91–100 of 140 posts
If you appreciate OSM, consider installing the StreetComplete mobile app[0]! It lets you contribute to OSM in a very simple manner, via simple questions like, "Is there a marked crosswalk here?" I'm not affiliated, I just think it's cool. It's very satisfying to complete quests in your local area. [0] https://streetcomplete.app/
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I cannot describe [0] my pleasure and satisfaction when, visiting Germany, we found an icecream shop closed. We'd stopped by with the assumption Google Maps would have the correct hours; they did not, and we carried on without icecream. OSM, on the other hand, correctly showed the shop as closed for the day. [0] I can't, but my fiancee used the words "impossibly smug"
Google has been atrocious all across Europe ever since Covid. They used to have (maybe still do?) this local guide thingy, but this empathetic contribution doesn’t feel good for a for profit company.
Some assholes worked out it was pretty profitable to (for example) create a '24 hour emergency locksmith' pins all over the country, with no real physical presence, then pass the business on to a real locksmith a few towns over, while taking a cut.
Once people find it's profitable to provide fake user contributions and you have to start policing them, I imagine the value of user contributions drops significantly...
If you appreciate OSM, consider installing the StreetComplete mobile app[0]! It lets you contribute to OSM in a very simple manner, via simple questions like, "Is there a marked crosswalk here?" I'm not affiliated, I just think it's cool. It's very satisfying to complete quests in your local area. [0] https://streetcomplete.app/
If you appreciate OSM, consider installing the StreetComplete mobile app[0]! It lets you contribute to OSM in a very simple manner, via simple questions like, "Is there a marked crosswalk here?" I'm not affiliated, I just think it's cool. It's very satisfying to complete quests in your local area. [0] https://streetcomplete.app/
StreetComplete is fun for casual contributions, but what OSM really needs is good local mappers. You can tell when a place has local mappers updating and monitoring changes in the real world. Even just taking care of the coming and going of shops is really useful. People who visit your area using apps like OsmAnd and OrganicMaps use that data!
This is exactly why I contribute to OSM and add/remove/fix my favorite restaurants, bars etc. in the city I live in. I feel like I'm doing three nice things at a time: helping local companies, making travel better for tourists, and sticking it to $the_man[1]
[1]: whatever corporation is currently responsible for sucking up data on what beer I drink, what pizza I eat, and what clothes I wear, so they can cross-references it with my haircut, circle of friends and lidar-scanned calves measurements from my robo-vacuum while i'm taking a shit to sell me keyrings and usb-cables from china
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StreetComplete is fun for casual contributions, but what OSM really needs is good local mappers. You can tell when a place has local mappers updating and monitoring changes in the real world. Even just taking care of the coming and going of shops is really useful. People who visit your area using apps like OsmAnd and OrganicMaps use that data!
Local mapping is surprisingly difficult. I believe that the commercial products (i.e., Google Maps) are viable only because there are strong incentives for people (e.g., business owners, property owners) to submit edits as they are the main way that people search for them. Without that, you get into a limbo where you have data but it's not the most updated one. By the way, not even government agencies have good geo d…
I'm trying to build a somewhat generic map view, which features many thematic maps (e.g. shops, restaurants, bicycle pumps, toilets, ...)
Most data comes from OpenStreetMap, but it also allows to make changes, upload pictures, show wikipedia or make reviews with mangrove.Reviews
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StreetComplete is fun for casual contributions, but what OSM really needs is good local mappers. You can tell when a place has local mappers updating and monitoring changes in the real world. Even just taking care of the coming and going of shops is really useful. People who visit your area using apps like OsmAnd and OrganicMaps use that data!
Local mapping is surprisingly difficult. I believe that the commercial products (i.e., Google Maps) are viable only because there are strong incentives for people (e.g., business owners, property owners) to submit edits as they are the main way that people search for them. Without that, you get into a limbo where you have data but it's not the most updated one. By the way, not even government agencies have good geo d…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
StreetComplete is fun for casual contributions, but what OSM really needs is good local mappers. You can tell when a place has local mappers updating and monitoring changes in the real world. Even just taking care of the coming and going of shops is really useful. People who visit your area using apps like OsmAnd and OrganicMaps use that data!
Local mapping is surprisingly difficult. I believe that the commercial products (i.e., Google Maps) are viable only because there are strong incentives for people (e.g., business owners, property owners) to submit edits as they are the main way that people search for them. Without that, you get into a limbo where you have data but it's not the most updated one. By the way, not even government agencies have good geo d…
https://www.transportation.gov/gis/national-address-database...
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I feel like an ass just for saying it but I downloaded the iOS app at the map style is so… busy. Granted I’m in NYC so there’s a lot going on but it’s showing me every single bus stop (there are literally seven in a one block radius) and building outlines even when zoomed out. It’s very visually overwhelming. This is something Google and Apple Maps really nail, I hope OSM can too at some point.
I get what you're asking here, but I think it's important to note that OSM's primary value is in its data, not in a human-consumable map. So if I could respectfully amend your request, I'd say I hope some third party can really nail this at some point. Organic Maps is pretty good, but I still need Google maps for a number of things. But even if that doesn't ever happen, the free OSM data is invaluable in a large numb…
I agree in theory but OSM does have a human consumable map. I think it’s in the projects interest for that default to be as good as it can be, rather than rely on third parties.
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Local mapping is surprisingly difficult. I believe that the commercial products (i.e., Google Maps) are viable only because there are strong incentives for people (e.g., business owners, property owners) to submit edits as they are the main way that people search for them. Without that, you get into a limbo where you have data but it's not the most updated one. By the way, not even government agencies have good geo d…
OpenStreetMap barely has any users in many areas. It seems likely enough that a modest amount of traction would lead to people noticing out of date information much more quickly.