Ryan,

Thought I'd leave you a question so you'll have something to read when you return from your holiday travels. :-)

Does AQ support joint placements? What if letterboxers with separate accounts plant a box together - is there any way for them both to be considered the box author without each entering the box separately (and leading to finders logging the box entered by one person only, not realizing it's actually listed on AQ twice)?

Two of my own boxes and four of my HHs are joint placements and also double-posted at AQ, which is why I've been wondering if there was a way to merge the finds that have already been logged by other AQ members while also allowing both authors to be listed. I'm mulling over some future collaborations and it would be useful to be able to list the box just once and credit all the box placers, allowing the box to show up in each author's separate logbook as well.

Thanks!

No, right now AQ doesn't support joint placements, though I have pondered the idea of adding them in the future.

But here's a question back to everyone at large: Is just one co-author enough? What happens if three people with accounts plant a box? Should AQ support such a scenario? IS there such a scenario already? What's the maximum number of joint efforts that AQ should support?

It would be a heck of a lot easier to support one extra person than an unknown number of co-planters, but thinking ahead, I fear if I do that, someone will say, "Hey, Ryan! There's three of us here who planted a box and we were wondering...."

Where does the madness end? =)

But if nobody has a box authored by more than two people, and nobody ever intends to do a joint planting with more than two accounts involved, I may take my chances and support just one additional co-planter.

-- Ryan

I'll chime in with my own experience. If you're creating a series that has multiple placers or "creators" if you will of boxes, then I think the person nominated to physically "place" the box is the "author" and gives credit to the additional "creators" in the clue itself. That has been my practice.

Our recent skipping christmas series was created by Phyto and Isosceles, but I took ownership of placing and maintaining and writing the clues for this series. I think it really depends if the box(es) were placed jointly.

Seems like a small point to me, but perhaps if you're really a stickler for those "p's" then it might be needed. Otherwise, I would just leave it up to the discretion of the clue maintainer.

-phyto

OK, my situation is a little different than others, but I will add my $.02. I homeschool my son and am using Letterboxing as a project in his schooling. Since we only have one (missing) box in less than an hour of our area, we will be the ones to begin the major groundwork here. I am personally hiding several for him to find (I will do the driving but he will do all of the solving) and I will obviously be the Planter. Later, as part of his study, he will compose the clues and hide but I will drive him to the location. In that case, he will be the Planter. My opinion is that whoever does the most work should get Planting credit... for instance, if one person carves and composes and the other just helps to compose, then the one that does the majority gets credit. Quite honestly, I don't think it will be THAT often where the work is split completely evenly between the team. I know it will happen, but how often? In those few cases, just split the Ps down the middle.

Seems like a small point to me, but perhaps if you're really a stickler for those "p's" then it might be needed. Otherwise, I would just leave it up to the discretion of the clue maintainer.

-phyto

Ryan,
I agree with Phyto on this. Why worry about trying to set up a system to record multiple placers. When folks get to a point of 100+ places then I believe they really don't worry about their count. I think the experience of sharing a series out weighs figuring out how it counts. For example: the letterbox we included in your Valley of Fire series we do not include in our letterboxes. The directions are part of your clue series and thats just fine and dandy for us.
The letterbox we share with Amanda at Nojoque Falls was set up with some rather weird and unique happenings, but the way it worked out was pretty cool.

Don

Quote

perhaps if you're really a stickler for those "p's" then it might be needed.

Hey, Phyto, weren't you the person who said they kept their hitchhikers as regular boxes so it would still count towards your P-ness? ;o)

I'll have to admit, when I first created AQ, I didn't really much care about PFX counts. I'm not even sure I could tell you how many finds I have to the closest hundred! As a result, AQ is definitely not well suited for tracking various counts. But there's a lot of people out there who want such numbers, and I'd like to appease them! So I definitely want to support the ability to have co-creators. I'm just trying to figure out the best way to design and implement such a feature.

-- Ryan

Ryan,
Seeing the latest posts on "My Page" is really cool. I don't have to go bouncing all over the place.
Thanks.
Don

<<sighing>> wishing this computer illiterate could get this
'cut and paste' thing down.

Anyway, my idea for those who plant boxes jointly:

If you letterbox together often, why not set up a page together as a group?
My two friends at work (Letter Bug and Berry Artistic) got me into letterboxing. We've gone out hunting together. And we'll sign into the log book as "The Elf Trio strikes again"

If we ever decided to make a box together, we could possibly set up a page for 'The Elf Trio' (What cha think?)

I love to carve. Letter Bug has problems in that area. But her clue writing is excellent. And I'm pretty bad at scouting sites.

There just might be a little Christmas Elf box out there some day.
~~The Orlando Knit Wit ...of the Elf Trio

I'm late chiming in on this BUT here's how we solved this problem. Pupp and I do a lot of joint projects. We have 3 or 4 series out now that we each carved pieces of the series or she carved the stamps but I did the log books, etc. Those we both go out and plant together and we write the clues together. All of these we list under a team name. That way people know it's both of us.

Maiden