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Boy Scouts Add a New Digital Badge
NY Times ^ | 4/16/2010 | Nick Bilton

Posted on 04/16/2010 2:10:09 PM PDT by Domandred

I wasn’t a very good Boy Scout when I signed-up at 6 years old. It wasn’t that I didn’t have fun traipsing around the woods — instead, I spent most of my time daydreaming about my brand new computer, a 1982 ZX Spectrum.

(Excerpt) Read more at bits.blogs.nytimes.com ...


TOPICS: Miscellaneous
KEYWORDS: boyscouts; geocaching; meritbadge
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I had already integrated geocaching into orientation and compass work for my scouts a few years ago.

Grabbed and scouted some cache locations and made the scouts find them using compass and map work instead of GPS.

They had fun doing it, then showed them how to do some others with GPS.

1 posted on 04/16/2010 2:10:10 PM PDT by Domandred
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To: Domandred
BSA page on new merit badge
2 posted on 04/16/2010 2:10:51 PM PDT by Domandred (Fdisk, format, and reinstall the entire .gov system.)
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To: Domandred
Bah auto excerpt screwed up my manual exerpt. This is the part I wanted to post:

the Boy Scouts of America have figured a way to merge the two worlds of digital and nature with the launch of a new badge for geocaching.

What is geocaching you ask? It’s like a treasure hunt, but instead of an old tea-stained map with a giant red X, geohunters use GPS devices to find hidden containers, or treasure if you’re a Boy Scout.

3 posted on 04/16/2010 2:12:03 PM PDT by Domandred (Fdisk, format, and reinstall the entire .gov system.)
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To: Domandred
Can you build a firewall with just two sticks and some tinder?
4 posted on 04/16/2010 2:13:45 PM PDT by KarlInOhio (Obamacare: The 2010 version of the Intolerable Acts.)
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To: KarlInOhio

lol


5 posted on 04/16/2010 2:14:49 PM PDT by martin_fierro (< |:)~)
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To: Domandred

And I apologize because like many NY Slimes articles it’s inaccurate.

The BSA page is for Geocaching activities, but makes no mention that I could find of any actual new merit badge.


6 posted on 04/16/2010 2:15:03 PM PDT by Domandred (Fdisk, format, and reinstall the entire .gov system.)
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To: Domandred

Would have been more fun back when unencrypted GPS had a deliberate 100-meter random error.


7 posted on 04/16/2010 2:20:32 PM PDT by UnbelievingScumOnTheOtherSide (NEW TAG ====> **REPEAL OR REBEL!** -- Islam Delenda Est! -- Rumble thee forth)
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To: Domandred

Uh, Nick?

I seriously doubt you joined the Boy Scouts at 6 years old...

But what would I expect from a NYT “Journalist”?


8 posted on 04/16/2010 2:24:14 PM PDT by thoolou ("I may have invented it, but Bill made it famous." - David Bradley, inventor of Ctrl-Alt-Del)
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To: SandRat

Scouting Ping SandRat.


9 posted on 04/16/2010 2:26:16 PM PDT by SZonian (We began as a REPUBLIC, a nation of laws. We became a DEMOCRACY, majority rules. Next step is?)
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To: Domandred

GPS is cool, and should be included, but not at the expense of map and compass skills. I agree with your approach. Demonstrate and teach both. EDGE model.

Batteries do die afterall.


10 posted on 04/16/2010 2:28:15 PM PDT by SZonian (We began as a REPUBLIC, a nation of laws. We became a DEMOCRACY, majority rules. Next step is?)
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To: thoolou
I seriously doubt you joined the Boy Scouts at 6 years old...

I noticed that too. He'd have had to join the Tiger Cubs at that age. Even too young for Cub Scouts.

11 posted on 04/16/2010 2:36:16 PM PDT by Bloody Sam Roberts (An armed man is a citizen. An unarmed man is a subject.)
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To: SZonian
And GPS maps can be highly inaccurate.

My hunting area the logging roads that have been there since the 40's don't show on my hand held even at greatest detail. Had to find a third party download for that.

My car GPS wanted me to go over a bridge that had been torn down for a new byway down in Arizona.

Not saying a paper map would have been any better for the car GPS problem, but for my hunting area paper and compass beats the GPS.

A new paper map is a lot cheaper to update than electronic GPS map. Compasses never need updating, though done a lot of replacing of lost ones.

12 posted on 04/16/2010 2:47:43 PM PDT by Domandred (Fdisk, format, and reinstall the entire .gov system.)
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To: Domandred

Agreed. GPS has its place in Orienteering, but I don’t know that I would bet my life on it.

I haven’t made the leap into handhelds yet. The costs are coming down and maps are getting better, but as you noted, there are still some drawbacks to GPS vs. map and compass.


13 posted on 04/16/2010 2:55:06 PM PDT by SZonian (We began as a REPUBLIC, a nation of laws. We became a DEMOCRACY, majority rules. Next step is?)
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To: Domandred

How the hell do you sew on a digital badge?

Just funnin, go Boy Scouts! Ruin to your evil detractors!


14 posted on 04/16/2010 2:56:27 PM PDT by boocoowell (Nuclear power now for crying out loud)
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To: KarlInOhio; Bloody Sam Roberts

“Can you build a firewall with just two sticks and some tinder?”

As the mom of an Eagle Scout and the wife of a computer software engineer, I would like to personally thank you for making me laugh! Great line!


15 posted on 04/16/2010 3:16:54 PM PDT by Mrs. B.S. Roberts
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To: Mrs. B.S. Roberts
I saw that one too. Made me chuckle. I will use it on one of my customers one day.
16 posted on 04/16/2010 3:18:40 PM PDT by Bloody Sam Roberts (An armed man is a citizen. An unarmed man is a subject.)
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To: Domandred
It will never take the place of bee keeping .

The future's all yours you stupid bicycle .

Discontinued in 1995

17 posted on 04/16/2010 3:20:20 PM PDT by kbennkc (For those who have fought for it , freedom has a flavor the protected will never know F Trp 8th Cav)
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To: RonF; AppauledAtAppeasementConservat; Looking for Diogenes; Congressman Billybob; ...

Scout Ping


18 posted on 04/16/2010 3:28:49 PM PDT by SandRat (Duty, Honor, Country! What else needs said?)
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To: Bloody Sam Roberts

I’m surprised that a good liberal writer for the N.Y. Times would admit to having been in the Boy Scouts at all. The Scouts are considered evil and loathsome by the liberals due to the ban on homosexual scoutmasters. To the good liberals, that ban overrides any other good that the Boy Scouts have ever done.

Or, is this writer indicting his own parents for enrolling him in scouting, as obviously they were not enlightened enough about gay issues to keep him out of that loathsome organization. (sarcasm)


19 posted on 04/16/2010 3:45:37 PM PDT by Dilbert San Diego
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To: thoolou

I already started a post with liar, liar but then thought.... Tiger Cub

Are they 6 or 7?

My work was at the other end of the line and I simply don’t know


20 posted on 04/16/2010 3:54:50 PM PDT by bert (K.E. N.P. +12 . Ostracize Democrats. There can be no Democrat friends.)
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