Talk:Geocaching/Archive 1

Archive 1

Code Letters

I'm new to geocaching and I noticed on the website that everyone leaves a code at the end of their logged messages like "TFTH" or "TN/LN/SL". What does this stuff mean? it would be really nice if this article could include some explanation of these codes.

TFTH: Thanks for the hunt/hike.

TFTC: Thanks for the cache.

TNLNSL: Took nothing, left nothing, signed log.

More can be found here: http://www.geocaching.com/about/glossary.aspx

The Bronze was here! Hi I'm a Geocacher in Central New South Wales, Australia. Quite literally Geocaching has changed my life. I now revolve around my weekends seeking caches hidden in the Australian Bush and urban hideaways. Geocaching to me is not about the finds (the finding of an actual cache) but the challenge and uniqueness of each location. Every time I set out to find a cache I find a new place.

The whole Geocaching community makes the sport a social one and with the strict supervision of the website it is more environmental than you may think. The policy "Cache in, trash out" ensure that teams that visit a cache are proactive in making a location tidy and more welcoming. After all who would want to find a cache hidden in a rubbish dump.

For a long time Geocaching was very much underground but since it's exposure through magazines, newspaper and even television, Geocaching has become a family and singles orientated sport and with graded cache and an easy, interactive cache page that dosen't fill your inbox you can go for a weekend walk along a footpath or canyon in 12 degree water over a long weekend.

For more information be sure to visit Geocaching.com and you Aussies, see you at Geocaching Australia. Similar concepts are terracaching, navicache and GPSGames.org offering shutterspot.

Monopoly?

Geocaching.com is definitely the biggest name in geocaching, but I don't think it should be called a complete monopoly. What do you think? Jobarts^-Talk 06:44, May 20, 2005 (UTC)

I use geocaching.com when I seek and log (online) geocaches. (For disclosure.) I'm addressing the usage of the word "monopoly". It seems like it would be easy to come to a conclusion, but it depends on the definition used. These definitions are from the Wikipedia article on monopoly as well as other sources. I'll assess whether geocaching.com meets each.

• The sole provider of a product (commodity or service). No
• Controlling enough of the supply chain to be able to set prices. No
• The amount of the commondity controlled will cause a significant cost (monetary or otherwise) in switching to another product. (This is how Microsoft was legally declared a monopoly; to switch to another operating system would have cost people a lot of money to buy new software.) No

But a monopoly does not necessarily do harm to whatever community is being affected. Theoretically, a monopoly can be more efficient and therefore deliver the product better for a better price. But like the efficiency of dictatorships, monopolies don't always deliver what the consumers want. This then leads to competition, unless the monopolist keeps competitors from entering. Legally, monopolies are not a problem. Microsoft was twice convicted (a decade apart) of making it difficult for competitors to enter (through multiple means).

I have brought up Microsoft (briefly) because that is the monopoly case that I am most familiar with. The antitrust (monopoly) laws were created in the days of the expansion of the railroads because of the types of things that they had been doing. But IBM and AT&T have also been pursued under these same laws.

But back to geocaching: Geocaching.com does not control geocaching. It has the advantage of having the web site corresponding to the name of the sport. The argument could be made that the commodity being controlled is the database of active geocaches. In this case, geocaching.com is clearly a monopoly. Geocaching.com used to share this database with other geocaching sites. This was of great benefit to the geocaching community. But they have shut down this access.

I would like to see them open up access to this database to the community again. But, as much as I want them to open it up, I think that they have the legal right to share or not share their database. I encourage other geocachers to enter their geocaches at other geocaching web sites that share their database even though I haven't done so with my own geocaches, yet.

So in summary, geocaching.com isn't a monopoly except with regards to the geocaching database. You're free to include my comments above in the geocaching article, but it would be "personal research". If you want to note the history of sharing of the database, that would be encyclopedic. But you can't realistically get away with calling geocaching.com a monopoly. Val42 16:40, May 20, 2005 (UTC)

I beg to differ

Geocaching.com clearly controls the pricing. They chose the $3/month level. And if they decided to make it $4 or $5, then it would be. If they wanted to, they could require premiums for all memberships. Some users would leave, and they would not find a large supply elsewhere.

It is true that there are other suppliers, and that these others are growing. One of them quite quickly. But none of them yet have the necessary membership base to be able to compete with Geocaching.com. So in most areas of the world, if you want to continue caching, you'd have no choice but to pay whatever price was demanded. --67.126.247.140 17:58, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Not too mention that they control geocoin tracking pricing. (Word automatically removed), they no longer allow people who sell geocoins that aren't trackable at geocaching.com to post advertisements on their forums. They used to allow this in the past. But since geocaching.com now charges $1.5o per trackable coin, it's in their interest to leverage their position as the #1 geocaching site to influence the production of geocoins to their benefit. They are using their (near) monopoly to affect another market, and quite successfully at that. --Dogbreathcanada 19:06, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

Geocaching.com clearly does not control the pricing. Anybody can make a website that lists geocaches on it. If the price was high enough, people would go to competing web sites. The reason that competing web sites have such a small user base is that geocaching.com is large and free (for most caches). If they started charging, people would leave. Also, anyone can make a website that tracks geocoins or travel bugs. Our local geocaching organization has a web site that tracks the movement of travel bug-like things which are not trackable on geocaching.com. The cost of switching to another web site to find geocaches is insignificant. Pfalstad 22:39, 21 April 2006 (UTC)

As you said, geocaching.com is large. They are only free, if you don't want the premium features, that is true. But where I must disagree is where you say that people would leave if they charged more. Clearly some would leave, yes. But where would they go? The ones who left would, for the most part, just stop caching. Other sites would get a certain amount of those members, but most other sites don't have a large enough user base to attract and keep them. And of course those new members would be from a self-selected group of people who don't want to pay.

Don't let the gc.com policy of allowing "non-premium" memberships fool you. They could choose to raise their premiums, or require all members to be premium any time they wanted. It would take years for the disgruntled members to coalesce around an alternative supplier. --Headybrew 00:56, 28 April 2006 (UTC)

gc.com may have terrible customer service and are a bunch of uptight snobs but they are in no way a monopoly. Caching simply isn't a big enough hobby to support two large database holders. I'd guess they wouldn't lose many if they doubled their prices (it's still extremely cheap) but if they went much higher than that you'd see other small databases increase in size. And I think you have to include letterboxing as a competitor as well.

Too many External links

Anyone else think there's too many External links on this article? The links section is about 1/3 of the article. Going by the guidelines at Wikipedia:External links, and noting Wikipedia is not a web directory this seems far too many.

• Specifically, links about things like travelbugs, geocoins, Where's George etc should be on the articles about them.
• The foreign language links should already be on their own language articles, i.e. geocaching.de should be on de:Geocaching.
• Do we really need all of the links for areas of the USA? Some of them seem to be for very specific areas, with several per state.
• Things like the Firefox plugin and Geohelper seem of questionable significance, though they could be useful to some people.

Maybe most of these could be replaced with a link to the appropriate category on dmoz or a similar directory of geocaching links? --Vclaw 14:05, 22 May 2005 (UTC)

I've found a place that lists geocaching associations by state and country. This will take the place of the growing list with the same information. First I'm compiling a list of those on our page that aren't on the page that I'm linking to. I'm going to send the list to the maintainer of that web site then make the change. Val42 16:36, May 27, 2005 (UTC)

Revisiting this topic many months later - YES, there are still too many external links on this article. I'm itching to delete some in that confusingly long "miscellaneous" category (leaving informational sites but getting rid of discussion forums and online magazines and sites to "connect you to the geocaching world") but fights over external links are awfully common and I don't want to get into one.

How about if I at least get rid of the book list? Such lists are valuable in wikipedia when they draw people's attention to information works they would otherwise be unlikely to find, but geocaching books are becoming a dime a dozen (Amazon has twice as many as here). This list now serves no purpose, I think, except to clutter up the page. Any objections? - DavidWBrooks 20:34, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

There's still too many links because all of the associations that were previously deleted have been re-added (plus even more!), I'm in favour of completely deleting that section. I agree with you about the miscellaneous section, some should be deleted (i.e. geoblogz which seems to have about 5 users and 10 posts). Some of them i.e. the Firefox plugin, the GSAK link, could be moved to Geocaching Software and/or Paperless Geocaching (though they are probably already on those articles).

