17, 2004

How about this guys gallery?

We were thumbing through looking for photoshopped locationless caches and found the motherload here.

6.4k · February 17, 2004

How about this guys gallery?

Gallery

We were thumbing through looking for photoshopped locationless caches and found the motherload here.

You think?

Yeah, looks like he's logged a bunch of locationless, but they sure don't look faked to me. Almost every shot seems to have a slightly different grasp of the GPS, and some have some really nice touches added if they are faked, like reflections off shiny objects and mirrors.

9.2k · February 17, 2004

I agree with Mopar. At the very worst, he's a better photoshopper.

February 17, 2004

How about this guys gallery?

Gallery

We were thumbing through looking for photoshopped locationless caches and found the motherload here.

You think?

Yeah, looks like he's logged a bunch of locationless, but they sure don't look faked to me. Almost every shot seems to have a slightly different grasp of the GPS, and some have some really nice touches added if they are faked, like reflections off shiny objects and mirrors.

Hmm - I agree some are real -

What about these two?

How do you get the border behind your hand then?

Standing here is impossible if you've been there

9.2k · February 17, 2004

OK, two out of 48 (and yes I've stayed at the Luxor, though I was drunk all weekend, so I'll take your word for it). Hardly the Mother Lode. The Mother Lode lies elsewhere. It is there, though.

February 18, 2004

No, no, I think this guy IS the motherlode - besides the two examples listed above, look closer at the rest. Check out the "jaggies" and pixelation around the left side of the hand and GPS in this shot - you can still see the original dark background on the jagged left side of the hand in the image below, and he accidently cut out part of his watch band in the picture below:

Compare it side by side with this other image, and you'll see what I mean. I don't understand the point of faking it, but to each his own I guess!

2.3k · February 18, 2004

How about this guys gallery?

Gallery

We were thumbing through looking for photoshopped locationless caches and found the motherload here.

You think?

Yeah, looks like he's logged a bunch of locationless, but they sure don't look faked to me. Almost every shot seems to have a slightly different grasp of the GPS, and some have some really nice touches added if they are faked, like reflections off shiny objects and mirrors.

Hmm - I agree some are real -

What about these two?

How do you get the border behind your hand then?

Standing here is impossible if you've been there

Those two shots (of the Luxor and the boat) are absolutely faked. The lighting does not match at all. The main photos are taken during dusk, yet the sun is shining down on his hand like it is midday...and the lighting on the hand in all the shots seems to be coming from exactly the same direction, and the shading across the hand cuts off at the same place, in the very same direction every time. Even the reflection across the top of the GPS screen is the same. Gimme a break, even the SaxMan can Photoshop better than that!

Edited February 18, 2004 by TEAM 360

February 18, 2004

Hi all,

So this will be my first post on the forums after spending time reading them...I have chosen not to post previously because sometimes the boards can get a little heated ....but after reading through the responses to this...I have an overwhelming need to respond...so please bear with my long response...

I am realatively new to caching...and have just begun to plan to find some locationless caches......what upsets me about this guy is that he has taken it upon himself to log locations that otherwise could have been logged by a cachers who were there...with the GPS...so in essence they are truly not found...

of course it is frustrating to read a locationless ...and know you have been there...but without a gps, before you began caching etc...so you can not count it...

I myslef have been to Buckingham Palace and would loved to have it count as a find...but it is my lose of not being prepared (more motivation to return )

All that being said.... (sorry for the ramble)...on to my point...

Having looked at this guys pictures...the ones that FSU Noles posted is just the tip of the iceberg....compare the following links and you will see all of these are faked (IMHO)...

http://img.Groundspeak.com/cache/log/475746_200.jpg

http://img.Groundspeak.com/cache/log/475702_200.jpg

http://img.Groundspeak.com/cache/log/475830_200.jpg

http://img.Groundspeak.com/cache/log/449704_200.jpg (the original in my opinion)

http://img.Groundspeak.com/cache/log/475526_200.jpg

http://img.Groundspeak.com/cache/log/475533_200.jpg

http://img.Groundspeak.com/cache/log/475848_200.jpg

http://img.Groundspeak.com/cache/log/475720_200.jpg

http://img.Groundspeak.com/cache/log/475764_200.jpg

You will see the pixalation that FSU Noles talks about and the same direction of the sun...and the impossible perception...and I know people will comment with the why do you care...and as stated....it just takes away the fun for someone else...now of course they can find another location...but again as stated...then this place is not truly "found"...

