Geography Reference
In-Depth Information
Microsoft!—swooping in to systematize and commercialize their guerrilla pastime. “Some
felt uncomfortable with a small group of people making money off of all their work,” says
Ed Hall, who ran another website called Buxley's Geocaching Waypoint, the first to dis-
play geocache locations on maps. “What are they bringing to it? Why are they trying to
assert ownership over
our
game?” Irish and his partners made missteps as well, sending
legalwarningstoHall'ssite(formining
Geocaching.com
datatodrawhismaps)andQuinn
Stone's NaviCache site (because his logo used the word “geocaching,” which Irish had at-
tempted to trademark). After Dave Ulmer himself got into a dust-up on Irish's message
boards, his name was removed from the site's “History of Geocaching” page, which for a
time credited the placing of the first cache to an anonymous “someone.”
The old scuffles are water under the bridge these days. Jeremy Irish is now more savvy
about the court of public opinion, and the old guard has come around to the idea of a
for many years, has mellowed. “I don't mind them making money off of it,” he tells me.
“
Geocaching.com
isanexcellentwebsite.Theguyhasputincrediblehoursintodeveloping
the site. He deserves a reward for that.” Irish's little start-up has grown into Groundspeak
Inc., which employs more than forty-five “Lackeys,” as they call themselves, at its Seattle
headquarters, all in cubicles festooned with lime-green shades reminiscent of a forest can-
opy. On March 8, 2010, the geocache count on its website hit one million.
One million geocaches! To be more precise: 1,385,781 active caches at the moment I
write this, with more than a thousand new ones appearing each day. That is an astounding
number. By comparison, here is a partial inventory of other things there are in the world:
6,230 wide-body jets; 32,000 McDonald's restaurants; 663,000 zebras; 40,000 Segways;
and 15,900 synagogues. You've seen all those things, but despite their comparative ubi-
quity, most people have never knowingly seen a geocache; Groundspeak cofounder Bryan
Rothrecentlycalledgeocaching
“
thebiggesthobbyintheworld
thatnobodyknowsabout.”
That'sthewholepointofthegame:thecachesarehardtofindifyou'renotexpresslylook-
ing for them and sometimes even if you are. But they are everywhere, on all seven con-
tinents. There's a geocache hidden in a stone wall at the Vatican, and one in a high temple
nicheatAngkorWat,andanotherinthecrookofatreebyVictoriaFallsinZimbabwe.Run
your hands along the bottom of the front gates at Las Vegas's Bellagio casino, and you'll
find one magnetically attached. There are six on the slopes of Colorado's Pikes Peak and
two at Antarctica's McMurdo Station.
Geocaches have changed a little since Dave Ulmer's day. In fact, his historic first cache
wouldbequicklyrejected todaybythenetworkof
Geocaching.com
volunteersthatvetsall
new caches, since it breaks several of their cardinal rules: no buried caches, no food, no
money.Buttheessentialsofthegamearestillexactlywhatheproposedinhis2001Usenet
post. A container is hidden somewhere in the world—the container might be big or small,
