Gratuitous ribbons for proposed achievement

I would (and you could) like to create this place as a workshop to propose certain gratuitous ribbons to become real achievements. The criteria are, of course, the same as for real achievements.

• The gratuitous ribbon should have been claimed by several people in the past, proving that it is interesting.
• The achievement should be generic enough to be achievable for any geohasher worldwide.
• The achievement proposal should include well-defined criteria.
• The achievement should further the spirit of geohashing. (All that is good, geeky, amazingly random or randomly amazing).
• ...

This page may be considered as a first stage to see if other people agree on ribbons becoming achievements, without having to create a proposed achievement page for every single one. They may, of course, evolve later on on their own pages, before actually becoming achievements.

Feel free to add new achievements to this list, or express your support and doubts.

Democracy achievement (and consolation prize)

This is a proposal made on 2009-09-28. Please leave comments and suggestions below, indicating your thoughts on the proposal, including:

• Support - you think this proposal should be added with zero or minor changes
• Do not oppose - you think it's boring/meh/not for you, but it wouldn't harm to have it created
• Oppose - you have a specific reason as to why this ribbon should not exist (state this reasoning in your comment)
• Needs work - you think the achievement should be created after more significant changes have been made

See Proposed achievements for more information on this process.

Ribbon

Zb and Baerenfell earned the Democracy Geohash Achievement by going voting on the way to the (47, 10) geohash on 2009-06-07.

Definition

• The geohasher must have cast a vote on the day of the expedition
• The geohasher doesn't need to have reached the hash point, but shown significant effort towards reaching it.
• The vote must require physical presence (letter or e-voting on the same day just doesn't cut it)
• The vote must be of significant political importance (well, as far as that usually goes. But that's usually the kind of vote requiring physical presence among the other criteria for a free and democratic vote.)
• Proof: No picture of the voting ballot. :P Pictures of the voting booth are welcome.

Support

• support - I would like to encourage people to use their citizen rights. It's a physical achievement. And all the problems involved in voting, fairness and possible manipulation will appeal to any security/mathematics/sociology geek out there. -- relet 15:13, 28 September 2009 (UTC)
• support - Koepfel _talk 19:09, 28 September 2009 (UTC)
• support I like the idea of encouraging people to go both voting and geohashing! --HiroProtagonist 13:30, 9 October 2009 (UTC)
• Needs work I don't want to see letter voting banned (see below) --Ekorren 20:27, 17 October 2009 (UTC)
• Support - I'm in favor of things that encourage people to get out and vote. I won't try and say anyone here has done it, but maybe getting an achievement if they can combine it with geohashing would get people to vote who would otherwise claim 'my vote doesn't matter that much' or 'it's too much trouble' and not vote. -- turbomagnus 10:20, 4 February 2011 (EST)
• support - A good way to encourage voting. -Haberdasher 18:06, 11 April 2012 (EDT)

Elaborate comments

• There is also the consolation prize for people who did not go hashing, because they thought voting was more important. I would like to include this on the achievement page as well. I just don't think that consolation prizes need the same conflict-free, elaborate approval process as achievements do. ;) -- relet 15:13, 28 September 2009 (UTC)
• An alternative would be to "arrange" for the hashpoint on that day to be in a voting station... SteveL 18:04, 1 October 2009 (UTC)
• I remember that, in order to go to the Eibsee expedition (on the Sunday of the European parliament election) without forfeiting my vote, I (and ekorren and dawidi, too) raced to the town hall on Friday shortly before they closed to get papers for letter voting. I'd like to include something like that as valid for future democracy ribbons. - Danatar 08:39, 4 October 2009 (UTC)
• I'm with Danatar here. The achievement here is making it possible to do both voting and hashing although they might get in each others way (time-wise, at least); no matter how this was accomplished. Letter voting past hash o'clock on friday requires physical presence as well, btw. You can't send them in any more at that time but have to run to the town hall to get the papers, and another time to hand them in. Apart from that, I think a gratuitous ribbon is sufficient. So: Needs work for now, may be changed to do not oppose depending how it turns out. --Ekorren 08:57, 4 October 2009 (UTC)

• I will leave the proposal as it is for now. I do not see how you could include other forms of voting (if you accept letter voting, then e-voting is just as acceptable) into this proposal without losing any time constraint. And (this being my personal opinion) I do not wish to encourage letter voting. -- relet 20:41, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

• There's the point: I don't see a reason to add an entirely artificial time constraint. IMHO the actual achievement/challenge is to combine both if they could get into each others way, no matter how this is achieved. --Ekorren 20:47, 17 October 2009 (UTC)