I also agree about the book list - unless there is some reason why those particular books are interesting / relevant / notable, they shouldn't be listed. --Vclaw 21:23, 16 September 2005 (UTC)

I removed the books. I removed geoblogz (which I found sprinkled on other article pages, too). I removed the Firefox plugin and the GSAK link, which are already on Geocaching Software. I'll wait on some of the others to see if there are more comments. - DavidWBrooks 00:34, 17 September 2005 (UTC)

Indeed... I don't think the long list adds to the article, especially not things like listing Great Plains Geocaching in each and every state it covers.

Every comment on the talk page so far has been positive towards removing the links. As the original poster said, it's not a web directory, it's an encyclopedia. I'm saying we should delete most of it, especially the "Associations by Country" page. Any objections - any links you find extremely worth keeping in an encyclopedic context? Enno 14:11, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

See my comment down below about creating List of geocaching organizations and moving all the geographic stuff there, rather than deleting it. A number of similar pages exist in Wikipedia - the key is to separate them from the real articles, so that they don't get in the way of reading. - DavidWBrooks 14:14, 22 November 2005 (UTC)

I agree with creating a List of geocaching organizations and moving everything but a short list of Cache Listing Sites and possibly Similar & Related Activities over to it... items such as Travel Bugs and Geocoins already have links from their respective Wikiarticles. 72.131.44.247 01:47, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Geocaching and letterboxing

Two separate people have moved letterbox geocaches from the "Types of geocaches" because "letterboxing is different than geocaching." Letterboxing is indeed a different, but related, type of activity. But there is a crossover in letterbox geocaches. Geocaching.com currently (I just checked) allows new listings that are, in their exact text, "Letterbox (Hybrid)". I have personally found a letterbox geocache and done the stamping. I had the notebook for the stamping because my local geocaching association (Utah Association of Geocachers) has a game called "Stampin' Fools". This game has stamps that travel from cache to cache and are logged, just like travel bugs. The goal is for a geocacher to get points by finding as many as possible.

Letterboxing is different, but related, so it is listed in the "See also" section. But letterbox geocaches are a legitimate type of geocache. So I'm going to move it back to that section. Val42 15:40, August 20, 2005 (UTC)

As someone who both geocaches and letterboxes, I agree. "letterbox geocaches" are geocaches in the sense that you find them via GPS (letterboxes are usually found by using a description, some of which can be very creative) and letterboxes in the sense that you don't take/leave anything, other then stamp impressions. Sadly, there are some LBers who have a somewhat 'anti-GCer' attitude. Both are fun, and if I'm going to a place, I try to see if there are both LB & GC and do both. --emb021

Three Points of Different Transportation=Word?

Need a word and clear definition for a point where a road, river, railroad tracks, bridge, walkway, subway, airport landing, or any other place or transportation meet. A name for when three of the above mentioned are connected. For Example A bridge for both a train and cars go over a transportation waterway. Confluence? Intersection?

What the government in Utah calls these places are "intermodal hubs". They are places where you may change from one type (mode) of transportation to another (iter-). Because there are multiple types (modes) of transportation their, they are called hubs. Is this what you are looking for? Val42 21:10, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Not to speak for the person asking for the original question, but it sounds as though they're looking for "intersection", "junction/conjunction", or "crossing". A bridge for both train and cars doesn't sound like a point of changeover for mode of transportation. I'm not completely sure what relevance the question has to the article in its current state though. ju66l3r 21:58, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

That question was asked by a passing anon a year or so ago, and it was incredibly irrelevant then, too. - DavidWBrooks 23:08, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Appropriate Category

I think there should be an appropriate category which includes at least:

• geocaching
• letterboxing
• trigpointing
• benchmarking (appropriate article not yet written)

and in addition, perhaps:

• orienteering
• treasure hunt

But what would the category be called? And would it be a subcategory of Category:Hobbies or Category:Sports or what? Or maybe there's already a suitable category to put them all in? --David Edgar 11:15, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

I know that this is long, but what about "Outdoor locating games". Val42 14:01, 20 October 2005 (UTC)

OK, thanks for the suggestion! - I've just created it. --David Edgar 18:46, 23 November 2005 (UTC)

Commercialisation

Why was the section on commercialisation removed? The anonymous user, Special:Contributions/66.23.231.191, that deleted it left the summary "No need to talk about commercialization, just about caching." but I don't see how discussion of businesses built around the sport isn't "about caching".

Tobin Richard 10:12, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

It also seems to me that mentioning geocaching.com specifically in this context is appropriate, the site even claims to be "The Official Global GPS Cache Hunt Site" (emphasis mine). - Tobin Richard 10:18, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

I replaced it. - DavidWBrooks 11:45, 2 November 2005 (UTC)

I removed it because there is always this stupid battle by Geocaching.com (or more particularly some of their users) to make them appear to be the only listing site that can legitimately list caches. Just leave it in. Too much trouble. Oh, and it is Commercialization.

I've just added some information on the one geocaching related lawsuit (or threat thereof) I know about. Perhaps some discussion of the fact that most caching sites use the word free in the sense of price not liberty would be of value. - Tobin Richard 11:58, 9 November 2005 (UTC)

Why was the snippet on geocaching.com's claim to be the official geocaching site removed? I think it's relevant in the context of listing competition. - Tobin Richard 02:55, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

It struck me as irrelevant advertising, slapped on by an anon ("XYZ Website says it's the best!") but if you think it is pertinent, it should remain. - DavidWBrooks 22:27, 16 February 2006 (UTC)

I see your point but the note about the lack of a governing body makes it look like it's not advertising to me. - Tobin Richard 00:10, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Yep, the second sentence is what gave it relevance. --Dogbreathcanada 01:44, 17 February 2006 (UTC)

Geocaching associations format and order

I've made the listings for geocaching associations consistent in format and order. Here are the rules that I used:

1. The two (by far the) most active countries are listed first in alphabetical order; Canada and the United States.
   1. Province/State geocaching associations are listed alphabetically under those.
   2. Format of listing depends on number of entries:
      • Zero: Not listed.
      • One: Listed on same line as province/state separated by colon.
      • More: Listed on following lines indented one more level.
2. Continents are listed in order of geocaching participation using basically the same rules as for Canada and the U.S.

Most of this structure already existed, but this is a formalization of the rules. If there is any objection(s) to continuing to use these rules, let's discuss it here. Val42 19:46, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

Looks very nice. The only debatable point, I think, is whether we should move the whole list to a separate page so it doesn't clog up this one - I think this has the worst ratio of external links to text of any non-stub article I know. - DavidWBrooks 20:07, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

Wouldn't that just make that page have a worse ratio? Or would that be okay because it is a page just for links? I'm not familiar with pages like that so that's why I'm asking such questions. Val42 20:47, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

True, but if the page was something like List of geocaching organizations nobody would be expecting anything else from the article. Right now, they may be looking for general information, and get lost scrolling around the page. - DavidWBrooks 21:22, 18 November 2005 (UTC)

External links (yet again)

The links really need to be trimmed down to the ones that actually add information to the article. They have been discussed several times over a period of months, but nothing has been done to reduce their number. I'll probably give it a few more days, then visit each site linked and take a chainsaw to the list. I would prefer it if somebody with an interest in the subject did the cleanup, but the current situation is ridiculous. --GraemeL ^(talk) 17:28, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

I've created List of geocaching organizations and moved all the local groups there. (That was the easy part!) - DavidWBrooks 17:58, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

I suspected a little external nudge might be enough to push you into making that decision. ;-) --GraemeL ^(talk) 18:04, 27 November 2005 (UTC)

Muggles?