My other point/question...I myself had two caches that I thought I logged and didn't...so my dates might be slightly off...and for that I feel bad...but I thought that accurately dating a find is important...if that is the case....

Then how can this guy have 18 locationless finds in one day.... In Alabama, Las Vegas, Maine, North Carolina, Oregon, Tennesse, Iowa, and England...I know people have done some pretty amazing things...but come on...

I guess I can believe he might have been able to be in Georgia one day and then Memphis, TN and Alabama the next....

Anyway, all this is just an opinion, hopefully I will not get snapped at for posting it...I just think that for locationless caches...some of his logs ruin it for others to find...since usually only one person can find it...

Thanks for listening....

38.2k · February 18, 2004

Then how can this guy have 18 locationless finds in one day.... In Alabama, Las Vegas, Maine, North Carolina, Oregon, Tennesse, Iowa, and England...I know people have done some pretty amazing things...but come on..

Actually, you can. The locationless coordinates are bogus and can be anywhere. So in theory, you could log locationless caches all over the world and never leave your town.

But it is obvious that this guy is cheating. A few pics are legit, but look at the rest. The watch is the in exactly the same position and the GPS display is always shaded.

"Do the guy is cheating, what's the harm?", some will ask. Well with most locationless caches, we are only allowed one log for a specific site, so these fake logs cut off those sites for legit geocachers. Some will have to drive a long distance away to log the cache because Mr. Cheater logged a fake find for one near their home

Edited February 18, 2004 by briansnat

February 18, 2004

How silly! What is the point of posting a log on a cache you didn't find? Who is going to be impressed?

Geocaching is akin to playing Solitaire . . . if you cheat then you are only cheating yourself . . . truly pointless.

Whatever . . . does it really matter?

That is my opinion . . . such as it is.

Happy caching and stuff! <_<

February 18, 2004

We are all accusing this poor guy of cheating, but why don't someone contact him and get his side of the story. He is obviously playing the game his way, and I honestly don't think it is any of our business what he logs as a find...instead we should be out there finding caches instead of criticizing others on their personal game.

Just because the pictures may have been faked in some way, does not mean that he didn't actually visit the place and hence to him it counts as a find.

Lets get over it, mind our own business, and all go out and find a cache right now...that is what I plan to do now.

February 28, 2004

Man, this guy gets around.

1.5k · February 28, 2004

We are all accusing this poor guy of cheating, but why don't someone contact him and get his side of the story. He is obviously playing the game his way, and I honestly don't think it is any of our business what he logs as a find...instead we should be out there finding caches instead of criticizing others on their personal game.

Just because the pictures may have been faked in some way, does not mean that he didn't actually visit the place and hence to him it counts as a find.

Lets get over it, mind our own business, and all go out and find a cache right now...that is what I plan to do now.

Well, the accusations are founded. Helen Keller and Stevie Wonder could pick out the flaws in his minuteman Photoshopping. The one at the Luxor that 360 mentioned is as blatant as they come. The least he could have done is shaded his hand a bit to make it 'appear' legitimate. I stayed at the Luxor less than a month ago, and know as well that the location of the pic is an impossibility.

If he was really there, no need for Photoshopped images would exist. I took my digicam with me to Vegas to get credit for several of the virtuals I visited along the Strip. If I had left it at home, a cheap disposable would have been ok, as long as I scanned the developed pictures and submitted as required.

It drives me nuts that some people feel a necessity to pull crap like this. Is it to justify their own existence, or a self-esteem issue? I'd be inclined to say yes, but that' just my opinion. Each and every find I've logged are legitimate, and that's good enough for me.

February 29, 2004

Let us not forget the ever elusive Mustard Man virtual.

February 29, 2004

Here's an interesting twist to this issue: we have a local geocacher who will sign the logbooks in the cache but will not log it on the site.

I found one just the other day that had a BUNCH of logs like that: People who had obviously been there -- 'cause they'd signed the log physically -- but who hadn't logged the cache on the website.

