Undisclosed Location(?)

[Necrogue]

One of the things that separate Night Ops from more mainstream urbex sites, forums, and communities are shadows. The cover of darkness. Secrets....... or do they? While Night Oppers certainly seem to favor the darkness of night, most mainstream urbex sites certainly don’t divulge much when it comes to locations. They seem to envision themselves as akin to lawful good paladins safeguarding and protecting the realm of all explorers (even at the possible expense of making exploration opportunities less accessible to some). The Night Ops community on the other hand, seems to embrace more of a rogue archetype. That being said, I do not get a sense that the Night Ops community is any less passionate about the hobby, but as a relative newcomer to this forum I am curious; what is the general consensus amongst Night Oppers on the importance of keeping locations secret?

[Xanatos]

PERESC mainly. It's usually enough to know what type of target you're infiltrating (school, church, etc) that you don't really need to mention the specific target you're infiltrating (unless it's a particularly interesting one). UrbExers act more like tourguides for others who may wish to visit said target, whereas Night Ops focuses more on the skills & experience of the operative rather than how interesting the target itself is to explore - it's about the journey, not the destination. In that sense, Night Ops casts a wider net on the types of locations to infiltrate, seeing as most of the places I've opped are targets that UrbExers wouldn't even consider.

[Necrogue]

Yes, I get that and I agree, but my question was more in whether to divulge a location when another seemingly eager opper or urbexer inquires. I know Night Oppers tend to be far more discreet as a general rule and aren’t likely posting such widely cast nets as more mainstream urbexers, but I know that a common question urbexers frequently receive is “where is that?” which many urbexers see as an affront as they consider themselves defacto custodians of sorts. Their motivations for safeguarding locations are noble in that they wish to protect and preserve the sites from wanton vandalism (which can lead to heightened security, outright destruction of the site, etc.), but is this the general consensus shared by Night Oppers who are asked to share the location of a particular site? For example, suppose there is someone here on the forum who has learned they are in the same geographic area as you, they’ve seen your photos and read your accounts of an amazing op at an awesome location and they want to check it out for themselves; if they contact you and ask for the location would you tell them?

There is no right or wrong answer. I’m sure there are many here who would gladly share locations and many who would not, and I respect both opinions. I am however interested in what the prevailing idea is within the Night Ops community. Some urbexers will share site locations, but the baseline is that the majority won’t. What is the baseline amongst the Night Ops community?

[Xanatos]

I'd probably share the location if someone asked privately and wanted to explore themselves. Don't know about the others.