Suspicious notes and users

Annie_in_exile · Post by **Annie_in_exile** » Wed Apr 16, 2003 8:14 am

Gauss wrote:Depending on the definition this does not necessarily qualify for a real hit (because they knew each other) but it is "natural and geographic circulation of currency" as defined by WheresGeorge.com, and as we all know, the whole idea of currency tracking comes originally from there.

I don't normally comment this sort of topic, but here I disagree. What makes it natural, if two eurobilltrackers exchange notes, knowing that both have or will register them in the system? And what comes to Where's George, I've understood so far that the Eurobilltracker rules are stricter in this sense, and several other hits have been moderated for the same reason. I just can't see what makes this case different, sorry.

Gauss · Post by **Gauss** » Wed Apr 16, 2003 10:57 am

Annie_in_exile wrote:I don't normally comment this sort of topic,

I'm glad you did.

Annie_in_exile wrote: but here I disagree. What makes it natural, if two eurobilltrackers exchange notes, knowing that both have or will register them in the system? And what comes to Where's George, I've understood so far that the Eurobilltracker rules are stricter in this sense, and several other hits have been moderated for the same reason. I just can't see what makes this case different, sorry.

Yes, EBT is stricter in this sense (maybe Where's George used to be stricter in its early days; now with several thousand hits daily no single person could check each hit). I essentially support this policy but there are some points which cause some concern to me. First and foremost, there is no fixed moderation policy - there were quite a lot discussions on that topic and some people got upset for various reasons. Since EBT is about fun and not about getting upset this state seems somewhat unsatisfactory. When choosing between losing users and accepting questionable hits I would opt for the latter.
Since WG is for obvious reasons less well known to most users I wanted to bring up the guideline of "natural and geographic circulation of currency" which is the key statement of the purpose of tracking. It's still fairly vague but something to start with.
Simple exchanging of bills is not covered by this. Paying financial debts is however what money circulation is about and, at least using this concept, paying debts between users with registered bills does not create a fake hit. Whether it is deemed "interesting" is a different question - but I found that quite a few users are not happy with that expression, too. Emmem uses in the EBT logs the term "OK hits", some other words have been proposed in this forum.
In any case, I felt that these hits are questionable but - considering the given comment - generally acceptable. And again, I'd advise to rather not moderate when in doubt.

Annie_in_exile · Post by **Annie_in_exile** » Sat Apr 19, 2003 7:20 pm

Thank you, Gauss. That was very well put and I do understand your point.... but call me stubborn or whatever, I still disagree on this particular case. I don't understand what difference this "owing money to somebody" makes. If I was to pay my debts to another EBT user, I would withdraw some "clean" money from an ATM or had those notes been entered already, I'd ask my acquaintance not to register them. But on the other hand, I'm a hopeless idealist and am used to disappointments

Here's a quote from Where's George guidelines. The third and last sentences are relevant when trying to make spontaneous hits (has that term been used before?)

"The purpose of Where's George? is to track the natural and geographic circulation of currency. This means that any bills you enter should be spent by you in the normal course of everyday life. Giving bills to friends, relatives and/or associates for the purpose of re-entry into the website violates the whole premise of Where's George?. After you enter any bills, just enter them into natural circulation by spending them as you would any other bills. Sending bills via US mail or any transportation methods to people in other locales does not constitute natural and geographic circulation. In general, the Where's George? definition of natural and geographic circulation is spending your cash in the course of any normal transaction with any unknown person/entity."

Gauss · Post by **Gauss** » Tue Apr 22, 2003 7:27 pm

Annie_in_exile wrote:Thank you, Gauss. That was very well put and I do understand your point.... but call me stubborn or whatever, I still disagree on this particular case.
[...]

You are right.
This is a short comment, but there is nothing I can say against that (and nothing that needs to be added in my opinion).

Annie_in_exile wrote:But on the other hand, I'm a hopeless idealist

Except for this: It's good to be an idealist, but already the fact that I need usually seven attempts with three different browsers (none of them being the Explorer) to log myself in - getting a vast variety of error messages - prevents me from being idealistic with regard to EBT.

Fons · Post by **Fons** » Tue Apr 22, 2003 9:04 pm

These two users: Vee and anmi hit each other very often, sometimes I think it's suspicious because it every time in (only) 10 days with a hugh distance (1639 km.) from Belgium to Finland
This is the newest hit between them (http://www.eurobilltracker.eu/index.php ... 61ca177438)

What do you think of it?

Fons.

Annie_in_exile · Post by **Annie_in_exile** » Fri Apr 25, 2003 2:15 pm

Fons wrote:These two users: Vee and anmi hit each other very often, sometimes I think it's suspicious because it every time in (only) 10 days with a hugh distance (1639 km.) from Belgium to Finland
This is the newest hit between them (http://www.eurobilltracker.eu/index.php ... 61ca177438)

What do you think of it?

Fons.

First of all I must say that I admire your energy and relentless hunt for fakes! Then some comments: you wrote "sometimes I think it is suspicious." That's a very kind way to say it. Don't you think so all the time?

Have you noticed that no matter where in Belgium Vee registers the notes (Brussels/Tervueren) and even on different days, they still mysteriously end up with Anmi in Finland. And vice versa, Anmi puts in a new note and *poof* it re-appears in Belgium and ends up with who else but Vee?

***
And a comment to poor Gauss as well: you must be an idealist or an optimist after all, if you keep trying despite all those errors... knowing that the future is brighter and one day you'll be able to sign in on your first trial.