This was one of the easiest caches I've found so far: It was in the trunk of a hollow tree in a city park with no particular effort to conceal it. My guess is that it had been found accidently numerous times by people who weren't especially interested in geocaching (especially since many of the logs without online equivalents were real names). They did as the instructions said: examined the contents, signed the log, and put it back. What amazed me is that this cache had been in its location for something like a year and a half, had been found accidently many times, but hadn't been stolen. Kinda renewed my faith in humanity.

March 2, 2004

<grumble::grumble> stupid double post. All I wanted to do was correct a misspelled word. :rolleyes:

Edited March 2, 2004 by Bayberry

March 2, 2004

How silly! What is the point of posting a log on a cache you didn't find? Who is going to be impressed?

Here's a hypothetical...

There's this guy, he gets the idea to start a caching group. Maybe all this guy wanted was to have a neat title and maybe some kinda badge to wear, to make him feel important. But he gets carried away, and somebody thinks he's some kind of threat to the universe.

So some Uber-Cachers tell him, No, they won't allow it. They don't wanna join, and they don't want anyone else to, either. Now, they can dictate policy because they have Big Numbers, and this entirely hypothetical guy ponders that.

How to catch up, and become as Big as the Big Guys, so they can't tell him what to do? That'd be a full-time job. So he decides to jack up his own numbers by faking finds.

Now, he's not that dumb, and makes a test run first, by creating a sock puppet account. Then, when he's caught, he can deny everything.

Now what? He still wants to be an Uber-Cacher, but how...? AH! Of course! By becoming an Uber-Hider! So now he tosses caches in ever park and parking lot he passes in his travels. If he keeps this up, he, too, can become an Uber-Cacher and make Big Important Decisions about how the game is played.

Just a hypothetical, as I said.

Edited March 2, 2004 by Bayberry

1.3k · March 3, 2004

Now, they can dictate policy because they have Big Numbers, and this entirely hypothetical guy ponders that.

I must have missed something. When did big numbers allow you to dictate anything and when did it become a requirement in order to form a group?

Edited March 3, 2004 by bons

March 3, 2004

Now, they can dictate policy because they have Big Numbers, and this entirely hypothetical guy ponders that.

I must have missed something. When did big numbers allow you to dictate anything and when did it become a requirement in order to form a group?

Yah, I wasn't aware that you needed a certain number of finds in order to form a group, or that the person with the most finds was the automatic 'leader' of the group... I guess I'll have to reconsider forming a 'geocaching group' in my area.

38.2k · March 3, 2004

One thing that could be done is to make a person's find count only visible to the cacher themself. That way, there is no "status" given to someone based solely on the fact that they have more finds than someone else

Find counts and the resultant "status" are important to others to some extent. If you are a cache owner and get a DNF from someone with 3-4 finds, you usually disregard it. If you get a DNF from someone with 500 finds, you take it a lot more seriously and will probably make a trip out to the cache site to see what's up.

Similar thing in the forums. You get someone here who has a strong opinion about a certain aspect of this sport and see that they have 1-2 finds, you take it with a grain of salt. An opinion from an experienced geocacher will usually carry a bit more weight. I'm not saying a novice can't have a valid opinion, but people will tend to pay more attention to someone who knows what they are talking about.

Edited March 3, 2004 by briansnat

March 3, 2004

For those that want to see a whole thread on the "locationless cheater" go here.

March 3, 2004

I must have missed something. When did big numbers allow you to dictate anything and when did it become a requirement in order to form a group?

It doesn't, it shouldn't, anyway. Briansnat's comments make perfect sense, but certain other cachers are so enamoured of their numbers that they did use them to slap down other cachers. In the process, they created a mess - the "Law of Unintended Consquences" at work.

And I'm really upset about that Mars Rover virtual. I thought that was going to be a traditional cache.

1.3k · March 4, 2004

I must have missed something. When did big numbers allow you to dictate anything and when did it become a requirement in order to form a group?

It doesn't, it shouldn't, anyway. Briansnat's comments make perfect sense, but certain other cachers are so enamoured of their numbers that they did use them to slap down other cachers.

They don't wanna join, and they don't want anyone else to, either. Now, they can dictate policy because they have Big Numbers

I'm sorry. I really don't understand. How did their big numbers allow them to "dictate policy". How could they have used these numbers to force other cachers not to join the group?

