Bitter sweet disharmony
There seems to be going (terribly?) wrong in the Flemish (or is it Belgium as a whole?) geocaching community.
It somewhat started with a person who started to lash towards cache owners via log notes. Instead of writing in a constructive manner, he/she decided to write things down in a obscene manner. All this was done via a specially created – thus anonymous – account. When the account was taken down, he/she created a new one. The criticism came to in essence to the fact that a cache owner made mystery/puzzle caches which – in his/her eyes – are very hard to solve. Only a few people of the ‘inner circle’ seem the be able to solve them, which he/she found ‘suspicious’ (I don’t want to replicate the exact abusive words over here).
The reaction to this from scoffie en de MISSloopsters was to make his caches only available for Premium Members. This prevents those anonymous spleen venting, since everything can be traced and it’ll cost 30 USD whenever that person tries to create a new account in order to log these notes. More on that initiative can be found on this site. I find this, as such, a good idea. Finally we get something more from our membership – as said before in a reviled blog post, we don’t get that much in return from our money at this moment.
Having said this, there is more going on though, namely the discussion about the quality of the caches. It has been said multiple times before; the quality of some caches leave a lot to be desired. The problem here are the criteria for a good cache. Does quality stands for a difficult mystery cache, a well crafted container, the physical efforts in order to log them, the scenery , a combination of all these, …? I guess it’s a personal matter on what one wants to achieve within this sport for both cachers as cache owners. Some wants to create/find as difficult as possible caches, others want to create/find as much caches as possible. Both possibilities are valid and everyone determines for himself which caches he/she wants to create/find.
I see in the BE (and other) forums that people turn up one’s nose at these Covo Loco caches. Is this some kind of snobbery or elitism? I don’t know, but I don’t see a reason why one should. As such, they have a point. And maybe they prove also another thing: the bureaucratic and (sometimes?) stupid guidelines are as such useless. Since these guidelines aren’t incorporated in the online report form, they deliver nothing more than frustrations for both the reviewer as the cacher. These guidelines won’t prevent and guarantee anything.
Another issue is the attitude towards cachers who create a cache after logging only a couple of caches themselves. Yes, it should be better that novice cachers should let them advice by a more experienced person (via a trial run if desired). An idea might be that one gets oneself a mentor (or assigned) which one specifies in the report form. A step further is that this mentor approves the cache before the reviewer does. Question of course is if this is done objectively enough, but one finds out real soon when a mentor is genuine or not. Anyway, de facto exclusion isn’t a good idea. What’s the ideal caching ‘age’ anyway?
After all, you’re free to search for them or not and if you do find it, there’s always the log where you can write down in a constructive manner. I’m sure that the cache owner behaves one’s age and do something with it. This happened with the TB & GC hotel I had, where there was criticism on the size and the place it was hidden. I asked the logger for advise and my reaction was to move the hotel a couple of hundred meters further and made it extra large. I get positive logs since then, so I’m still thankful for the initial reaction. We should learn from each other and not react negatively on less favourable logs nor completely ignore them. An example of this is the fact that I wanted to cache in a certain area and looked at the available caches. Since most of the caches had DNFs or need maintenance, I decided to mail the cache owner the other day. I’m still waiting for an reaction from this experienced (thus established?) cacher.
PS. One can always show one’s appreciation via GC Vote. Check my earlier blog post for details.
October 22nd, 2009 at 3:05 pm
I enjoyed this post. It’s sad that someone has to gone to the logs and been so vicious, just becuase they can’t figure something out or have suspicions. Personally, I am not a fan of the “?” caches, but I don’t get all upset about it…. I just don’t do them. There are also some cachers I don’t care for, and it’s just so much easier NOT to do their caches. I don’t know why someone would waste there time making accusations and being nasty.
As far as newer caches placing hides… I really wish there was some kind of requirement. Like maybe you would have to have 50 or 100 finds to place a hide. Too often new cachers get excited about the game and go hide a cache – then their passion fizzles out. I feel like the more finds you have, the more likely you are to stick with it. Also, the more you have, the greater the likely hood that the cache was placed correctly and in an OK location.
…Anyway, that is just my opinion
October 22nd, 2009 at 3:43 pm
Thanks for your input. You should try some mystery/puzzle caches though. They aren’t all that difficult.
Will 50-100 finds will always result in a good cache? What if he/she didn’t log anything else than (couch) virtuals and drive by film canister caches or LPCs?