Olivier · Post by **Olivier** » Sat May 10, 2003 9:25 pm

Antti, do you know what happened with this bill of yours... ?

King of rannikkosaari 2003-05-10 19:32:54 Miami 33462
Antti. 2003-05-09 18:32:40 Turku 20250

EuroBillTracker · Post by **EuroBillTracker** » Sun May 11, 2003 9:57 am

Gauss wrote: Except for this: It's good to be an idealist, but already the fact that I need usually seven attempts with three different browsers (none of them being the Explorer) to log myself in - getting a vast variety of error messages - prevents me from being idealistic with regard to EBT.

Have trust in Mankind...

Hang in there just a little longer... excellent news to come up soon

Antti · Post by **Antti** » Mon May 12, 2003 3:07 pm

Olivier wrote:Antti, do you know what happened with this bill of yours... ?

King of rannikkosaari 2003-05-10 19:32:54 Miami 33462
Antti. 2003-05-09 18:32:40 Turku 20250

Well it looks very weird but it has an explanation. We know eachtoher, I referred him to EBT and he entered a couple of notes last fall. Then he went inactive for months. And then he suddendly decided to become active again when he had some notes I had given him. (I gave him two notes of 10€ but after this hit he realised what was happening and he didn't enter the other one.)
And about the huge distance in short time: well, forstly the time is longer but there was the time I couldn't log on to EBT.
And secondly and more importantly He just likes entering his notes as if he was in Florida although he is in Finland, he spends some weeks in Florida every year

Gauss · Post by **Gauss** » Tue May 13, 2003 4:54 pm

Antti wrote:Well it looks very weird but it has an explanation. We know eachtoher, I referred him to EBT and he entered a couple of notes last fall. [...]
And secondly and more importantly He just likes entering his notes as if he was in Florida although he is in Finland, he spends some weeks in Florida every year

In this case you should point out to him that this is a clear violation of the EBT rules. Faking the place where the note was received makes it, strictly speaking, a fake entry. Therefore I feel that this hit needs to be considered for moderation.
Discussion? Here's the link.

BogPoet · Post by **BogPoet** » Tue May 13, 2003 7:37 pm

Gauss wrote:
Antti wrote:Well it looks very weird but it has an explanation. We know eachtoher, I referred him to EBT and he entered a couple of notes last fall. [...]
And secondly and more importantly He just likes entering his notes as if he was in Florida although he is in Finland, he spends some weeks in Florida every year
In this case you should point out to him that this is a clear violation of the EBT rules. Faking the place where the note was received makes it, strictly speaking, a fake entry. Therefore I feel that this hit needs to be considered for moderation.
Discussion? Here's the link.

I fully support the moderation of the hit. I think Antti already admitted it was an error. As for the Florida/Finland thing, I also think he should be persuaded to insert notes where he is. I believe the purpose of the site is to know where notes travel to, not where it would be nice that they'd be. It would also be fun if the €5 bill I just entered appeared in Taiwan or, say, Burkina Faso, but it's just not that way. It's in my wallet, in Lisboa. If I were to get a hit with Antti's friend and I had entered the note as if I was one of those countries, everyone would believe it had travelled all the way from Asia or Africa to the USA, when, in fact, it would have travelled from Lisboa to Helsinki... Maybe it wouldn't be so serious as entering consecutive serials (after all, it would be a legitimate hit), but all its info would be false...

Antti, tell him to enter notes in Miami only when he is there, please

Fons · Post by **Fons** » Tue May 13, 2003 8:50 pm

Yes I also support to moderate that hit, but like Antti already said: 'About the short time-difference: 'I couldn't enter the note because we couldn't log in'
That's way I also put the date in the comment section when I can not enter the note the same day when I get the note, when we can't login, so if this happends with a normal hit with a big distance than you can see the date when a person got it if it's twice entered after some days we couldn't login.
So the second person got the note later than the first person but at the real entering date it isn't to see so without the date in the comment, than people don't think it's fake.

So what I want to say: 'When the site is down and can't login, put the date in the comment section if you spend the bill before we can login again!

BogPoet · Post by **BogPoet** » Tue May 13, 2003 9:29 pm

Fons wrote: So what I want to say: 'When the site is down and can't login, put the date in the comment section if you spend the bill before we can login again!'

Wise words from Fons! No, really, that's a great idea, considering all the infamous login problems that regularly plague the site... It's a pity we can't edit the date for the bills' record... On the other hand, that would make cheaters' lives a lot easier

Fons · Post by **Fons** » Tue May 13, 2003 10:18 pm

BogPoet wrote:
Wise words from Fons! No, really, that's a great idea, considering all the infamous login problems that regularly plague the site... It's a pity we can't edit the date for the bills' record

I put the date in the comment sections with my notes at days we couldn't login.

BogPoet wrote: ... On the other hand, that would make cheaters' lives a lot easier

Yes, but cheaters don't think of dates in a comment section, they only think of how many notes they can enter fake.

Antti · Post by **Antti** » Wed May 14, 2003 8:08 pm

Gosh, my 'hit' caused a lot of talk
I agree with the moderation, it's very fake and artificial, incorrect location and a user giving notes to another user (I can only say for myself I didn't know he was going to enter it)
I'll talk to him about this tomorrow. He isn't actually the type to follow all rules and regulations strictly but I think I'll be able to make him get my point
And yes I should have included the date in the comment