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Cache Ratings


Adventuring Lovers

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:unsure: We've been caching for over 2 years and have 574 finds toour credit, so we're not exactly newbies. We've cached in many different states and areas. We LOVE caching to the point that some of our family think we're obsessed. If it weren't for work and kids we'd probably do it every day. But we do have 1 complaint... inaccurate ratings. Especially when you travel to different areas, you'll find that people rate them SOOOO much differently! We understand that different people are gonna have different ideas of difficultly/terrain, but as we've been discussing it we think we've come up with a possible solution. Not sure how difficult it would be to implement, but we do think it would help with the rating system.

 

So, here's our idea... allow cachers to rate the cache along with their logs, and then factor these ratings in as they accumulate. As I said, it might be difficult to implement (technologically speaking), but I think it would really help to get a more accurate rating system. I'd also like to see an additional category added in addition to difficulty and terrain... creativity/beauty. This part should only be rated by the loggers, and based solely on their enjoyment of the cache itself. We've been to so many caches that we absolutely loved due to their creativity or their gorgeous location, but were rarely visited because they're either off the beaten path or their difficulty/terrain is high. We feel that if people were able to know in advance that they would be rewarded for their effort they may be more inclined to do these caches.

 

So... anyone have any other ideas about this? Do you think it would work, or would it end up just being an exercise in futility? :)

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;) I haven't the experience that you have and have found most of the caches near us to be mostly close on their assessments of the terrain and dificulty so I can't comment much on the first part of your message.

But I totally agree on the second part. In fact I had just sent an email to the Groundspeak people and they suggested I post my thoughts in the on-line forums.

 

The following is the message I sent regarding rating caches on beauty/enjoyment/uniqueness. I would love to see something like the way I can rate products on Amazon or movies at imdb - Internet Movie Database.

 

Hi, we just attended the San Luis Obispo County Cachers Meet-n-Greet

Picnic and had some good discussions. One thing discussed and which had

high agreement was this. Many of us are into quality geocaching, not

quantity, and would love to see added to Geocaching.com a way to rate

caches found. We picture a way to rate the particular cache experience

for quality. Such as: view, uniqueness of cache and it's hiding place,

the hike in, or the drive to the site. We would picture it being a 1-5

star rating upon logging the site.

 

This would be very helpful to out of town geocachers to help them find

the quality spots and ignore the mundane or lesser quality caches. I

know the ratings can be somewhat subjective but if 10 people have

visited a cache and it only rates a 1.5 * and another site rates 4.5 *

then you can pretty well bet that the 4.5 is going to be worth finding

and the 1.5 can be left until another day.

 

What do you think, is this something you might foresee putting on this

site someday? ;)

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I'm for a rating system even if it isn't perfect.

 

The 2 components I see as useful to rate are interest in the area of the cache (scenic, historical, educational, etc) and interest in getting to the cache (clever, innovative, fun, devious, etc). Maybe those could be differentiated.

 

The whole point is to allow one to search for unique places in a limited amount of time, such as on vacation.

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