Different anonymous IPs occasionally add the phrase that non-geocachers (that is, about 6.49999 billion of the world's 6.5 billion people) are called "muggles", as in Harry Potter terminology. While this may be true for certain clusters of pre-teen geocachers, as far as I can tell it is not widespread, so I have removed it. - DavidWBrooks 21:29, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

Yes, Muggles

Last I checked 44 does not qualify me as a pre-teen, and, yes, Muggles is a term used in geocaching as is muggles, geo-muggles and a cache being "muggled". I will refer you to the book by by Joel McNamara "Geocaching for Dummies" page 18, page 125, & page 128 and several aritcles on geocaching.com for example the article from the UK newspaper the Telegraph at http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/main.jhtml?view=DETAILS&grid=P8&xml=/health/2005/10/04/hgeo01.xml. I'm sorry if you hadn't heard about it but it is real.

I stand corrected - my apologies. - DavidWBrooks 22:07, 2 January 2006 (UTC)

I would agree; Muggles started in the UK I believe, but it's used worldwide now. Confusingly, those who haven't read Harry Potter often use the phrase "Mugglers" Kert01 11:59, 28 June 2006 (UTC)

Geocaching as a Sport

Since defining geocaching as a sport is a relatively controversial topic in the geocaching community, allowing the text of the article to state that "In general, geocaching is accepted as a 'recreational sport' by most participants" would be wrong. The majority of geocachers agree that geocaching is an activity and a hobby at the very least, which is why I will continue to change the text above to state "In general, geocaching is accepted as a 'recreational activity' by most participants". --Dogbreathcanada 01:09, 10 January 2006 (UTC)

While I understand your concern, I do believe it is safe to say that most participants consider it a recreational sport which is different to most people than any other kind of sport. If it is just an activity, then why bother with this statement at all. "Activity" is the "duh" response. "Sport" or more specifically "recreational sport" is the clarification response that helps people understand what it really is.

The American Heritage definition of "sport" is:

1. Physical activity that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often engaged in competitively. A particular form of this activity.

2. An activity involving physical exertion and skill that is governed by a set of rules or customs and often undertaken competitively.

3. An active pastime; recreation.

By all three of these definitions, geocaching should be considered a sport. Call it recreational sport if you will, but a sport it is. In addition, look at the activities you mention to describe this. "Others are very difficult: under water, many staged multi-caches, challenging cryptography, 50 feet up a tree, on high mountain peaks, on the Antarctic continent or above the Arctic Circle." Peaks, trees, under water, artic circle - not a "sport"?!?!?!? --129.62.34.147, 10 January 2006

The three definitions are not equal. Dictionaries list definitions in order of common usage. So the first definition is really the only one worth noting. Goecaching is NOT governed by a set of rules, instead it is governed by a set of guidelines. Secondly, geocaching is not engaged in competitively, since competition begs a set of clear-cut rules that the participants will abide by, thus allowing for comparison between participants. If you've ever taken part in any of the geocaching forums, one of the quotes geocachers will often throw back at you, if you complain that someone isn't playing "fair", is that all cachers "play by their own rules." Now imagine if football allowed it's participants to play by their own rules. Or marathoning, where Joe decides he'll take a shortcut, because he's playing by his own rules? Would those still be sports? Of course not. --Dogbreathcanada 21:31, 17 January 2006 (UTC)

Hi. I'll have to agree with the other guy and that geocaching is a sport. If you take a shortcut while running a marathon, that doesn't make the marathon itself any less of a sport. Furthermore, read the blooming definitions. Multiple definitions exist because there are multiple meanings. Yes, a sport CAN be governed by a set of rules OR CUSTOMS (read guidelines). But it can also be "An active pastime; recreation." Sorry, dogbreath. You are just wrong on this one. I'm changing it back to sport.

Oh, I'm sorry, I wasn't aware that you were the ultimate judge on the issue. --Dogbreathcanada 20:47, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

It seems there is no widely accepted terminology (as the start of the section says), so why not remove that final sentence ("In general, geocaching is accepted as a 'recreational sport' by most participants") completely, and forget the arguing? - DavidWBrooks 18:03, 22 January 2006 (UTC)

I am not intending to continue this argument, but I did just add a fair-use quote from Dave Ulmer that I think adds to the value of the discussion by providing some historical input without taking away from the two modern viewpoints. Plus, who can argue with the guy that invented the "sport".

Well, Ulmer's an idiot then. *grin* Besides, he didn't invent the hobby ... pirates did. Treasure hunting. And, do you really think an Easter Egg hunt (high tech or not) is a really a sport? That's how he describes geocaching. --Dogbreathcanada 19:56, 24 February 2006 (UTC)

Sure, why not go down this path.  :) Like geocaching, Easter Egg hunting is "an active pastime; recreation." Your statement about no competitions is also false. The Texas Challenge for one takes place every year and is a state-wide, highly competitive "egg hunt." There is even an entire section on "competitive geocaching" in Geocaching for Dummies. AGA, TXGA, WGA, and others often host their own competitions. KeenPeople.com and Terracaching.com are two sites dedicated to making Geocaching competitive. Just Google "competitive geocaching" or "geocaching sport" and prove yourself wrong.

Why is it necessary to continually change these statements? We've already established that the definitions of the word "sport" indicate that geocaching is a sport, the inventor of geocaching says that it is a sport, and all of your arguments against it being called a sport haven't stood. If the SPORT really hasn't changed any in the past 6 years when it WAS considered a sport, then by your own comment's logic, geocaching IS still a SPORT. Was a sport + hasn't changed = still a sport. Recreational sport? Yes, but it is still a sport.

• From Geocaching.com, "The sport where You are the search engine!"
• From the cover of The Geocaching Handbook, "Geocaching is one of the fastest growing outdoor sports of the millennium, combining aspects of treasure hunting, high-tech navigation, and exploration."
• From the front page of Buxley's Geocaching Waypoint, "GPS-based "geocaching" is a high-tech sport being played by thousands of people across the globe."
• From the front page of TXGA, "The purpose of our association is to promote the sport of Geocaching in Texas."
• From About.com in reference to Geocaching, "The sport is now played world-wide."
• Even in the now infamous article about the geocache hidden at a police station http://deseretnews.com/dn/view/0,1249,635176898,00.html, the headline reads "New sport called 'geocaching' raises red flags."

As is seen by all of the above references and hundreds of thousands of other Google hits, the term sport has long (6 years at least) been associated with geocaching and is used too often by geocachers and non-geocachers to even really be having this discussion. The term sport has been describing this activity LONGER than the term Geocaching itself! Despite the fact that there are individuals like yourself who don't like the term, it should be obvious from just being the tagline of Geocaching.com that geocaching is commonly and publicly associated with the word sport, and despite your objections - the general public, the media, book publishers, Geocaching.com, and Dave Ulmer himself (who IS widely credited with the creation of Geocaching) consider geocaching a sport. Please, sir, I implore you to concede.

The entire section on the "debate" about whether geocaching is a "sport" is unreferenced in its entirety. Where has the discussion occurred, who are the proponents of each position, what have they said, etc? As far as I can see, the section is just a summary of the above discussion. If this is true, it needs to be zapped. As for whether or not it _is_ a sport: one suspects an etymological hijacking is in progress. Consider that there must be literally billions of references to homosexuals as "gay" -- and yet how many of them fit the previous definition of the word? Frankly, if geocaching is to be called a sport, then we might as well call going into unfamiliar supermarkets a "sport" too. If you want "sport", you must go to geodashing at the minimum. Far more challenging, and it's safer as well (no bogus/missing/trashed/etc caches, no concerns about the contents of a cache, etc -- all reasons why I gave up on geocaching years ago). mdf 22:02, 20 June 2006 (UTC)

I wouldn't think the entire question is relevant an encyclopedic article. Sure, maybe in a discussion of what categories to include, but not deserving of a section or even paragraph! I concur, let's remove that section rather than have a paragraph about semantics. --RJFerret 04:25, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Squibs?

Is someone who is aware of geocaching, but does not actually participate in the activity a Squib?

