Earthcaches, vs virtuals and locationless caches

[fraggle69]

Surely if we're able to do Earthcaches where there is no log to sign, it is time to bring back virtuals and locationless caches. I believe it was thought by groundspeak at the time that all caches should have a log to sign.

If this is the case then groundspeak are being a little two faced here aren't they.

[Happy Humphrey]

Yes, I'm not sure why they were moved to waymarking (which seems a better site for them), then returned to geocaching.

If you like virtuals and locationless, (IMO) waymarking is much better than the old geocaching version. The main objections seem to be that waymarking doesn't update your geocaching profile (at the moment), and that it takes a little while to get used to the more complicated interface (due to all the extra features) but my money is on this being rectified later this year (when "Project Tucson" is complete). If you're not too hung up about numbers then you should have no problem.

It's possible that geocaching will become a waymarking category anyway, which will give us the best of both worlds. Perhaps earthcaches will move into a separate category then.

[sTeamTraen]

I'm not a big fan of Earthcaches, which don't always seem to live up to the quality standards which they claim, and because I also like my world nicely consistent where possible. If they evaporated tomorrow I wouldn't cry.

That said, it's Jeremy's site, and if he thinks that even a minimum of geological education will do people some good (along with their family-friendly walk in the woods), it's up to him whether or not he dangles the carrot of a smiley in front of them. (I think a lot of forum debates would be a lot more honest if we all had to introduce ourselves with "Hi, I'm <name>, and I will do a surprising number of weird things for a smiley". I'm prepared to be first up on that.)

Actually, as long as Earthcaches upset a certain group of people (see https://forums.groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?s=&showtopic=77126&view=findpost&p=1143790 and Jeremy's reply 4 posts later), perhaps I should be a bigger fan of them.

[Alan White]

Earthcaches are just virtuals by another name, which is why they were moved to waymarking. They were moved back because GSA thought that putting them on waymarking was belittling them (my theory, though there was a post by Jeremy at the time, and I read between the lines :)). If true, it says all anyone needs to know about waymarking.

There aren't too many earthcaches around here but I can't say that those I've done were as good as GSA claims they are, nor were they better or worse than the best or worst virtuals I've done. They just sit better in waymarking because then - events aside (which also aren't caches) - all caches would have a physical container. Much more tidy and straightforward that way.

And if geocaching goes to waymarking there'll be a lot of people leaving the hobby :D.

[fraggle69]

https://forums.groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?s=&showtopic=77126&view=findpost&p=1143790 and Jeremy's reply 4 posts later), perhaps I should be a bigger fan of them.

LMAO one minute it's rocks, the next it's religion lol.

Anyway, I think GS need to find a direction and stick with it, too many times do they break there own rules grrr.

I'd like to actively start a pettition to bring back the lost icons, not because I want or need ;em, but because I think they're FUN! I wonder how I go about collecting names and badgering the big J?

[markandlynn]

Earthcaches were moved to soon so no one did them as waymarks which then raised questions of why should the earthcache org pay GC any money. This lead to them coming back it was about revenue.



GC could also save themselves lots of time if they gave everyone a full set of icons with a find count of zero next to them.

[Happy Humphrey]

I'd like to actively start a pettition to bring back the lost icons, not because I want or need ;em, but because I think they're FUN! I wonder how I go about collecting names and badgering the big J?
Whatever you think about waymarks, bringing them back into geocaching won't happen (not unless you've got loads of money to sponsor it, in which case anything is possible!). This has been discussed endlessly. You only have to look around a few hundred waymarks to realise that it's not practical. There's about 120,000 now: some areas would be awash with virtual caches if they were converted back. And without categories, a lot of them would be pretty pointless.

There were so many waymarks in Toronto when I visited there recently that I had to stick to just a couple of categories: in the city centre they were everywhere . Nick will know that there's a shedload in Strasbourg (http://www.waymarking.com/wm/search.aspx?f=1&lat=48.574733&lon=7.753617&t=6&wo=True&r=10&wst=6), even if you totally ignore the "locationless" ones (which is more than half the game anyway - the reason that many waymarks have few or no logs). It actually becomes quite handy that these are well out of the way when you're searching for geocaches.