I can understand a new geocacher somehow thinking the number might actually mean something, and starting some bizarre behavior out of that misunderstanding, but that only tells me that the new geocacher should NOT be the one starting a group and that it was very unlikely many experienced people would join a group led by someone whose toes weren't even damp yet.

Once upon a time, (and this was a long time ago) forums had an unwritten rule that you should lurk for a while to learn the lay of the land. Groups and hobbies tend to have a similar unwritten rule: You need to be an active participant for a while before trying to form a club or organize an event. It's sort of a paying your dues sort of thing. This unwritten rule exists for some very good reasons.

Now it doesn't mean big numbers. CarleenP doesn't have big numbers. But she does have our respect. She's been doing this for awhile, has helped out at many levels, is intelligent and funny, and most importantly, has an amazing amount of tact. In short, she's paid her dues and then some. I'm likely to listen to her, much more than someone's whose sole experience is a couple cache machines, even though the cache machine guy is likely to have higher numbers.

I'm sorry, but anyone who wants the job of big cheese and is willing to lie in order to get it should be slapped down until they understand the concept of service and forget their illusions of glory. It's probably the least painful solution for everyone involved.

Edited March 4, 2004 by bons

March 4, 2004

I'm sorry, but anyone who wants the job of big cheese and is willing to lie in order to get it should be slapped down until they understand the concept of service and forget their illusions of glory. It's probably the least painful solution for everyone involved.

No, no, you misunderstand. This person started the fakes after he'd been slapped down.

The whole thing could have been handled much, much better. A bunch of folks had talked about the idea of starting a group, and this one person jumped on it, and "started" a group, without much input from other cachers. Some of us talked quietly (off-forum) about how to handle him, and we had a pretty good plan. But others kicked up such a hissy fit that the plan fell apart.

At about the same time, the "owner" of the "group" started a sock puppet account to experiment with pumping up his numbers. That finished off all attempts to start any group.

Many of the people involved in the talks (on and off the forum) about forming a group were not newbies. Some were Big Names Cachers in their own right. If the nay-sayers had been small-number cachers or newbies, they could have been ignored. But no one - especially us small-fry -- wanted to have a face-off with a VIP. And no one wanted to be involved in a social club that was born in flames.

The point being, that some people here at CG.com take their own stats too seriously. In this instance, it caused a neat idea to be buried. Worse -- it gave us a loose cannon. He's out there, planting caches in places filled with so much disgusting trash that many of us won't set foot in them for fear of getting some disease from discarded needles. (Ask Briansnat about his caption.)

He's doing it to pump up his numbers, because he has the weird idea that doing so will make him, as you say, "a big cheese." He's out there planting caches in questionable places where he's just daring a land managers / property owners to make a fuss. I don't know if he wants that, or if he's just acting stupidly, but the end result may be the same, if he becomes an ipso facto spokesman for Geocaching because of it.

I don't know why this "virtual fake" with the metal watchband is doing his fraud. Certainly not to be clever - or he would have done the Mars virtual photo. Most likely it'll result in nothing negative.

One can hope.

(dadgum it, I read the forum w/o logging on so I won't be tempted to post, but here I am posting a friggin' novel. dadgum. Time to log off again.)

38.2k · March 4, 2004

He's doing it to pump up his numbers, because he has the weird idea that doing so will make him, as you say, "a big cheese." He's out there planting caches in questionable places where he's just daring a land managers / property owners to make a fuss. I don't know if he wants that, or if he's just acting stupidly, but the end result may be the same, if he becomes an ipso facto spokesman for Geocaching because of it.

I know of this person who you are referring to. Faking finds and planting numerous lousy caches won't make him a "big cheese" and in fact has made him somewhat of a laughingstock.

As I recall it Bayberry, a lot of people were against his forming a regional group, chiefly because he was a bit of newbie at the time and really didn't know what he was doing. But I wouldn't let this stop you from forming one in the future. Someone like you, who may not have big numbers, but has been around a long time, gets as much respect as anyone. And I'd say more respect than someone who has been around for 3 months and has 300 finds. Its not about numbers. Its about judgement and experience.

Edited March 4, 2004 by briansnat

Geocache Fraud

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