Uk Left Out Again

[nobby.nobbs]

first jeep do the travel bug thing and we can't win one. now magellan do mystery caches in usa with prizes so again we can do them. is it something we said?

[+Lazyboy & Mitey Mite]

Want us to send you a jeep?

[+The Hornet]

Yep! I saw this yesterday and feel the same way. There again, although this is an international sport, of the 125,000 odd caches placed 98,000 or 78% are in the USA/Canada so anybody wanting to develop a partnership will target that area.

 

That being said, it's a great pity that TPTB can't come up with a scheme that includes everybody in the sport.

[+Cave Troll and Eeyore]

As usual we in the UK are the poor relations in the sport as in everything else, perhaps shortly we may get a booby prize a passifier just to keep us from complaining too loudly

 

Joan

Edited July 3, 2004 by Cave Troll & Joan

[+Orti_]

hmmm, I thought it is just a game personally I enjoy walking around and solving puzzles to find a cache box. It is a nice way to see a lot of the countryside and find places I wouldn’t have known / visited without this little box hidden in the woods. Let them have the commercial things over there I think we don't need this. Let's have fun without this.

[+yorkstan]

Actually I think that the UK cachers are a much more friendly lot. I travel to the Memphis area several times a year, so I often check out the forum for that part of the US (South and SouthEast) to see what is happening. Well they don't talk to each other - certainly not the way they do on the UK forum.

 

Using the statistics quoted on the forum site - they have had 7,912 posts versus the UK's 32,826. Yesterday (2nd July) they had just 3 posts. I have not bothered to count the number of posts on our forum (too many), but there were 14 topics.

 

So despite the lack of yellow jeeps or "Cache her if you can" games, I think we are a nicer group to "play" with. Let's just build the sport here, and then maybe we will get the chance to chance jeeps (or minis?) here.

 

How about another game of football? Who's got the ball?

 

Yorkstan

[+Volvo Man]

hmmm, I thought it is just a game personally I enjoy walking around and solving puzzles to find a cache box. It is a nice way to see a lot of the countryside and find places I wouldn’t have known / visited without this little box hidden in the woods. Let them have the commercial things over there I think we don't need this. Let's have fun without this.

Yeah but it would be nice to pull up in a shiny new Jeep, to go walk in the woods eh?

[+Stuey]

hmmm, I thought it is just a game personally I enjoy walking around and solving puzzles to find a cache box. It is a nice way to see a lot of the countryside and find places I wouldn’t have known / visited without this little box hidden in the woods. Let them have the commercial things over there I think we don't need this. Let's have fun without this. 

Yeah but it would be nice to pull up in a shiny new Jeep, to go walk in the woods eh?

Jeeps..... *yuck*. They can keep them in the USA for all I care

[+Team Marigold]

Not wanting to open old wounds again but I still feel that certain cachers have been poorly treated regarding commercial activities when large corporations are able to use our sport to promote their products.

It is also a worry to me (and I know that this sounds snobbish but it isn't meant to) but I think that big prizes such as these would attract the wrong sort of people into the sport.

We have all too much experience of what happens when caches are found by "the wrong type of people"

I know this makes me sound like a paranoid facist but for me part of the joy of caching is getting away from the corporate commercial world we are exposed to day in day out.

Just my tuppeneth

SL

[+sTeamTraen]

I know this makes me sound like a paranoid facist but for me part of the joy of caching is getting away from the corporate commercial world we are exposed to day in day out.

Perhaps not a "paranoid fascist" , but remember that this stuff doesn't happen by itself.

 

I don't like adverts for Pepsi in my face every five minutes either, but let's not forget that without the US Department of Defense (Internet and GPS), plus Garmin or Magellan, plus Microsoft or Apple, plus Intel or Motorola, none of all this would be happening. And unless you walk or ride your pushbike to every cache, you can add in Ford or General Motors or Renault, plus Shell or BP, etc etc.

 

And GC.com is a remarkable Web site - I use it as an example of good design and superb database integration - for which most of us pay nothing. In fact people outside the US probably don't even contribute indirectly, since what advertising there is on the site, is US-oriented. (In the same way: I don't smoke or gamble, but I'm happy for everyone else to do so and pay lots of tax for me !)

 

PS: I also hate Jeeps and all things 4x4, but that's partly because they tend to squash my MX-5 without seeing me:

Edited July 5, 2004 by sTeamTraen

[+Haggis Hunter]

Not wanting to open old wounds again but I still feel that certain cachers have been poorly treated regarding commercial activities when large corporations are able to use our sport to promote their products.

Large corporates promote their stuff through all sport, why should this be any different. Have you thought that they may actually be paying GC.com to advertise their product, such as along the lines of sponsorship, as large coporates do with all other sports personalities, teams and organisations. This may be how GC.com can afford to keep our premium subscription at a modist fee, and allow people to have the choice on whether they actually want to pay to take part.

All you need to do is go to any GPS trading site on the internet and it will advertise Geocaching. I believe they may do this free as for without us their sales wouldn't be as good as they are.

We are fairly lucky on this site because if you don't want to see the advert you just don't click the link.

[+Team Marigold]

Fair points and well put.

 

I guess I am just a bit old fashioned and look back upon the days when racing cars were not mobile adverstisments and the pop chatrts were the "top ten" not the pepsi max chart" as the good old days.

 

Oh well they do say "Nostalgia ain't what it used to be"

 

Whatever happens it will be interesting to see the way the sport progresses in the next few years.

