The Geocachers' Creed

When placing or seeking geocaches, I will: Not endanger myself or others (examples) Observe all laws & rules of the area (examples) Respect property rights and seek permission where appropriate (examples) Avoid causing disruptions or public alarm (examples) Minimize my and others' impact on the environment (examples) Be considerate of others (examples) Protect the integrity of the game pieces (examples)

Help Raise Awareness of the Geocachers' Creed!  Free downloads (brochure,  signature cards, etc.) are available on the Resources page.

The Geocachers' Creed is a voluntary set of guidelines that describes how geocachers in general act.  It is not affiliated with any organization or listing site.  See How the Creed was Developed

The Geocachers' Creed is designed to help orient new players to the ethos of the geocaching community and to guide experienced players in questionable situations, so that everyone can enjoy geocaching!

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Above the grey line, is an excerpt from the Geocachers' Creed website, the entire contents of which can be viewed at www.geocreed.info. The "examples" and other links do work, but they take you to the actual geocreed.info site, opened in a new window. Please do read the bulleted examples for each of the seven "tenets", as they're called; they are very important (although not part of the Creed itself), just too long to reproduce here in this post.

Two weeks ago, we did threaten to do a blog post on "another thing in the public domain hammered out by the community in Geocaching forums", and so we are! The Geocachers' Creed was developed by the community in much the same way as the public domain Geocaching logo. The development of the Creed is very well documented, which you can see by clicking on the "how the creed was developed" link in the table above, or here. We will hit the major points on that page, and we have some quotes from a couple of "big names" in Geocachers' Creedom, if you will. This blog post will concentrate more on the history of the Creed, and it's "keepers", rather than commentary on, or explanation of it's seven tenets.

It has been said the need for the Creed arose over concerns that Geocaching could be banned in some locations, due to the actions of a small number of careless people. There were actually three separate forum threads in 2004 dedicated to the development of the Creed, the Original content development thread, the distribution discussion thread and the second content development thread. It was decided that the Creed should be voluntary, and it's name was even changed from the Geocachers' Code to the Geocachers' Creed to better reflect that is is meant to be voluntary, rather than mandatory. 

Note in the excerpt above that the Creed is not affiliated with any Organization or listing service. We at the blog talked to Bob of Kai Team, one of the driving forces in the development of the Creed, who said  "We had offers from and considered hosting the Creed on a couple of geocaching related websites (not geocaching.com), but because of controversy and competition between various listing sites at the time, we decided not to pursue those offers - we wanted the Creed to remain site neutral." Bob is actually the original domain name owner of Geocreed.info, and the Creative Commons License. but he was sure to add "it was always a team effort, and I saw myself as a facilitator of a group effort and not the owner of the Creed." He also went on to say "one of the great things about the Creed is that it has always been a voluntary, group effort, independent of any cache listing site or vested interest other than people who like to geocache." 

After publication, The Geocachers' Creed online was originally discretely hosted on the webspace of a Geocacher's personal business site (Bob, all these years later, doesn't remember exactly who this Geocacher was). After a while, the Creed needed to be moved from that space, and another "driving force" in it's development stepped up to host it online; Geocaching.com username Coyote Red (whom we did not contact for this post). He and his wife were the owners of one of the first online Geocaching retailers, The Sissy-n-CR store with CR standing for Coyote Red. Their specialty was Geocaching container stencils, the blogger himself remembers buying some around 2005. You may notice, if you click on that link, that the Sissy-n-CR store is no longer open. It was closed in late 2012. 

The owner of another rather well-known online Geocaching retailer, Lisa from Cache Advance, noticed the website for the Creed wasn't working any longer. She contacted Coyote Red and Kai Team, asking if there was anything she could do to help, and she said: "CoyoteRed asked me: “What do YOU get from the creed?  How do you see it used as a guide?” My response was: “I followed the progress of the creed online, and agree with it. I've been caching since 2002, and I've been teaching it and in the business of  caching   for almost as long. It was the creed that inspired my first product, Dr. B's Geocaching Repair Kit: “Make minor repairs if you can, it will save the owner a trip”. We are in the process of redesigning the Repair Kit (caching has changed a lot in the last 7 years) and that is what led me to notice that the creed was unavailable online. We also include a card with the creed on it (and link) in our Dr. B's Newbie Kit and have sold thousands of these in the past few years (the creed is printed on the opposite side of the decryption key). We are also corporate partners with Leave No Trace."

Obviously CR and Kai Team had no problem with credentials like that, and in January, 2013, Lisa began hosting the Geocreed.info domain on the webspace for her business Cache-Advance. The domain name was transferred to her, and she also bought http://www.geocreed.com (go ahead and try it, it works). She went on to add: "I am, however, a geocacher first, and my top priority is the fun and continuation of the game. I believe that the 7 parts of the creed are the best way to keep the game fun, safe, and to minimize its impact. It is so easy in the excitement of the game to hide or seek a cache that could be questionable or troublesome in some way. One person's bad judgment can lead to someone getting hurt or the game actually being shut down; either banned in an area or worse. If cachers would take the 7 parts into consideration (think beyond their own excitement of the hide or find), caching can continue to grow wisely, all can have fun, and the game will coexist peacefully with the world at large. I hope that can give you some insight on how I use and feel about the creed. I and Cache Advance would like to do what we can to keep it alive and accessible.”

We appreciate both Bob from Kai Team, and Lisa from Cache Advance taking the time to talk about the Geocachers' Creed! Please take some time to familiarize yourself with it, if you're not already. The creed, examples, and the entire website are very well written. There was an English teacher or two involved in writing that up, I'm sure! Please also remember there are the seven basic tenets, and the examples are just that, and if something is not spelled out specifically, consider the intents expressed in the tenets before making a decision.