The gaining popularity of the short log
As a cacher who has over 100 active hides within our province, I get a fair amount of log emails on a regular basis. I usually expect to see at least a few logs roll in every day. I enjoy reading the various logs of people’s adventures finding my caches. I know that for my larger series a lot of them are copy & paste logs but I am fine with that knowing that there are so many different caches and it being hard to distinguish between each of them.
Most of the logs I see come in are short logs with quick tales of finding a cache or thanking me for the hide, etc. Some logs are fairly long winded telling me a good story about finding a particular cache. I have however begun to see a very distinct pattern emerging from cache find logs recently.
In the last few months, I have been seeing a considerable amount of logs that consist of no more than 10 characters. A great deal of them “TFTC!” and nothing else. I’ve had a pile of logs that were nothing more than a smiley or some other emoticon. Personally, I find these types of logs very annoying. I know that a lot of people go out and cache and may snag a lot of different ones in a day. I also know I have been guilty of short written logs. But really, is TFTC or 🙂 the only thing you can come up with when you log a find on a cache? Is it really THAT much of a hassle to write even a little one liner about what you experienced?
Isn’t that the whole point of a log? To share the experience of finding the cache with the owner and other finders? Have cachers become so obsessed with numbers that log entries are now reduced to nothing but a couple of characters, all in the name of trying to get the logging “out of the way”. I would rather have 100 copy and paste logs that at least tell me about your day out caching, then 100 “TFTC” logs. The sad thing is, I am seeing this more and more. I see a lot of new or unknown names on caches of mine and many of the logs are very short and it seems to be a growing trend.
Is anyone else seeing the same thing on their caches?
Yup, I’ve got over 100 hides as well, and I’ve been getting some logs like that too lately.
I found 150 caches this weekend and about 50 were from the same hider, all the same container in the same type of trees down back roads and he no longer caches, he got a lot of “found it, TFTC” logs. I see no point in trying to make up a log for 50 caches with no character and were hidden for one purpose, quick number runs during the winter placement contest. I also found a few caches from another new cacher and although they were also all very similar I tried to make a few comments about the ones I enjoyed but some did get a short log. I get lots of TFTC logs on my regular boring type finds and some other get specific logs relating to the hide. Funny thing is I just hid my “fun with logs” caches to help promote longer logs with some character and I have received a couple of TFTC but that is ok with me. I use my BlackBerry to do field notes when I do longer runs, it lets me be more specific in my logs and makes it much easier to log them when I get home but I still read them all and edit some before I post them.
I too have received a lot of logs onmy caches that consists of nothing more than a smiley. its better than a frowney i guess. I think that part of it has to do with it being summertime and a lot of the logs come from people who are traveling from out of town that probably dont have much tiem for logging.
When i write my logs, i try to tell a fun story when there is one to tell, but face it, not all caching adventures are worth writting about. on a big power trail where you will find 50 identical caches in a row, i mostly just copy/paste my logs. but they normally consists of at least a couple of sentences.
But you’re right Zor. I like hearing what people thought about my caches, or the adventures they had getting there. Small logs are a bit disappointing.
I guess part of my geocaching addiction includes my obsession with logs. In a weird way, I enjoy writing the logs a much as the actual find. I also love reading the other logs. There is not ONE cache we’ve found, not one GC code that I’ve entered, not one cache page that I have visited where I did not click the “additional logs: view them all” link. So how do you think I appreciate the: TFTC log?
Worse, a smiley with a period as a log; a one tinny dot, one character! Have you ever seen this one? If not let me know, I’ll point you towards some examples. What the heck is that? A dot! Better than a “space bar” log I suppose. LOL
I think that there is always a story that can come with a find, always. But I too am guilty sometimes where I do not write more than a couple of words in some random downtown ‘park and grab’ in a parking lot. So I can understand someone not writing much on a random Pokemouche river micro near a bridge series 😉 I can also see how it can be difficult to remember each and every cache when you do a “power caching trip”. I did 18 caches in one day (or was it 17) and that was way too much for my liking as I could hardly remember what happened for what cache (another aspect is that after 10 or more, they tend to become “random”, so another reason why we do not do a whole lot at once).