I take it you mean it along the lines of blood purity - squibs, as compared to muggles? Personally I've never heard the term used. --David Edgar 17:11, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Personally I don't see why we would have to use it. Let's not start using it. --Dogbreathcanada 21:28, 27 March 2006 (UTC)

Neutrality

It seems to me that this article is extremely centered around www.geocaching.com, rather than geoacaching in general. I know that www.geocaching.com is, as the article states, the "most popular" site. But it is far from the only site. And their recent move of most non-traditional caches to a seperate site seems to be reflected here in that locationless or virtual caches are relegated to a brief mention as a "variation". Also there is no mention of point systems or how caches are approved for listing (which varies considerably on other sites. I think it would be appropriate to include these things in the article.

Any thoughts?

--Headybrew 00:14, 20 April 2006 (UTC)

Some variations of the game include a point system to enhance game play.

I'm not sure what that sentence means. Can we elaborate here on what it means, and maybe we can rephrase it in the article to make it more clear?--Sonjaaa 12:26, 12 May 2006 (UTC)

Growth?

How about adding:

Geocaching has enjoyed impressive growth and popularity with, for example, the number of geocaches placed in Connecticut doubling annually from 2001-2006.

(This is based on my records starting in 2002, and Geocaching.com listings, showing that there were 100 in Spring 2002, 200 Spring '03, 400 Winter '04, 800 Spring '05, and now 1600 Spring-Summer '06.) -RJFerret 05:13, 1 July 2006 (UTC)

Hi, RJF, unfortunately, we need a reputable independent source to meet the "no original research" policy of wikipedia to include something like that. Has there been a newspaper article that references the growth rate that GC.com listings have experienced since 2001? That would be our best bet for inclusion in the article. ju66l3r 20:06, 24 August 2006 (UTC)

Pictures

We've got two regular size, and a micro cache picture? I think we should replace one of the tupperware pics with an ammo box cache, show a greater spread of caches.--Grand Edgemaster _Talk 14:48, 25 August 2006 (UTC)

UK reversion war

There has been a recent rash of UK IPs (presumably all the same person) attempting to push back in the "Politics" section that has been reverted previously because it's strongly POV and lacking much information or verifiability. They also remove a number of good informative statements and links and move around certain sections making those parts of the article much less readable. Very little of the edits they are continually pushing onto the article are all that good or useful, so it's become a see-saw trying to keep the older version.

I'd like to see discussion and consensus here about the changes they are proposing before they are accepted into the article en masse. If we can reach a consensus then further changes can be considered vandalism at that point and the 3RR policy will not come into play for someone, like myself, who is trying to maintain the overall integrity of the article. Thanks. ju66l3r 14:16, 27 August 2006 (UTC)

"the 3RR policy will not come into play for someone, like myself, who is trying to maintain the overall integrity of the article......" is just as arbitary as the person 'imposing' the "Politics" section by reversion.

"They also remove......." The same person is doing all this? A rather paranoid assumption and unverifiable just as is "presumably all the same person".

"lacks much information or verifiability...." the renegade section included links to geocaching.com, AI and the Geocachers Creed which supported the points made. To say there was a strong POV was questionable..... given that it was asking whether Politics was an issue..... rather than saying Politics WAS an issue. IMHO it would more easily sit with the section on "Ethics" after "Without some rules geocachers could be a danger to themselves, other cachers, or society....."

—The preceding unsigned comment was added by 62.64.228.132 (talk • contribs) .

Actually, it is not as arbitrary a position because if a consensus is reached here that the additions are not acceptable, then as per Wikipedia guidelines, the consensus version is the "right" version until consensus changes and any attempts to change those parts would be considerable as vandalism to the "right" version. This is the means to which discussion fosters compromise and ends edit warring.

It is my presumption that one or a very few people are attempting to force certain changes into the article by brute force. The IP originates with the exact same provider and each time they only choose to work on this exact article without any efforts elsewhere. I'm just not willing to put in the checkuser request at this point, as we're still working to build consensus, but ultimately I'm more and more certain that your IP (along with most of the others) will traceback to a single source computer or two. If you'd like to be better trusted, then establishing an account on Wikipedia goes a long way towards verifiability as to how many others are working to build consensus (instead of renewing their dynamic IP to IP-sock their opinion as coming from many others as well).

Finally, some of the links removed were useful and others were redundant (no need to reference GC.com multiple times in this article aside from where the major websites are listed). This is also why the Politics section is seemingly pointless (aside from its POV prose), because there are little to no politics when multiple sites are playing very different games all under the umbrella of geocaching...unless you're speaking to the politics of a specific website (which would then not be appropriate to this article). ju66l3r 16:28, 28 August 2006 (UTC)

"It is my presumption that one or a very few people..." I'm glad that you now accept that this may not be all the work of the same person, but I think the sentence would read better if you wrote "It is my presumption that one or a very small number of people..." 80.225.7.2 11:10, 29 August 2006 (UTC)

GA nom

This was just nominated as a GA. There are some things in it that still need to be worked on though, before it can pass against the criteria. The article falls under the quick-fail criteria for the multiple cleanup tags, for example. I haven't reviewed it myself, as I don't know much about the article topic; somebody with an interest in geocaching might want to pick it up and suggest areas to improve. The general problems that will prevent it from successfully passing as a GA though are:

• Multiple cleanup tags that are still valid. These need to be addressed.
• External links should generally not be included within the body of an article.
• All web references need to include publisher and access date information at the least.
• Some statements are not yet referenced. For example, the points about law enforcement official's responses, and the names & dates of the first websites.

Thanks. –Whitehorse1 18:31, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

Thank you. I will try to fix all these things after the article passes/fails (likely the latter). It's probably not best for me to do it until it's complete, since I nominated it. It was probably a bit to soon, but I was trying to be bold. MobileSnail 20:09, 10 July 2009 (UTC)

As I nominated it before I did substantial work on the article, I figured I can fix it myself and have now taken care of bullets 1, 2, and 4. MobileSnail 19:27, 16 July 2009 (UTC)

Archived

I created a second archive of this talk page as there were many stale discussions in it. MobileSnail 01:19, 21 July 2009 (UTC)

Number of Caches

I think keeping a running total of a number of caches is a waste of time and we should remove statements like "X number of caches since date Y". If we were to keep counts, I think having a table with every site would be much more useful than the current tracking of a single site (geocaching.com). Thoughts? Hardaker (talk) 14:09, 2 October 2009 (UTC)

I disagree. I think knowing upfront at least the approximate number of geocaches, and then knowing how current that number is would be information many people doing a quick lookup of the concept of geocaches would want to know. I think it should stay.Mmyers1976 (talk) 20:25, 13 October 2009 (UTC)

I understand the desire. But I don't think the way it's currently done is a good one. It'd be better to have a table (as I suggested above) rather than a number from a single site. Hardaker (talk) 17:23, 14 October 2009 (UTC)

Paperless Caching

I've added a line here mentioning the availability of Windows Mobile solutions as well as adding one example software here (I know of 2 for the WM platform, but the other one just comes in German). Maybe is would be a good idea to have a whole software section (or even a own article), as there are numerous tools for paperless caching and Geocaching in general. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 93.125.224.159 (talk) 17:51, 27 June 2009 (UTC)

References Needed

There are 2 sections (Appeal and Geocaching as a sport) that I have marked for requiring references. There are many weasel words ("some geocachers", "others", "a small group", etc.) in these sections and absolutely no references to where these opinions are coming from. Both sections are on border of being total POV junk to be deleted.

Also, the Geocaching websites section needs more of the non-U.S. websites listed.