• Even though it would preclude me from getting this achievement, I would seek to make letter/e-voting not be a part of it. Here in Oregon, there is no on-day voting, you must vote through letter ballot. --aperfectring 23:40, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

I like the time constraint part of it, even though I'd be excluded too, at least this year (won't be in the US in November). I like the achievement as proposed, including the exclusion of letter votes. -Haberdasher 18:06, 11 April 2012 (EDT)

• I (still ;) ) support this and I agree its okay to exclude letter voting, because then the definition will get more complicated. I like the achievement because voting is important and the letter-voters can still get a gratuitous ribbon for that. (include a hint to that in the description maybe) --HiroProtagonist 21:43, 31 January 2010 (UTC)

• We need to define "significant effort" somehow. We really should make a general definition of it somewhere, but just having "significant effort" in the requirements without definition tends to make it very tenuous how this would be assigned. I don't think this is enough to prevent it from becoming an achievement. I still think letter ballots should be excluded, because including them makes the achievement very hard to define. --aperfectring 16:04, 27 September 2011 (EDT)

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Celebrity achievement

This is a proposal made on 2009-09-29. Please leave comments and suggestions below, indicating your thoughts on the proposal, including:

• Support - you think this proposal should be added with zero or minor changes
• Do not oppose - you think it's boring/meh/not for you, but it wouldn't harm to have it created
• Oppose - you have a specific reason as to why this ribbon should not exist (state this reasoning in your comment)
• Needs work - you think the achievement should be created after more significant changes have been made

See Proposed achievements for more information on this process.

Ribbon

Yerushalmi and his wife earned the Celebrity Geohash achievement by meeting a guy in a monkey suit on the way to the (31, 34) geohash on 2009-08-16.

Definition

• The geohasher must have met a celebrity on the way to or from the hashpoint
• The celebrity in question must meet a certain minimum definition of fame (I'm open to suggestions of how to define it. Perhaps a page on Wikipedia about them? That might be too broad. Though it would neatly cover the "who gives a damn about movie stars, I want to meet Cory Doctorow" attitude most of us share.)
• The amount of contact needs to be defined as well. Is it enough if you spot them through a crowd? Say hi? Shake hands? I'd assume "going to a concert before going to the hashpoint" shouldn't count.

Support

• Needs work - I wouldn't want to support it until there is a clear definition of celebrity. -- relet 15:56, 17 October 2009 (UTC)
• Needs work for the same reason - missing useful definition. Tendency to oppose because earlier discussions on IRC showed that it will be very difficult, if not impossible, to find a satisfying definition. --Ekorren 20:25, 17 October 2009 (UTC)
• Needs work about the definition of a celebrity. DNO if we are able to nail down the definition, see comments below. --aperfectring 23:45, 2 November 2009 (UTC)
• Needs work - I see two flaws that would need addressing; one, the aforementioned definition of a celebrity; and two, location, certain cities and areas are known for the celebrities that live or work there (Hollywood, for example), so geohashers in those areas would have a distinct advantage towards claiming this achievement. -- turbomagnus 10:28, 4 February 2011 (EST)
• 'Oppose - it's a cute gratuitous ribbon, but I agree that defining it and proving it would be too difficult, and the odds are quite slim anyhow. -Haberdasher 18:06, 11 April 2012 (EDT)

Elaborate comments

• After claiming the gratuitous ribbon for my particular case, that provided the inspiration for proposing an actual achievement for it. My claiming it was deliberately tongue-in-cheek, because it was a guy in a stuffed animal suit (not unlike meeting a guy in a Mickey Mouse suit); I'll change it to Radio Yerevan or something if the achievement gets approved. The achievement obviously needs a lot of work, though, in order to come up with a good and objective definition (I do hope people make an effort to do so before rejecting it on that basis!) Yerushalmi 08:37, 29 September 2009 (UTC)

• It is all great and good to meet someone who is a "celebrity", but how would we provide proof? I personally don't like to interrupt people's day-to-day for my own stupid stuff. You would have to ask the celebrity for a picture or autograph, in order to be able to provide the proof. Chances are, if you are headed to a hashpoint, you aren't also going to someplace which would have a celebrity providing photo ops or signatures, so I would see this as an intrusion on the celebrity's privacy. Yes, they probably get it all the time, but that doesn't mean that I am going to do it, or that I would encourage others to do so. If you are on the way to a hashpoint where a celebrity is providing photo ops or signatures, then I would say count yourself lucky and take the gratuitous ribbon. --aperfectring 23:51, 2 November 2009 (UTC)