But in close to 800 caches found up to now, there is certainly not that many caches where I did not write much, or at least part of a little story. There is more to write in a log than a single dot 🙂
But that is my preference and geocaching is about all kind of tastes, opinions and preferences.
i’ve only done one series of caches that i cut and pasted the logs and that was 61 of the trail of the gods series where they are exactly the same one after another so… One thing I’ve found handy is bringing along a device or paper to jot down a note or two about the find so that i can remember when i get back. My acadian run was done with an ipod touch with the groundspeak app so that i could log all of the caches as field notes along the way. Because i have a terrible memory and because i wasn’t able to log them online till i got back home 5 days later.
I also feel pretty disappointed when i open my e-mail and see the short log. just something like “nice quick and easy find” is better than “TFTC”
We receive TFTC and occasionally use TFTC. When we do a power trail I write a log with a thank you for the first find then make a note that all following logs will be TFTC unless there is something specific to tell.
We love getting logs so try to leave thema s well. This weeks have arrived in Dutch, French and Spanish and German, the only part I truly understood was the smiley.
We’re like most of you, we write logs for caches that give us something to write about. Like CD, if we’re doing a series we’ll do a good log for the first and copy/paste the rest unless we saw something special at a particular cache. We use field notes, too, but even then it’s hard to be creative on find # 68 of a series. I figure they’re put out and found solely for the numbers so they mostly get the letters (TFTC)! 🙂 For caches we find that aren’t in a series we try to be a bit more creative or show more thanks for the hider’s efforts because we enjoy reading the same on our hides.
CD – we too have recieved some logs in languages we don’t understand. We copy and paste into Google Translate and get a pretty good idea of what the cacher wrote. Give it a try http://translate.google.com/#
I try to keep it short. The less I say the harder it is to tell I wasn’t there.
There seems to be a rise in the TFTC or [:)] logs again, I have been getting a few lately. some were even for FTF’s. This bugs me and if and when these cachers hide some, guess what we should put in their logs?
IDK
If we do a series or a large number in an area, we write a descriptive log about our day and/or the seires. We then cut and paste into some of the logs or TFTC in others and add information to some where we have more details. Using cut and paste means that the owner may see the soame log often, however, it is not only the owner who may be reading the logs. For that reason, we will keep ding what we do, despite what others may be doing to our caches.
Some came up with a logging etiquette, check this out: GC1YT47.
Here is a link to the code: http://www.mbgeocaching.ca/forum/viewtopic.php?p=16631#16631
and here is the code: Logging Etiquette: Geocache hiders sometimes go through a great deal of planning to place their caches. As a result, they’d like to hear your feedback on whether you liked or disliked any aspect of the hide, or if you feel that some cache maintenance is required. Single word, acronym, or emoticon logs may be easier when you have a lot of caches to log, but it doesn’t tell the hider or other finders anything about your adventure (or lack thereof) in finding the cache. Please keep this in mind when entering your log.
Seems like this topic is on a lot of caching site: http://www.mdgps.org/forum/viewtopic.php?f=1&t=6872&hilit=etiquette
http://feedback.geocaching.com/forums/75775-geocaching-com/suggestions/1758021-logging-etiquette?ref=comments
I discovered that if you are using the geocaching app for ipod/iphone and mark “found it” that it will upload a blank log. I had to then go to the site and edit all of blank logs with a cut and paste log. I generally avoid cut and paste logs, but I figured it was better than nothing.
You can set it, as I used to do when I used the android groundspeak app, set the logging to “log as field note” instead of logging directly. That way, when you get home, you can edit the entries to your heart’s desire before submitting the final, posted version.
I do the same thing now with my GPS, the Oregon, and its field notes. 🙂