Is it possible to.............

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have the australian site (or any other country specific site for that matter) cut a deal with GC.com to allow them to access the GC.com facilitys, data etc etc, and negotiate with them to pay a smaller price for that? <br><br>By this I would propose that we pay a fee for our premium memberships in AU$$, then GCA.com.au would contribute a portion of that to the mothership (GC.com). <br><br>I personally know that being an Aussie, in Australia, with Aussie currency, I would much rather pay my fees in Aussie clams and would also prefer to log into a local site that has more "locals" and rather than filtering through the forums of non relevant country specific issues just to get to something about a local issue etc. <br><br><br>I have also noticed that a few caches are being muggled or coins/bugs are being taken from caches around the country of late, I am currently working on an alteration to the standard GC.com printout that you can stick into your cache (saying "if you found this by accident" etc), and I think it should have some sort of detail about the age groups that do caching (young kids, family's etc) and that by muggle'ing the cache they are being nasty to those who really want to participate and play the game of caching!! What do ya think?

Groundspeak are in the business to make a profit. They have threatened other sites with lawsuits in the past. I doubt very much that they would be interested in such an arrangement!

What facilities, data etc are not available from www.geocaching.com.au that you would like to see? The developers/coders are very open to suggestions for improvements from people who support the site and want to be involved.



GCA exists as an alternative because some people don't feel you should have to pay any clams to play.



Are you talking about the groundspeak forum? A new thread gets posted and 5 minutes later it's up to page three with a couple of dozen "me too"s quoting all previous posts. (and I am SO greatful people don't do taglines on this forum.)
Much more interesting and fun here.



Sounds good. There's a few linked on the wiki. Please feel free to share it when you are finished. http://wiki.geocaching.com.au/wiki/Stash_note

Tea for 2 maybe!

we have split this from an unrelated thread

in regards to your topics:

1. gca is a free site and doesn't charge or collect any money. so it's a big stretch for it to collect money on behalf of another site. if you'd like to get some kind of bulk purchase discount, that's something that you are welcome to arrange through the forums if you wish.

2. as damo says, there's one in the wiki that you can update if you wish

damo, we hate signatures too - we find they make it very hard to follow the discussion. one of the key reasons we offered to host the ezboard forum started by pyrenees kid is so we could turn off the signatures! (the other reason was to stop the ads, or people having to donate money to keep it ad-free)

What sort of detail? Do you have access to the demographics of people who participate in geocaching? We don't have young kids and we do not cache as a family - are we an "etc"?

Well, for example, If I post a cache, and the letter says that it is just a cache, someone would likely muggle it just for fun, my thoughts were that if you stated on that description letter, along the lines that kids, familys, disabled, young and old etc do caching, in more descriptive terms than simple being an international game, then a person would be less likely to muggle it, and more likely to develop their own interest in geocaching.

I doubt it'll stop all but the most honest people from muggling caches.

A lot of honest people stumble on caches and will leave a note and move on, but you will always get the people who feel the need to strew the contents of the cache from hither to thither.

<br><br>

I doubt if someone who is going to muggle the cache would even READ the stash note.<br><BR>
Cheers,<br>
ThatGuy

Someone who muggles a cache will muggle it no matter what the cache note says.

it can't hurt to change it, can it?

If it is changed it may increase the chance of a muggle that finds it joining Geocaching but i stand by that it wont reduce the chance of it being muggled

I've had a couple of variations on stash notes for micros that basically tried the "why wreck someone else's fun for no reason?" approach.
They were mostly in urban areas (hence being micros), and none of them ever had a friendly muggle note, some just disappeared.

I'm sure there are still nice kids in the world, but none of them seem to've been the ones who've found my urban caches!

I have even thought about putting my email addy or mobile number and saying something like "if you want to experience caching, contact me"

I have my mobile phone number on the log book, inside the cache lid and on the stash note - didn't help.

Still, that's no reason why you shouldn't make your suggested stash note with changes.

Hey, it might work.

The cups are half full

But even more important than that. There's more in the pot.