Turf insider December 2019

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Round Winners[edit]

Congrats to the winner of round 113: Király from Skåne who took his 19th medal, Oberoff from Stockholm wanted to see if a part-time dad could win a Region medal and then he went and biked home a Silver medal. DoctorDave from Östergötland earned his first bronze medal.

Well done mates!

Turf Events[edit]

LusseTurf[edit]

Västerås annual Christmas event will take place Sunday the 8th of December and the event runs between 11.00-13.00. The venue opens at 10.15 am, and you are welcome to register at www.uturf.se but you can also register at the event.

Vb Winter Classic 2020[edit]

Turf Västerbotten wants to invite everyone to their yearly Winter event:

"There is winter, and there is winter. Then there is Västerbotten Winter Classic 2020! If you want to experience a real winter event, then make sure to make use of the leap-day (29th of February 2020) and join this classical event in Umeå. The event is organized by Turf Västerbotten. We can offer a special prize for the turfer who travels the furthest to experience our popular winter event, and some affordable nice accommodation (but you need to be speedy).

More information regarding registration etc will be posted on our web page: turfvasterbotten.wordpress.com."

If you want your public event featured in Turf insider, write to: insider@turfgame.com preferably at least two months in advance and add a web page if possible. After the event it is always fun to read a paragraph about it (winners, weather, funny episodes) and remember that a picture is always worth more than a 1000 words.

Musikhjälpen and SteelFM[edit]

December 9-15 is the Sweden Music Aid (Musikhjälpen) in Västerås and of course we will find something on Stora Torget. The theme of the Music Aid this year is ”Sex is not a weapon”, read more here. Turf Västmanland will ensure that there will be Crowdy takes (2 different attempts to get a Crowdy-144) as well as a digital collection box Turf för Musikhjälpen.

In Åland, the radio channel Steel-FM is organizing a collection for the Food Bank in Åland. It started on December 2 and will run until the New Year.

Turf Region Battle[edit]

During the next round, Dalarna is battling with region Örebro and it can be followed here: https://turfportalen.se/event/kampdalarnaorebro2019

The battle is between 29 turfers from Dalarna and 56 turfers from Örebro. The battle will finish on the 5th of January 2020. May the best team win!

Medal Vote 2019[edit]

During November turfers could vote for the next Turf medal from seven choices. The winning proposal was ”Amount of unique zones during one round”. Behind this mouthful is the idea to go for ”round unique zones”, a concept introduced by https://frut.zundin.se/unika.php. The zones taken does not have to be all time new unique zones to the turfer, but unique for the current round. The Medal workshop is busy designing and naming the new medal, so keep an eye out for it!

The picture is missing, feel free to upload it if you have it

Let's talk about Abuse[edit]

Sometimes turfers take advantage of the game in a negative way and break the few rules that exist. Since Turf Crew are not all-seeing, any turfer that discovers a rule violation can write to abuse@turfgame.com. Do not blame or question the behavior of a specific turfer in public, since it rarely results in anything good, but could be devastating if the accused was not doing anything wrong. Report your suspicion to the abuse-mail instead. Different actions can be taken by Turf Crew depending on the kind of abuse and in some cases an assessment has to be done with regards to how serious the violation is.

The most common rule violation is ”gps spoofing” where the turfer is fooling the game to believe the gps of the phone is in a specific zone while being somewhere else, usually at home by a computer. This is often done by newbies excited about trying their 'hacking' skills. This kind of abuse always result in the account being shut down/banned.

Another common abuse of a Turf account is one account with several turfers. This is usually done out of naivety about the rules. A warning by e-mail is often enough for the turfers involved to come to their senses and stop sharing one account. If a warning is not enough, the account is banned. Unsuitable Turf nicks are changed by Turf Crew when brought to the attention of Turf Crew via the abuse-mail and the turfer is informed by e-mail about why the nick was inappropriate.

One turfer having two accounts is NOT abuse, nor is 'armpit turfing' (blocking the phone's gps signal by putting the phone in the armpit when you are in the zone), although many feel these are moral grey zones. Turfing by car is not against the rules either and hence is not abuse. If traffic rules are broken while turfing, it is a matter between the turfer and the police, not a matter for Turf Crew, just as a turfer who bikes or walks also has to obey the local traffic rules.

Another kind of abuse that can lead to repercussions are foul language in the chats in the Turf app. The first step is usually a short temporary chat-ban (the turfer can still use the app and take zones, but can no longer write in the chats). If a short temporary chat-ban is not enough to deter the turfer from abusing the chat privileges, a longer chat-ban is put in place, sometimes lasting 'forever'. In really severe cases, the account can be shut down. Turf Crew can also ”clean” the different Turf chats by removing the foul language if it is deemed necessary.

Tip of the month: The Turf Schnapps song[edit]

Christmas time is upon us and warm drinks are a nice way to finish a turf session. If you are having a drink with friends this Swedish Turf schnapps song might be a fun way to break the ice.

Turfzonen kommer (melody: Punschen kommer/Elvira Madigan, text by mpmoke)

Zonen kommer, zonen kommer, ny och gul
Zonen kommer, zonen kommer, ny och gul
Skål för alla nya, skål för varje zon
Inga sorger finnas mer när zon vi får!

Turfa lugnt/Safe turfing!

Munin