We've had many discussions about why locationless/virtuals are fun but waymarks not - and the only reason that can't easily be knocked down is that waymarks don't update your caching totals.

[Happy Humphrey]

...And if geocaching goes to waymarking there'll
be a lot of people leaving the hobby :D.
If they are so offended that they have to sign on to groundspeak.com and set a few options that they leave the game altogether, then they can't have been very keen! ;)

I think that the idea is that you go to the portal the first time, and set your options for which categories you're interested in. If looking for log books is your thing, you just set all the rest to "ignore" and you never see it again.

Similarly, at the moment, I don't see any "McDonalds restaurants" within waymarking, because I set that whole category to "ignore": it's the same principle.

I might be wrong, or things might turn out different, but that's what I've gleaned from various posts from Jeremy.

[walkergeoff]

I had another look at the waymarking website as a result of this thread. I have to confess it did not attract me at all. Near me there are a large number of posted waymarks that have never been visited, and others visited over a year ago.

You need to be a premium member to have an ignore list, and it seems, unless I have missed something, that being a premium gc.com member does give you the same rights on waymarking.com.

[fraggle69]

All I want are the icons back on gc.com, surely that should be the portal and we can actively get rid of the trashy ones, like they do in terracaching.

[Happy Humphrey]

Near me there are a large number of posted waymarks that have never been visited, and others visited over a year ago.

They're the equivalent of Locationless logs. I haven't checked your profile, so excuse me if I seem patronising, but in case you aren't familiar with these: Locationless were only loggable once. And there are probably several hundred "locationless"-type waymarks (categories) within ten miles of your home: you just have to find them.

For instance, Victorian Post Boxes were a popular Locationless and if you found one when out and about you had to work out whether anyone had already logged it (which wasn't easy). If not, you logged a "find". That's the equivalent of a waymark (there is a Victorian Post Boxes category).

That was the end of the road as far as that location was concerned, and a lot of waymarkers still follow this same format, which is why a lot aren't visited.

But now, you have the option of easily seeing whether anyone has logged a find on the post box in question: and if so, rather than having to just ignore it you can log a "visit" (if you want). In many cases, this is also used in the same way as the old "virtual cache", in that the category log/waymark is deliberately set up to be attractive for people to visit. I have a Wind Harp like this, and a village tour where you pick up clues as you go round.

But some things tend to lend themselves less towards this approach and so are left unvisited: post boxes are an example, where most of the fun is finding a new one, and there's not much interest in revisiting one that's already found.

Sorry to blather on about waymarking, but so many people dismiss them after misunderstanding the concept, then claim that they'd love to find some new locationless/virtual caches, when in fact they can in all but name (and numbers).

[fraggle69]

yeah, it's not really the numbers that bother me, I think it makes for interesting chat.
What I want is my spook back do you know what I mean? I mean why get rid of something then replace it with what is essentially the same thing in a differnt guise?

ah well, still no real answers here!

[The Wombles]

Personally I enjoy Earthcaches although I've done a couple recently which were disappointing. It's the usual quality problem: the early ones get the best spots and then later ones are sometimes just landfill.

[Happy Humphrey]

yeah, it's not really the numbers that bother me, I think it makes for interesting chat.
What I want is my spook back do you know what I mean? I mean why get rid of something then replace it with what is essentially the same thing in a differnt guise?

ah well, still no real answers here!
The answer is that there are still quite a few around if you're just after the icon and number count.

[The Cache Hoppers]

Personally I enjoy Earthcaches although I've done a couple recently which were disappointing. It's the usual quality problem: the early ones get the best spots and then later ones are sometimes just landfill.
You had me worried there cos I know you did my two in Berkshire recently! Whilst looking to see what you put :) I spotted this photo that someone had uploaded to the Rushall Farm Chalk Face earth cache - quite amusing :)
https://img.geocaching.com/cache/log/6cd98558-c9b5-4b22-916c-6c7de074df0c.jpg