Finally, I would like some opinions on how to better keep this article about "Geocaching" and not about Geocaching.com. Editors of this article need to filter everything they want to say here through a neutral PoV better, because this article should be about the activity and not about any specific website's influence on that activity. ju66l3r 20:44, 2 September 2006 (UTC)

I would agree on ditching those two sections. They appear to serve no purpose other than to sell geocaching to the reader. ikes 01:13, 3 September 2006 (UTC)

I vote to keep Appeal because that was exactly what I was looking for when I looked up geocaching, I knew what it was, I wanted to know why people did it. I also suggest removing the reference needed tags. Yes, it uses words like "some" and "others" but those are legitimate words when there is disagreement within a group. As an example, '"some" americans voted for Bush "others" did not, "a small group" is very vocal about the election' is a perfectly valid statement. As to expertise, the opinions are coming from the author who is presumably a geocacher and therefore has the only qualification required to write about why people do it. I actually agree with ikes that some cites would be nice, but I take a less strict view because if I marked everything that really needed it with a "needs citation" tag I'd have marked 90% of the articles in Wikipedia.Jerdwyer 04:57, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

That is exactly the reason that references/citations for "some" and "other" (aka weasel words) are necessary. If "some" Americans voted for Bush, then there must be a good reference showing that they did. Provide it. Otherwise, you are exactly right; the reader must presume expertise on behalf of the editor and that presumption could easily be wrong. If 90% of Wikipedia is missing a citation, then so be it...hopefully, by bringing the need to attention, these things will be verified and verifiable by the next person or removed (as there's no basis to find them as fact). WP:V and WP:OR are good places to read up on why you shouldn't just presume the editor is always right. ju66l3r 05:46, 11 September 2006 (UTC)

Sorry to bump an old topic. Wanted to check here to make sure it was OK with regular contributers to this article if I go ahead and convert all references to footnote format. Currently, two citation styles are used, (predominately) HTML and also a single footnote. OK to convert to all footnotes? thanks and regards, --guyzero | talk 20:27, 10 May 2007 (UTC)

That would be great! Thanks! ju66l3r 23:27, 12 May 2007 (UTC)

That would be a good idea. Go ahead and do it. Val42 05:43, 15 May 2007 (UTC)

OK, done. Suggestions and corrections are welcome! regards, --guyzero | talk 00:31, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

Archival of talk page

I moved all of the pre-September discussion to the archive box. This way we don't have wierd conversations coming up randomly from the past where a number of the contributions were unsigned/timestamped. ju66l3r 23:22, 8 September 2006 (UTC)

Vigorous defluffing

Links area was defluffed again. In the process I've found that there are articles for Paperless Geocaching and Geocaching software, so there's no need for most of the software links that were here before (and those pages may need their own defluffing/merging). ju66l3r 20:58, 10 November 2006 (UTC)

Popularity of Websites

The information stating "xxx is the most popular", "xxx is the second most popular" etc - who is justifying this. OK geocaching.com is the biggest, but does that make it the most popular, or the best? And what statistics are there for the positions of the next two? Sounds like somebody's making stuff up, again from a US-centric POV. Cached 07:03, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

I agree to a degree. Geocaching.com is the largest and best known. That's hardly disagreeable considering its geocache data quantity (largest), net traffic and linkage (which can be found on alexa, google, etc.). It's also larger than most regional websites outside the U.S. As for who would be considered "second" or "third", I can agree in disagreement and US-centricity there. The section you're talking about has bothered me for some time, but I've been a bit too busy to make sure it's worded right instead of just not worded...which would be preferable (better to edit/replace than simply delete). ju66l3r 18:01, 21 November 2006 (UTC)

Well, yes it would by the very definition of "popular." By the way, learn how to punctuate and don't use rhetorical questions if you want anyone to take your opinions seriously. Oh yeah people are just making things up just so you have something to talk about on here. We all have that kind of time to spend editing Wikipedia articles so we can be "US-centric," so we just invent statistics. You really hit the nail on the head there, buster. User:12.41.171.140 03:52, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

Please read WP:AGF, WP:CIVIL andWP:TALK. cheers, --guyzero | talk 18:16, 30 November 2007 (UTC)

For example in Russia the Geocaching.su seems to be by far more popular than Geocaching.com, as Groundspeak doesn't support Russian. Are there other similar places in the world where the Groundspeak site wouldn't be dominating? --Tliuska (talk) 19:49, 22 October 2008 (UTC)

AFAIK, opencaching.pl is more popular in Poland than gc.com 78.128.176.147 (talk) 16:26, 10 November 2008 (UTC)

In Hungary, there is geocaching.hu (English introduction here). It has its own listing, own cache IDs and own rules (for example there is a password in the caches which you need to log your visit) and its database more than twice as big as the .com's database of Hungary (currently .com: 1026, .hu: 2398). The site receives more than 10 000 logs per month (source), I have no data about the .com website. It must be more popular than the .com, but I can only quote the number of logged visits. Just compare the logs of a cache's .hu and .com version, for example GC134J6 / GCSaBa (.com (78 successful visits), .hu (442 successful visits)). Eckerg (talk) 08:59, 12 April 2009 (UTC)

Striking the Off-site "History" Page

I contest the accuracy of the offsite "History" page linked from the geocaching topic. Since this Wikipedia entry is meant to be an accurate page which already includes a history, the biased and less than factual link off this site to a "history" page should be stricken from the entry.

I do not suggest that it be replaced with the history page located at http://www.geocaching.com/about/history.aspx but that it should be removed entirely. For Wikipedia to be a useful site the bias should be left at the door.

I also want to ensure that there is a record on the entry stating that the link should be stricken. I'm well aware there are biased (re)writers of this entry. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 63.251.6.105 (talk) 02:27, 26 January 2007 (UTC).

I agree that the link should be removed and was bold and removed it. The simple fact is that the link was a personal webpage and therefore is a "link to be avoided" per the external link policy. While parts of the link were well-sourced, there were also many conclusions or inferences drawn that were not sourced making it fail the reliable source policy as a primary source with unsourced claims. If someone wants to reinsert the link, I ask that they discuss it here first. I do take exception though to the previous editor's lack of good faith on the part of the "(re)writers" that are claimed to be biased. I don't see any evidence to make bad faith assumptions about any of the editors of this article. ju66l3r 05:44, 26 January 2007 (UTC)

Geocaching Terminology

Wouldn't it help to have a geocaching terminology page? —The preceding unsigned comment was added by The SOAD Fan (talk • contribs) 14:09, 16 February 2007 (UTC).

Wikipedia is not a list of definitions or dictionary. If you are thinking about logbook acronyms, then you're going to have to present them in a way that is not just a list like:

1. TNLN - Took Nothing, Left Nothing
2. TFTC - Thanks For The Cache
3. etc...

There could be a section within this article, possibly. It would have to rely more on describing the fact that these acronyms and initialisms exist and less on being a dictionary of terms. There is already a link to the GeoLex at the bottom of the article. ju66l3r 00:41, 17 February 2007 (UTC)

I don't think there are so many variants of logbook acronyms that it warrants even its own page. DNF TN LN SL TFTC TFTH.. that's about all I can think of ... hardly such a broad vocabulary that it's worth mentioning. Is it really up to the scope of a wiki anyways to describe every last mechanical detail or local nuance specific to the active participation in a sport or is it sufficient to simply describe its commonly practiced or official general principles? Where do you draw the line between adequately detailed and bloated with too much information? It seems rather subjective to me. Since there is a link to GeoLex, I feel that the Geocaching wiki shouldn't reinvent the wheel. I guess for me the ultimate decider between enough and too much could be decided by the answer to the question, "Is this information enough to give a stranger to the sport a good feel for what the sport is all about or does stray too much into becoming a 'how to' article?"-Matt 07:55, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Trigpointing vs Benchmarking

If one is in the main article, then both should be. Just because Benchmarking is on Groundspeak does not in any way devalue the equivalent Trigpointing. --PopUpPirate 12:33, 1 March 2007 (UTC) Current edit reflects this, apologies --PopUpPirate 12:34, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

I agree. That's why I chose to also remove benchmarking. Neither of these things are exactly geocaching and so they are better suited to their own article(s). The virtual cache moniker in the cache type variants could potentially have quite a bit more than just the earthcache sub-type or none at all. I'd be willing to hear thoughts on the matter. Since multiple websites do host virtual caches I think it's important that it remain in the text as a variant, even though it doesn't fit the definition of geocaching really. But equally so, I'm not sure that maintaining every possible sub-type of virtuals is necessarily a good option either. ju66l3r 17:00, 1 March 2007 (UTC)

