In case many haven't noticed yet, the KML for viewing caches in Google Earth has officially been killed by GC.com

Here's the official word:

Groundspeak has discontinued support for Google Earth KML.

There are a couple reasons for the removal of the network KML. The network KML was implemented before we had a proper online mapping tool for Geocaching.com. Some of the more tenured cachers may recall the old GeoMicro maps that would reload the page every time you panned or zoomed (and how tedious that was). The subsequent introduction of full-featured Geocaching.com Google Maps has made the KML link somewhat redundant.

Another reason for the removal of the network KML is that only about 200 users regularly accessed the Google Earth KML, and the performance hit to the site was grossly out of proportion with the return. In other words, it was making the site run quite slowly. Groundspeak hesitates to inconvenience even a small number of geocachers. However it is sometimes necessary for us to identify areas of performance loss as the site grows in order to keep the site responsive and available at all times, even if it means sacrificing a feature that some found useful. Obviously we would rather introduce new features than take them away, so we hope you can understand the uncomfortable situation we were in.


Please keep in mind that you can still use Google Earth to import .GPX files from Pocket Queries. In fact, the accuracy with this method will be much better since the network KML had always randomized locations to some extent anyway.



My 2 pennies... a carefully written piece for sure but does anyone else get the feeling the true reason was $$ ? The GE kml worked for anyone, premium member of GC.com or not. Now to get good live mapping you need to pay.