• Proof: The geohasher should get the celebrity to sign the printed geohash coordinates/map/notes for the day. Celebrity: What would the problem with requiring a wikipedia page be? There are other achievments (e.g. "named by other than geohashers or those influenced by geohashers" on A Tale of Two Hashes) where there are restrictions on the topic of the ribbon. So the wikipedia page should not be initiated by the geohashers and the geohashers should not be associated with the celebrity. It'd be quite unfair if you work for one. --DavidSchmitt 2009-11-25

• It'd be awkward for me. I'm a minor figure in the transgender rights movement, there's a wiki page about me. Anniepoo 2011-09-20

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Rubik's Cube Achievement

This is a proposal made on 2009-11-26. Please leave comments and suggestions below, indicating your thoughts on the proposal, including:

• Support - you think this proposal should be added with zero or minor changes
• Do not oppose - you think it's boring/meh/not for you, but it wouldn't harm to have it created
• Oppose - you have a specific reason as to why this ribbon should not exist (state this reasoning in your comment)
• Needs work - you think the achievement should be created after more significant changes have been made

See Proposed achievements for more information on this process.

Ribbon

Sermoa earned the Rubik's Achievement by solving a Rubik's cube at the (50, -1) geohash on 2009-06-28.

Definition

• The geohasher must solve a Rubik's cube at the geohash point.
• Proof should ideally consist of a before and after shot of the cube, and some indication that they were taken in that order.

Support

• Support - Good clean Geohashing-geeky-classic fun! Thepiguy 20:34, 26 November 2009 (UTC)
• Needs work - I don't find a single, particular puzzle to be achievement-worthy enough.. but maybe we could make this a challenge. The first claimant must solve a rubik's cube and a second puzzle of his choice. This second puzzle becomes the challenge for the next claimant. And so on. -- relet 01:55, 13 December 2009 (UTC)
  • I don't think this would work well, because there are few puzzles as widely known as the Rubik's cube. DNO the original idea. --HiroProtagonist 21:45, 31 January 2010 (UTC)
  • I don't think this would work well either, but I agree that a single puzzle isn't enough. I haven't solved a Rubiks Cube myself, but I suppose it is trivial once you "get it". Solving one for the first time at a hashpoint (maybe frozen and/or underwater) would be more impressive, yet impossible to verify. --The ru 15:37, 2 February 2010 (UTC)
    • Perhaps timing could be involved, to prevent this becoming trivial? And i don't mean this as "get into the top 3 worldwide", but beat your own previous best time! ;-)
    • As for other puzzles, i can't think of any that's as ubiquitous as "the world's top-selling puzzle game"... Maybe any kind of assembly puzzle would do, but what are the chances of such a puzzle being available? -- CrystyB 04:09, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
      • You might just find one along the way :P -> File:2009-09-22_48_8_Puzzle.jpg (the challenge is to make a T out of these parts. For size comparison: The photo covers about 2 m²) --Ekorren 11:46, 3 February 2010 (UTC)

• Oppose because it's offtopic and I don't see how it makes the expedition more interesting or challenging. Those who currently are into that puzzle will claim the achievement, those who aren't will just ignore it (or, if they are achievement completionists, call it an annoyance). It won't ever get someone to do an expedition that would have been skipped otherwise, it is not about the location, not about travelling, and not about meetups. A gratuitous ribbon is fine for that, if you want one, but I wouldn't call it an achievement. --Ekorren 11:46, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
  • You're mostly right, but the "more interesting" part is subjective (some people do have fun with a Rubik's), and maybe there's a 0.1% chance of someone going on an expedition if they see someone else planning to get this achievement, on the idea of asking for pointers and/or being taught and/or exchanging solving techniques... -- CrystyB 14:43, 3 February 2010 (UTC)
    • I don't doubt that people have fun with a Rubik's, but I do not think it adds experience or fun to the expedition. Rather it does the opposite: It keeps you from exploring the location. The other part of your argument applies to basically everything you could ever do anywhere just the same. --Ekorren 11:58, 5 February 2010 (UTC)

• Needs Work - Perhaps a record, fastest solve at at a hash? The biggest problem I see is that it would be hard to prove that it is a legitimate solve. Eylrid 20:04, 11 February 2010 (UTC)

• Oppose - This is just another "thing to do at a hashpoint". There is nothing in my mind which separates this from playing a game of hopscotch at the hashpoint, or sending someone an e-mail. This itself has nothing to do with geohashing. By all means, if you want to, solve a Rubik's cube (or similar cube puzzle), and post pictures/videos of it! Have fun at the hashpoint, that's kinda the whole point. However, we shouldn't have achievements for doing fun things at the hashpoint unless they directly add to the social aspect of geohashing (i.e. spreading the idea), or change the way the geohash is reached. --aperfectring 16:14, 27 September 2011 (EDT)