Re: Geocaching gets cash boost.

As an avid geocacher I have concerns about the initiative and commercial motives. While I normally applaud the placement of new geocaches, I am concerned about the possible “quality” of them.

Geocaching is a fun activity and nothing is worse than a poor geocache. Also it concerns me greatly about the “commercial advertisement/local business spotlighting” mentioned too.

Here is a quote from Geocaching.com at http://www.geocaching.com/about/guidelines/aspx.

“Caches that solicit –

Solicitations are off-limits. For example, caches perceived to be posted for religious, political, charitable or social agendas are not permitted. Geocaching is supposed to be a light, fun activity, not a platform for an agenda.

“Commercial caches – Commercial caches will not be published on geocaching.com without prior approval from Groundspeak. A commercial cache is a geocache listing or geocache which is perceived by Groundspeak, Groundspeak’s employees, or the volunteer geocache reviewers as having been submitted to geocaching.com with the principal or substantial intent of soliciting customers or generating commercial gain. The geocache is presumed to be commercial if the finder is required to go inside a business, interact with employees, and/or purchase a product or service, or if the cache listing has overtones of advertising, marketing or promotion.

“Additionally, links to businesses, commercial advertisers, charities, political or social agendas, or the inclusion of their associated logos are not permitted on cache descriptions without prior permission from Groundspeak.” End quote.

Wade Peacock a.k.a KnightOrc