Regardless of the fact that the geocache.com website features benchmarking, I don't feel that's appropriate to list as a sub-type of geocaching because there is no "CACHE" involved in it. Geocaching.com also features links from cache pages to "nearby waymarks" and waymarking is no more or less related to caching than benchmarking (note that waymarking.com and geocaching.com are both sites being owned by the Groundspeak company of Seattle, WA). On the subject of Trigpointing vs. Benchmarking, it would seem Benchmarking would generically also include Trigpointing as a subtype of benchmarking (at least in the US) because both trigonometry and other types of survey markers including USGS are all included under the moniker of benchmarking. I have found several different types of marks personally and all of them were registered in the geocaching website under benchmarking. But again I would keep benchmarking, trigpointing, waymarking, letterboxing, degree confluencing, book crossing, and all other variations of this internet tracked public finding type game out of the geocaching discussion because they don't involve caches.. All such non-caching sports can all have their own dedicated wikis.. and should if they don't.. I would support listing some of them as "related" links, but that's it. Just my $.02-Matt 07:37, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

Mystery/Puzzle cache variation text

An editor has recently wanted to add a very specific location as an example of a mystery/puzzle cache. Unfortunately, there's nothing contextual about the coordinates or text added and so it seems ill-placed and somewhat like they are attempting to highlight their own cache (or planned cache). Neither the text nor coordinates fits the general description of the cache variations and I have even gone so far as to modify their original edit to give a fuller description of the variation than was there before. Any other discussion on this? I'd like to hear from the editor, but they have not yet responded on their talk page, mine, or this page as I suggested on their talk page. ju66l3r 21:19, 6 April 2007 (UTC)

My feeling on this is that highlighting any specific cache is not useful for the purposes of describing the sport, and like you said Ju66ler, it smacks of favoritism or could appear to be inappropriate use of the wiki to do self promote even if that isn't the case. An example can be done generically by simply describing the contents of an average cache page similar to this: "GPS coodinates which lead to the general or specific location. Name for the cache which can reflect its puzzle question, theme, a hint in finding, or a point about the surrounding, a text description which can contain clues or stories about the location or cache, supporting information about the size and difficulty of the cache, terrain hazards or links to related or nearby caches and lastly a section reserved just for hints." etc etc.. no specific cache needs to be cited and therefore, no favoritism can be inferred nor conferred. Anyone wanting to see an actual cache will probably be intelligent enough to navigate their own way to a geocaching.com related website.-Matt 07:20, 24 April 2007 (UTC)

A newbie here at Wiki, but I've been caching since '02. I concur that highlighting any specific cache type would not be useful or all that encyclopedic. I think we should avoid such.Rhodesisland (talk) 12:30, 13 April 2009 (UTC)

Geographing link

What appears to be a single editor (likely a WP:COI problem) has been attempting to insert a link to a service called "Geographing". This is essentially a "virtual cache" only listing service of new design for an old concept. The link itself fails the external link policy (namely it is only used to promote this new website, probably a conflict of interest by the submitter, and finally WP is not a repository of links and the EL section is long enough as it is without every Johnny-come-lately listing service being added). I do not see how this link furthers the knowledge of "what is geocaching". Please discuss the issue here instead of continually adding the link to the article ad nauseum. Thanks. ju66l3r 11:00, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

It seems as though that only ju66l3r has a problem with the link. I thought it was a very interesting take on geocaching with a lot of interesting content. Are you applying the same standard to all links? A quick check does not seem as though you are. Thank you. Faust13 20:35, 19 May 2007 (UTC)

Simply because I am the only one to quickly remove it does not mean that I am the only one who feels it should be removed. It is also not appropriate per WP:EL and you have not shown it to be otherwise. Other links presence is not precedent. Maybe I just haven't gotten to those links yet. ju66l3r 16:40, 22 May 2007 (UTC)

I added a link to geocaching.fi —Preceding unsigned comment added by 91.153.147.209 (talk) 09:56, 25 November 2007 (UTC)

Variations

"geographing is not a geocache type" -15:01, 5 June 2007 Ju66l3r Says who? You? Stop being a Wikipedia bully, this is a variation in every sense of the word. I don't understand your crusade against geographing. Based on your edits, you have displayed a strong bias. Wikipedia is a public encyclopedia, not your personal take on a topic. --faust13| talk 16:12, 05 June 2007 (UTC)

First, new talk sections go to the bottom. Secondly, Assume Good Faith. I have no crusade against geographing. If it's a pertinent topic for description on Wikipedia, then it should probably have its own page at Geographing with a link in the See Also section of this page (I think you'd find that the concept is not notable and the page would be quickly deleted). It is, at best, essentially the same as the virtual cache variation. To that point, virtual caches are already described in this article and this article is not here to advertise everyone's favorite website/discussion group. Most of the rhetoric being used to describe geographing in this article depends on the idea that they serve a better purpose by reducing environmental impact, etc. That is not neutral and any neutral definition of "geographing" (go to a pair of coordinates and take a picture) is served by the generic virtual cache variation that's already in place. If you disagree, there are ways of resolving disputes that do not include continually reverting your text back into the article (this is actually against policy if done often enough). We could ask a third opinion if other people interested in this article do not speak up here in a timely fashion. Let's leave the discussion here and wait to see if there are other opinions for consensus? ju66l3r 08:47, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

What I found interesting in this edit war, was that the text inserted actually said "it was similar to geocaching" which to me certainly implied it was trying to be different. From a "what is it perspective" I don't think it is geocaching because it's a totally different "feel". Many people don't think virtuals are geocaching and would probably like them to be removed (and maybe they should be moved elsewhere; I'll refrain from that topic at the moment). I do love the idea of geographing, and would very much like to see it get it's own page and referenced in the see also section. I'm not sure how to define what should go into the geocaching sub-type list and not. My best guess is that if it has it's own listing service and is independent (like geographing) it shouldn't go into the sub-type list. If it is a type of cache listed in multiple geocaching listing services (like virtuals are) then it makes sense to be a sub-type itself. Since that's the best criteria I can think of, I would agree that geographing probably needs it's own definition somewhere and linked in the see also section. Otherwise we end up with every GPS game known to man being a type of "geocaching". Cause then geodining would probably qualify too... Hardaker 18:17, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

faust, consider creating a geographing article in wikipedia and I would support it being See Also linked from this article. I believe providing a description for geographing within the geocaching article would set the precedent for any gps-related activity to have a section here, which detracts from providing a solid article on geocaching itself. As it is, the list of the different types of geocaches is already too heavy for the article and should probably be spun off into its own article, Types of Geocaches(?)

By the way, after a bit of searching before responding to this thread, I found that Dave Ulmer, one of the creators of geocaching, was also involved with the creation of geographing [1] .. regards, --guyzero | talk 20:51, 6 June 2007 (UTC)

I fixed Wherigo caches as they are not the same as a Wherigo cartridge. You use a Wherigo cartridge like the intermediate stages of a multi to find the final physical stage. Wherigo cartridges don't always include geocaches. Also moved Night Caches from under traditionals, which they are not, to under multis which is the more appropriate category. —Preceding unsigned comment added by CoyoteRed (talk • contribs) 15:01, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

Merger proposal

Paperless geocaching seems like such a minor detail of geocaching that I think it would make perfect sense to merge it into this article. Dave Foster 03:21, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

I agree - merge it Kabads 10:43, 20 August 2007 (UTC) —The preceding unsigned comment was added by Kabads (talk • contribs).

