Where are my caches?

[howarthe]

I haven't logged on in a long time, probably a whole year, maybe two. But I got a newsletter today about a contest, and I like contests, so I logged in. Everything looks totally different. In fact, its so different that I'm not sure I'm in the right place, but the logo the same, so I think I am. What I am most worried about is that the caches that I hid no longer appear. When I click on my username, it actually says I haven't hidden any caches. Where did they go? Did they wipe the slate clean when they redesigned their website or something? That seems insane, but I also miss the raccoon. That's the part that makes me think that maybe I'm in the wrong place. The website I remember was mostly brown, and there was a super-cute cartoon of a raccoon on every page, but this new site is mostly blue, and there is nothing cutie about it. If you know what I'm talking about and can offer any insights, I would sure appreciate it. Thanks!

[TermiteHunter]

YUP,
Wrong site.
This is the REAL OPENCACHING NETWORK
Your caches are on opencaching.com

I won't explain opencaching -vs- opencaching here but welcome and give us a try.
There is much more here even if there are far fewer caches near you.

[DudleyGrunt]

Concur with TermiteHunter. You were obviously on Garmin's OpenCaching.COM previously. We're glad you heard about our contest and found your way there, though. For an explanation of the "OC vs OC" situation, see a couple of our first blog entries, HERE.

[howarthe]

Oh, my goodness. Thank you very much. Yes, it was a Garmin site. I thought I found THEM through path tags, but I'll bet I googled open caching and wound up there instead of here. OK. New stuff to learn. Thanks again.

[Mr.Yuck]

What, you don't think our background image of a beach on every single page is cute enough?? That actually rotates every 3 months for the season. It's a farm snow scene in the winter, for example (probably a farm in Poland, but that's besides the point). Mascot? We have talked about it. Our graphic artist who did a bunch of work for us last Spring/Summer has disappeared from the internets though. However, I am working with another on a collaborative Pathtag design, and I'll bet she could whip out a cute mascot in 5 minutes. But would a mascot be consistent with the OpenCaching ethos?

Back before we started having email delivery problems, we could pretty much trace every "trouble report" sent to octeam at opencaching.us to people confusing us with Gamin.

I usually rant more aggressively elsewhere on the internet, but restrain myself here in an official capacity. Basically, Garmin cluelessly took the Opencaching name, in use since 2005, and conceived of way back in 2003, and put .com on the end of it, all while the original opencaching sites had country specific domains such as .de, .uk. pl. .us etc.... Had I been webmaster in December 2010, I may have hired a lawyer, and they would have gotten a cease and desist order on using that name. And let me tell you, the guy who closed both of my real estate transactions makes most of his money as an attack dog defense lawyer. But alas, I was only a regular (pissed off) user back then.

[Mr.Yuck]

I don't know about a mascot, but I just came up with a great slogan: OpenCaching - Founded by some guy named Hank.

(Some guy who identified himself only as "Hank" in his forums bought opencaching.com in 2003, and we have been unable to contact him. Opencaching.de launched in 2005. In the source code of SEVERAL files on this website, there are comment lines indicating he wrote them in 2004 and 2005)

[DudleyGrunt]

I suddenly thought of "Hank the Hamster", but hamsters have been used by both Groundspeak and Munzee and I think they're a little played out. What about Hank the Hawk? We cold make him a Red-Tailed Hawk, since they are exclusive to North American bird and the most common hawk in North America. And hawks can out a hamster, not that we'd encourage that.

[Mr.Yuck]

I suddenly thought of "Hank the Hamster", but hamsters have been used by both Groundspeak and Munzee and I think they're a little played out. What about Hank the Hawk? We cold make him a Red-Tailed Hawk, since they are exclusive to North American bird and the most common hawk in North America. And hawks can out a hamster, not that we'd encourage that.

Hank the Hawk. I absolutely freaking love it, I say we do it!! Let me get the Pathtag finalized, and I'll see if she wants to do it.

Should we ask in the .eu forums if anyone would be offended if we had a mascot? You never know, there might be European Opencachers out there who think that would be "commericalization".

[Mr.Yuck]

By the way, excerpt from the source code of register.php, just for an example:
(P.S. don't click that forum link, it's been dead since 2005).

<?php
/***************************************************************************
./register.php
-------------------
begin : Mon June 14 2004
copyright : (C) 2004 The OpenCaching Group
forum contact at : http://www.opencaching.com/phpBB2

***************************************************************************/

/***************************************************************************
*
* This program is free software; you can redistribute it and/or modify
* it under the terms of the GNU General Public License as published by
* the Free Software Foundation; either version 2 of the License, or
* (at your option) any later version.
*
***************************************************************************/

/****************************************************************************