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  1. What’s the difference between the planters, owner, contacts, carvers and foster parents of a letterbox?
  2. How do you adopt a letterbox once you have the owner's permission?
  3. Should I contact the owner of a hitchhiker directly?
  4. What is the difference between a "Planter" and an "Owner"?

What’s the difference between the planters, owner, contacts, carvers and foster parents of a letterbox?

Find reports will go to everyone associated with the letterbox except the carvers, including the person who listed the letterbox if they are not already listed as the planter, owner or contact.

Only the planters receive credit for a plant. Some people like to count any letterbox they've carved the stamp for as a plant, but Atlas Quest does not for two reasons: (1) A hand-carved stamp is optional and it seems odd to get credit for planting a letterbox for a feature that's optional, and (2) if you later find the letterbox with your stamp, you can still record it as an official find. If you were getting credit for the box as a plant, you would not also be able to claim credit for it as a find.

Likewise, as much as we appreciate those who've adopted and maintain a letterbox, those are adopted letterboxes and do not count towards your P-count. However, they may count towards your F-count if you went out and found the box yourself.

The owner of a letterbox may change, sometimes quite often, and ownership can be revoked or transferred by the listed planter or owner. The carver of a letterbox cannot transfer ownership of the box to someone else—unless, of course, they are also a planter or owner.

Finally, there is a ‘secret’ piece of information included with every letterbox listing—the person who originally listed the box in the first place. Their name won't show up anywhere on the listing; it was originally designed to find people who list letterboxes without permission. However, if they have received permission to list the boxes, it also assumes you have permission to edit the boxes as necessary, and therefore the original lister of the box can also edit the boxes. Anyone designated as the owner or planter can edit clues, but not someone listed as a carver, contact or foster parent.

If the carver, planter, or owner do not have accounts on Atlas Quest, leave the appropriate option blank and give credit where credit is due directly in the clues.

Table summary (powers and privileges):
Status Notified of a Find Credit for the Plant Edit the clue Transfer Ownership Expected Use
Owner Yes No Yes Yes The person who maintains the box
Planter Yes Yes Yes Yes The person(s) who physically planted the letterbox
Lister Yes No Yes No The person who listed the box on Atlas Quest
Carver No No Yes/No Yes/No The person who carved the stamp. By default, when a carver is added to a box, he or she is also added as a contact automatically so most carvers will get notifications of finds. Additionally, under normal circumstances, carvers cannot edit a box’s listing, but if the listing becomes abandoned, they will get full admin rights to the box.
Contact Yes No No No People who should be notified whenever a find or attempt is recorded
Foster Parent Yes No No No Someone who volunteers to help maintain the box and update information about the box in the form of an addendum.

How do you adopt a letterbox once you have the owner's permission?

The owner of the letterbox is able to transfer the ownership to you by using the Edit Box option and changing the name of the owner. Only a registered owner or planter can change the owner of the box. The adopter does not need to do anything (and can't do anything) to transfer ownership.

Should I contact the owner of a hitchhiker directly?

Some letterboxers find hitchhikers frustrating because you launch one and never hear from it again. Unlike a traditional letterbox, you can't just revisit the box and check on it. Once it starts moving, the owner has no more idea where it is than anyone else. Because finders don't get a "find" credit for a hitchhiker, they have little motivation to log such finds. And it's often difficult to find where a hitchhiker is listed -- if at all -- leading many finders to just give up and not even bother to try any more. As a result, owners often hear about their hitchhikers only rarely if at all.

If you enjoyed finding a hitchhiker and want to encourage more of them being launched, by all means contact the owner by any means possible. Just drop them a line telling them where you found it.

If you're willing to do more, offer to scan (or digitally photograph) the log book and e-mail the scans/files to the owner. They will usually be most appreciative of such an offer, since they can see for themselves where their hitchhiker has been and see the sig stamps therein -- which are often different than the sig stamps they see in the letterboxes in their vicinity. Remember, though, that you cannot send such scans via AQ-mail since it will not transmit attachments. The owner will have to provide a non-AQ e-mail address for sending the scans/files.

What is the difference between a "Planter" and an "Owner"?

The planter is someone who participated in actually planting a letterbox while the owner is the person responsible for maintaining the letterbox. The planter is usually the owner, but if someone else adopts a box, the owner may be different.

On Atlas Quest, a box can have any number of planters, but all boxes have exactly one and only one owner. In the unusual case that a box has no owner (the person requested that their account be deleted, for instance, so the owner really has no account on AQ), it'll be assigned to the System account, a generic account that nobody monitors.

Planters cannot record a find on their boxes, but the owner can do so if they are not also a planter.