Agree. Jjasi 14:25, 20 August 2007 (UTC)

Agree. — Val42 03:58, 23 August 2007 (UTC)

Done. Dave Foster 23:21, 24 August 2007 (UTC)

Geocaching is a "nerdy" outdoor treasure-hunting game

I'm going to delete the word nerdy from the first sentense as it seems slightly unnessecery. The SOAD Fan 11:59, 20 September 2007 (UTC)

Comment

My mentor in my new job is a geocacher, presumably having picked it up from his father-in-law. It sounds very interesting, I'd like to try it too. But I don't have any GPS equipment. Do I need it, or can I rely on Google Maps coordinates in large cities? JIP | Talk 18:05, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Many many people start out finding a few without a GPS. There have been some people that have found quite a few without one. I know there was one that had found over 800 without a GPS at all; so yes it can definitely be done. Generally, of course, it can be harder but it's very possible. Hardaker 20:44, 22 October 2007 (UTC)

Number of Countries

Regarding the introductory quote that states, "placed in 222 countries around the world." I believe that there are only 192 United Nations recognized countries with the most recent additions of Montenegro (2006) and East Timor (2002). This being said the UN does not recognize all countries as member-states, for instance Switzerland did not join until 2002 and Taiwan, Western Sahara and Palestine are still not officially recognized. http://wiki.riteme.site/wiki/United_Nations_member_states 98.203.214.158 (talk) 13:20, 7 December 2007 (UTC)

Here is the list of "countries" that are listed on Geocaching.com:

United States, Afghanistan, Aland Islands, Albania, Algeria, American Samoa, Andorra, Angola, Anguilla, Anguilla, Antarctica, Antigua and Barbuda, Argentina, Armenia, Aruba, Australia, Austria, Azerbaijan, Bahamas, Bahrain, Bangladesh, Barbados, Belarus, Belgium, Belize, Benin, Bermuda, Bhutan, Bolivia, Bonaire, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Botswana, Bouvet Island, Brazil, British Indian Ocean Territories, British Virgin Islands, Brunei, Bulgaria, Burkina Faso, Burundi, Burxina, Cambodia, Cameroon, Canada, Cape Verde, Cayman Islands, Central African Republic, Chad, Chile, China, Christmas Island, Cocos (Keeling) Islands, Colombia, Comoros, Congo, Cook Islands, Costa Rica, Croatia, Cuba, Curacao, Cyprus, Czech Republic, Democratic Republic of the Congo, Denmark, Djibouti, Dominica, Dominican Republic, East Timor, Ecuador, Egypt, El Salvador, Equatorial Guinea, Eritrea, Estonia, Ethiopia, Falkland Islands, Faroe Islands, Fiji, Finland, France, French Guiana, French Polynesia, French Southern Territories, Gabon, Gambia, Georgia, Germany, Ghana, Gibraltar, Greece, Greenland, Grenada, Guadeloupe, Guam, Guatemala, Guernsey, Guinea, Guinea-Bissau, Guyana, Haiti, Heard Island And Mcdonald Islands, Honduras, Hong Kong, Hungary, Iceland, India, Indonesia, Iran, Iraq, Ireland, Isle of Man, Israel, Italy, Ivory Coast, Jamaica, Japan, Jersey, Jordan, Kazakhstan, Kenya, Kiribati, Kuwait, Kyrgyzstan, Laos, Latvia, Lebanon, Lesotho, Liberia, Libya, Liechtenstein, Lithuania, Luxembourg, Macau, Macedonia, Madagascar, Malawi, Malaysia, Maldives, Mali, Malta, Marshall Islands, Martinique, Mauritania, Mauritius, Mayotte, Mexico, Micronesia, Moldovia, Monaco, Mongolia, Montenegro, Montserrat, Morocco, Mozambique, Myanmar, Namibia, Nauru, Nepal, Netherlands, Netherlands Antilles, Nevis and St Kitts, New Caledonia, New Zealand, Nicaragua, Niger, Nigeria, Niue, Norfolk Island, North Korea, Northern Mariana Islands, Norway, Oman, Pakistan, Palau, Panama, Papua New Guinea, Paraguay, People Den Rep Yemen, Peru, Philippines, Pitcairn Islands, Poland, Portugal, Puerto Rico, Qatar, Reunion, Romania, Russia, Rwanda, Saint Helena, Saint Kitts and Nevis, Saint Lucia, Samoa, San Marino, Sao Tome and Principe, Saudi Arabia, Senegal, Serbia and Montenegro, Seychelles, Sierra Leone, Singapore, Slovakia, Slovenia, Solomon Islands, Somalia, South Africa, South Georgia and Sandwich Islands, South Korea, Spain, Sri Lanka, St Barthelemy, St Eustatius, St Kitts, St Marten, St Pierre Miquelon, St Vince Grenadines, Sudan, Suriname, Svalbard and Jan Mayen, Swaziland, Sweden, Switzerland, Syria, Taiwan, Tajikistan, Tanzania, Thailand, Togo, Tokelau, Tonga, Trinidad and Tobago, Tunisia, Turkey, Turkmenistan, Turks and Caicos Islands, Tuvalu, Uganda, Ukraine, United Arab Emirates, United Kingdom, United States, Unknown, Uruguay, US Minor Outlying Islands, US Virgin Islands, Uzbekistan, Vanuatu, Vatican City State, Venezuela, Vietnam, Wallis And Futuna Islands, Western Sahara, Yemen, Zaire, Zambia, Zimbabwe.

I extracted this directly from their search page. I used an automated method to count the number of lines in the extracted list and came up with 257 entries. One was "unknown", and others aren't otherwise recognized countries, like "Falkland Islands", "Svalbard and Jan Mayen" and "Antarctica". This list of "countries" is probably where the 222 number originally came from. I know that they used to list this statistic on Geocaching.com, but I can't find it now so I've modified it. — Val42 (talk) 19:44, 11 December 2007 (UTC)

Article on Dave Ulmer

The article on Dave Ulmer, after some discussion at WP Oregon, was removed and changed to a redirect to this article, mainly due to lack of reliable sources on Ulmer. Reasons are more clearly set forth on Talk:Dave Ulmer.

If anyone objects to this move, feel free to revert and give reasons at the talk page there.

Thanks,

--EngineerScotty (talk) 00:59, 6 February 2008 (UTC)

Bomb

Geocaches have been blown up, just look at: This google news search. Trying to find a non-subscription one with an active link. §hep • ¡Talk to me! 01:56, 5 May 2008 (UTC)

Wikiproject Geocaching

Is there a Wikiproject for Geocaching? Zef (talk) 16:54, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

Not that I know of, but is the scope really large enough for a WikiProject? As it stands, the only articles of relevance to it would be a small subset of those in Category:Outdoor locating games (I guess just 5-10 in total). Maybe a task force would be more appropriate, or a wikiproject with a wider scope. --David Edgar (talk) 17:38, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

I could not find one. Just wondering. Zef (talk) 18:38, 19 May 2008 (UTC)

There would be geocaching, geocoin, travel bug, Benchmarking (geolocating) and perhaps a few more. This wouldn't be enough for a project, but they should all be in the suggested category. I don't know why you'd want to create a project for these few articles. — Val42 (talk) 04:46, 21 May 2008 (UTC)

Caching

I am relatively new to this sport, but as I understand it, isn't Geocaching a brand? Making Caching the actual sport. You have geocaching, terracaching, navicache etc. I would think that the Geocaching article should be moved to Caching and all those names would become redirects. Any other thoughts or opinions on this? --JAYMEDINC (talk) 16:54, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, geocaching is a brand; however I believe it's also the most widely used name. Wikipedia shouldn't be defining what the name ought to be; it should be reflecting the most easily recognised name.

Wikipedia is about accuracy, not what is easily recognized. By encouraging this article to be improperly named (if it is), geocaching dot com just increases their brand awareness. I don't believe the is the wiki thing to do. I agree, it would be so nice to just call the sport geocaching. However, I am trying to find out for the wiki community if that is what it is really called or if that is just groundspeak's brand. --JAYMEDINC (talk) 17:54, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I would point out WP:NAME: the first (and most important) point in the policy is "Use the most easily recognized name". --David Edgar (talk) 18:36, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

I note that TerraCaching's main page title is "TerraCaching - The Quality Geocaching Community" and Navicache's main page title is "Geocaching with NaviCache - Home Page". Both strongly indicate that the most commonly used name for the activity is 'geocaching', not 'caching'. Therefore I would suggest that 'geocaching' is the term most easily recognised.