 

SL

[nobby.nobbs]

yeah i know i agree the fun is in the hunt and i love the sport just the way it is.

 

but there's always the kid in me that wants the prize, the little treat, you know that little extra you didn't expect or have to pay for. i'm not going to turn down a jeep or so on but it's not the end of the world if we don't get it.

 

why not have a little something from these companies for us. little trinkets.

ok i admit it i'm a bloody magpie. but i'm just a normal bloke. the stereo with the most dials and flashy things is the best, sound quality doesn't come into it!

 

that's why i love signature items. they're unusual or unique just a little something extra when you get to a cache.

 

if i have to choose though between the sport as it is with the quality of the cachers we have against the chance to win a jeep then there's no contest......just give me the keys!

[+sTeamTraen]

I guess I am just a bit old fashioned and look back upon the days when racing cars were not mobile adverstisments and the pop chatrts were the "top ten" not the pepsi max chart" as the good old days.

Your profile page says you're 41... you must have been born with a dipstick in your mouth if you remember racing cars without ads. Here's Jackie Stewart's Ford from 1969:

 

(Check the amazing spoilers - still popular in parts of Kent and Essex, I believe )

[+Pharisee]

Your profile page says you're 41... you must have been born with a dipstick in your mouth if you remember racing cars without ads. Here's Jackie Stewart's Ford from 1969:

Hate to be 'pikky' but 1969 was the year Jackie won his first World Championship and the car was a Matra not a Ford. He was also British Formula One Champion in that year, a separate championship.

[+Team Marigold]

Those were the days indeed.

Look at those spectators!

They appear to be standing at the side of the track.

Safety wasn't really much of an issue in those days.

Although before my time I grew up on stories of British Racing green Bentleys,

Red Ferraris and small boys climbing the fence and scrambling up and peering over the banking at Brooklands.

The shame is that one of my heroes Colin Chapman is (allegedly and disputably) responsible for bringing sponsorship into the pits.

One thing I do know is that the level of sponsorship in F1 hasn't had much of an effect in keeping ticket prices low but that's a whole new kettle of fish for another forum.

SL

[+sTeamTraen]

Hate to be 'pikky' but 1969 was the year Jackie won his first World Championship and the car was a Matra not a Ford. He was also British Formula One Champion in that year, a separate championship.

Ford powered maybe ?

[+Pharisee]

Ford powered maybe ?

Yes, it certainly was. The good ol' Cossie DFV.

It won straight out of the box the first time it was raced when Jim Clark drove his DFV powered Lotus to victory at the 1967 Dutch GP. Graham Hill won it's first World Championship in a Cosworth porwerd Lotus in '68 and it went on to dominate for the next 15 years. Ahhh.... the smell of hot castor oil and burning rubber

 

But this has absolutely nothing to do with the thread topic, sorry

[+Lost in Space]

.... the smell of hot castor oil and burning rubber ..........

Shouldn't that be Castrol R??

 

[+Pharisee]

.... the smell of hot castor oil and burning rubber  ..........

Shouldn't that be Castrol R??

 

Castrol 'M' was a pure, first pressing castor oil. Castrol 'R' was a castor based oil with a few additives. Both smelt wonderful

[+wildtrekker]

PS: I also hate Jeeps and all things 4x4, but that's partly because they tend to squash my MX-5 without seeing me:

That's not completley true, we do see you

 

[+Naefearjustbeer]

I am sure there is a big enough caching population in the uk to attract some sort of sponsored competition, Maybe not enough to warrant a Jeep as a prize but there are many national chains of outdoor shops that could get in on it. Millets, Blacks & Tisos and I am sure there are a few I have missed. And there are plenty online shops that sell gps equipment. Anyone out there work for one of these firms? That would be the best way to get something going.

 

Cheers

 

Donnie

[+Pharisee]

Whatever happened to the ban on commercial caches ?

[+sTeamTraen]

Whatever happened to the ban on commercial caches ?

It's a bit like the BBC's ban on advertising

[+The Hole-in-the-wall Gang]

I suspect that if commercial organisations were to get actively involved in geocaching then we may find that they would want to control it more and more just like large corporations do in other sports. They would inevitably require 'more bang for their buck' as they pursue sales generated by this form of marketing and so would do what is right for them rather than what is right for geocachers.

 

I guess that we might see that geocaching would be come less of an environmentally aware, friendly pastime where we have some fun and enjoy the countryside and instead could tend towards becoming a materialistic pursuit where our greed may overcome our altruistic side.

 

I'm not entirely a luddite and can see a place for sensible commercially sponsered caches but only if it really is for the good of the whole caching population rather than for the lucky few who find the 'golden ticket'.

[Deego]

PS: I also hate Jeeps and all things 4x4, but that's partly because they tend to squash my MX-5 without seeing me:

That's not completley true, we do see you

 

:)

[+sTeamTraen]

PS: I also hate Jeeps and all things 4x4, but that's partly because they tend to squash my MX-5 without seeing me:

That's not completley true, we do see you

 

Oh tee-hee.

 

Well, the #@£%~ who nearly took me out this morning while talking on her mobile phone, smoking a cigarette, and for all I know changing a CD at the same time, while "driving" her never-goes-offroad Toyota Brain Damage Cruiser in which she probably "feels safe", certainly didn't see me. Although she did get a close up of my middle finger afterwards

Edited July 6, 2004 by sTeamTraen