Couldn't it be argued that they are only using that as an SEO trick to help them get noticed in the search engines? --JAYMEDINC (talk) 17:54, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

That's certainly a valid point; however partially this works *because* 'geocaching' is the most commonly used term. --David Edgar (talk) 18:36, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

As an additional reason to keep the article located at the current title, 'geocaching' is relatively unambiguous, whereas 'caching' is not; it's a very frequently used term in computing. See cache. --David Edgar (talk) 17:10, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Right now Caching is just a re-direct to cache. That could easily be fixed if necessary. --JAYMEDINC (talk) 17:54, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Yes, of course it could be easily changed; my point is that it doesn't make sense to do that, given the ambiguity. --David Edgar (talk) 18:36, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Welcome to the sport. =) According to the article, geocaching (the name of the sport) existed prior to geocaching.com. They also considered "geostashing" as the sport name. kind regards, --guyzero | talk 17:21, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Thanks for this post. It caused me to Google Matt Stum mentioned as the suggester of the term geocaching. I found this link [2] where he continually calls it a cache after abandoning the word stash. According to Matt in this website, David Ulmer came up with the variation of the name called geocaching. According to Alexa dot com, geocaching dot com was registered July 3, 2000. GPS Stash hunt was taken over from Mike Teague by Jeremy Irish into geocaching dot com. [3] Just more food for thought, since some of the history in this article probably needs to be tweaked now. --JAYMEDINC (talk) 17:54, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

The sport is geocaching. However, Groundspeak registered the website Geocaching.com. The Geocaching.com website name is trademarked by Groundspeak, however the name of the sport, geocaching, itself, is not and can not be trademarked. One of the earlier commenters is incorrect to say that "geocaching is a brand". Geocaching.com is a brand of Groundspeak but the game/sport/hobby/whatever of geocaching is not. ju66l3r (talk) 19:58, 29 July 2008 (UTC)

Well, now we have a couple different answers on the subject from the few people that responded. Not exactly clearing it up for me or anyone else who may have the same question. I agree that the article name will stay the same. It doesn't mean I think it is correct. I was just trying to get some help in finding out of my thoughts were close or way off, or if anyone else had the same thoughts. --JAYMEDINC (talk) 18:08, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Jaymedinc, geocaching became the name of the hobby after geostashing was considered to have a bad connotation, IE, Park Ranger, "What are you doing?" GPS user, "Going to find a stash." "Caching" is an abbreviation, just as you wouldn't put the Letterboxing page under Boxing, it wouldn't be logical to put geocaching under some unrelated title. Similarly you wouldn't want the muggle page to redirect here despite geocachers using that term to apply to non-cachers. You might also consider how people would search for it if they were unfamiliar. If they found a box in the woods with a geocaching sticker on it, or marked "geocache", or read the "what is geocaching" note inside, why would they search wikipedia for "cache" or "caching"? Similarly GPSr manufacturers suggest their devices might be used for geocaching and stores sell geocaching items. There are 34 items on eBay found under "caching", many computer related, compared to over 600 more for "geocaching", which is also it's own category on eBay. Although companies have since sprung up that make geocaching products or supply services, it's not a brand any more than rock climbing is a brand of climbing. Heh... (Double entendre intended...) ---RJFerret: talk, 18:43, 30 July 2008 (UTC)

Geocaching is not trademarked by Groundspeak. Forum post by Jeremy Irish, CEO Groundspeak. Groundspeak would not have been able to claim trademark as someone else thought it up, is was in popular use, and it was documented as such on the still existing talk list. CoyoteRed (talk) 14:37, 5 August 2008 (UTC)

PDA's

I added words saying that Palm, as well as Windows CD, PDA's can upload GPX files. I know you have to run a conversion program on the PC first, but I think it's more accurate to list the two main types of PDA's used for paperless, or semi-paperless, caching.

If anyone objects, maybe we shouldn't mention specific types of PDA? Britbrat0325 (talk) 22:26, 7 August 2008 (UTC)

I agree, I removed the specific types. --David Edgar (talk) 15:13, 8 August 2008 (UTC)

And when we pluralize an acronym, an apostrophe is not used. That is only to show possession or the absence of a missing letter (whereas "PDA's" is not appropriate- "PDAs" is accurate).

Geocaching bans

Why is geocaching banned in certain wild life management areas? —Preceding unsigned comment added by 72.230.39.131 (talk • contribs) 14:54, 30 October 2008

Presumably to avoid disturbing places like nesting / breeding sites. Searching for a cache can have quite a noticeable impact on natural areas. It also seems that in some areas where hunting takes place, another reason for such rules is to ensure the safety of geocachers. --David Edgar (talk) 15:23, 30 October 2008 (UTC)

The Future Is Wild

In the "The Future is Wild", the Animated version episode 17 "Around the World In 80 Minutes", one of the characters starts what he considers the ultimate geocache game. I thought this would be worth mentioning in the article as it shows how the game has been adopted for nature documentary style speculative fiction. --198.85.212.10 (talk) 13:51, 27 January 2009 (UTC)

TextCaching

I added TextCaching to the multi-caching section. I looked around for the best place to put information about this and that seems to be the best place. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.153.110.226 (talk) 04:20, 3 February 2009 (UTC) 2050 Media 2050 media (talk) 05:09, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

Nothing showing up on GoogleNews...again. Removing as not notable enough for inclusion for now. §hep • ^Talk 00:42, 4 February 2009 (UTC)

I didn't realize that an innovation had to be on Googlenews to be notable.

Thanks for the inspiration. I have started submitting information about TextCaching to every media outlet I can reach.

TextCaching.com does come up first in the organic listings on Google for the search Text Caching.

2050 media (talk) 05:09, 7 February 2009 (UTC)

No, but an "innvoation" has be to covered in multiple reliable third-party sources before being listed. Currently it appears that it is not; when there is sufficient referencing from thrid-part sources the information can be readded, §hep • ^Talk 03:48, 8 February 2009 (UTC)

Anti-Geocache (Geotrashing)

There should be more anti-geocache, pro-geotrashing information in this article. -Axmann8 (Talk) 00:53, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

No there shouldn't as only a moron would do that. What there should be is more virtual caching. 72.154.166.139 (talk) 04:04, 12 June 2009 (UTC)

Geocaching + fundraising combined for the first time

Friends, Big Brothers Big Sisters of Canada has created what we believe to be the world's first application of the geocaching activity to charitable fund-raising. Once upon a time, a gala was a just gala, a run was just a run, and a golf tournament was just a golf tournament... until they were applied to fundraising. We are doing this on September 11th 2009 in four cities simultaneously. When the time nears, would anyone be willing to help me post a modest entry about it in Wikipedia? We would love to establish credit for being the first to combine these things (assuming we truly are), for both pride, posterity, and giving credit to our cash-poor, idea-rich charitable organization. I also believe we have developed a new team-based game variant worth a line or two as well. Please drop me a line if you are willing to help us make this entry. Thanks! Joel Porter: jporterbbbsc.ca

WikiBigBrother (talk) 03:04, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Hi there, there are many Geovents held each year that go towards chairty. A specific event going on in just 4 cities doesn't seem notable enough for inclusion on the encyclopedia. Sorry to disappoint, §hep^Talk 04:25, 26 March 2009 (UTC)

Geotrashing?

Is it a valid 'term' really?Aranesp (talk) 00:56, 21 May 2009 (UTC)

Geosexing

I recommend this reference be removed. It is a link to another wiki stub which basically says "nobody actually does this, but I am thinking about starting it someday, so I want to have a name placeholder here until I have the details worked out." In what way, specifically, does this kind of thing add to a layperson's encyclopedic understanding of geocaching? --Mroesler (talk) 16:05, 3 July 2009 (UTC)

Yeah, it's bull. I'm going to remove the reference, and if somehow a riot is started and everyone wants to keep it, go ahead. This should have been removed a long time ago. It's not real, and could offend some readers, as it is not what they expect to read on this article. MobileSnail 14:57, 7 July 2009 (UTC)

I deleted it after a brief discussion with User:Smashville on his talk page. Consider this subject closed. :) MobileSnail 15:31, 7 July 2009 (UTC)