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Google Crowd-Sources Maps
Wamoc writes "Google has invited 'citizen cartographers' to refine the US map for Google Maps and Google Earth. 'Today we're opening the map of the United States in Google Map Maker for you to add your expert local knowledge directly. You know your neighborhood or hometown best, and with Google Map Maker you can ensure the places you care about are richly represented on the map. For example, you can fix the name of your local pizza parlor, or add a description of your favorite book store.'"
http://www.openstreetmap.org/
Address and ratings for all the girls that put out? Sure, there is no way this can be abused...
I've abandoned my search for truth; now I'm just looking for some useful delusions.
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So "Joe's Pizza" can now be changed to "Joe's Awful Pizza"?
spider-hole is here.
Cheers.
Yours in Chelyabinsk,
Kilgore Trout
I just can't wait to work for free for all of Google's shareholders!
After submitting that they have my street name wrong and the next one over with it's label, and another one missing, years ago, I can just do it myself? This, this is just epic genius! I mean, that thought never went though my mind. Completely unobvious.
Like a city whose walls are broken down is a man who lacks self-control.
GPS is free. In fact first few phones with GPS were totally offline operations with the maps cached locally not forcing a data plan. But pretty quickly the carriers and hand set makers colluded to make it non workable and they all peddle dataplans at various levels. That Google is also aiding and abetting these nickel and diming makes me mad. Mind you, I have been as anti-Microsoft and as fanboi-yi Google as anyone in slashdot. I am not really looking for turn by turn navigation etc. Simply get directions while on WiFi, cache all the intervening map tiles, fuel stops, restaurants, hotels along the way. Just locate me on the map with GPS. That is all I ask for. But you can't get it in Android without a data plan. Some app called MapDroyd is rated to be the best for offline GPS on Android. It does not work well.
So people contributing to crowd sourced maps should demand that Google release a decent working version of offline google maps for Android, on par with iOS versions.
[*] Yes, there are many reasons to have an Android phone without a data plan. WiFi calling helps you avoid international roaming charges. WiFi connection painlessly syncs your calender, to do list and contacts with gmail. Android forces the handset makers to use standard USB chargers. You can get a low end Android with these benefits for about the same price as a well equipped non smart phone. Of course, high end Android might not make sense without a data plan.
sed -e 's/Chuck Norris/Rajnikant/g' joke > fact
There is both a good and a bad side to this. Ignoring the wikipedia type abuse that will occur it will probably be a net good, however say goodbye to favorite places that only locals or a few know about. Someone will put it on Google.
Ever discover a good side road that works to get around traffic? A friend and I who carpooled found one. One day a radio station started a segment where people could call in with traffic tips. Someone glowing described this wonderful detour. The next day it was as stalled and backed up as the highway. Years later I went that way again, still as screwed up. I suspect this sort of thing to happen with various other kind of favorite spots.
On the "plus side" parents will probably easily find out where the kids hang out, party, etc.
Terms of service for the submissions:
Yet I can't use Google maps or the maps API for most things I'd like to use them for (basically saving anything locally is forbidden and the API use is forbidden for everything except showing things on Google Maps).
TL;DR: Thanks but I'll stick with Openstreetmap.
Or, you could donate it to http://www.openstreetmap.org/ instead.
... why would I want to help a proprietary map that will then be owned by Google, instead of helping the map [OpenStreetMap project] that belongs to all of us? ...
Because Google is the 800 lb gorilla with money and brand name recognition. People know and trust it, its motto is do no evil, why are you worried?
Can't wait to see what the 4chan / Anon crowds dream up.
(apologies to Rush...)
"Hey y'all, don't you wish you could be white washing this here picket fence? I gotta great job, betcha you wish you could be spending the afternoon white washing this here fence, you suckers..."
Seriously, Sergei (and you, too, Arianna. Especially You!) people work for you, you pay them. This Judy Garland/Mickey Rooney "Hey, kids, let's put on a show in my grandma's barn, we can call it 'User Generated Content!'" shit has gone about as far as it can and should go.
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That's why I bought a Garman. Lot's cheaper and faster than streaming maps. (Hint! It also works where there is no cell service.) Doesn't interfer with using your phone either if you wish to make a phone call. Dah.
OpenStreetMaps is a classic grass-roots effort. People have sweat blood making OSM work, proving the "business" model, working out the kinks, and donating immeasurable time towards making this a success. Now that somebody has done the dirty work to prove that this method of crowd-sourcing maps can work, Google trots out its sexy service that will grab the buzz, divert the resources, advertise interest away and steal the user cycles towards improving its own closed proprietary maps. Yes, that's correct, proprietary -- there's no guarantee that what you do will remain freely available.
Has everyone forgotten the CDDB debacle? Quoting wiki: "The original software behind CDDB was released under the GNU General Public License, and many people submitted CD information thinking the service would also remain free." Those of you who remember will recognize what an understatement that is. Needless to say, those users were wrong and one day they found that all their effort was suddenly swallowed up and they were being asked to pay for access to the data they submitted.
I don't believe Google is evil and I don't work with OSM, but if Google is not evil it has to realize the negative impacts its actions can have on the kinds of grassroots open-source efforts it claims to support. Google is not stepping in to use its resources to do what the crowd cannot -- it will end up undercutting a project where the crowd was doing just fine on its own. And the ordinary Joes need to realize what is going on and channel their efforts to the project where they will own the product. OpenStreetMap.
All that talk about not being evil is all fine and dandy. But how come Android does not have a decent off line map application?
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/wiki/Android has several, including osmand.
As for your complaints about Google Maps not having an offline mode and whining about a cabal between Google and the carriers - on Android, it caches map data which is now vector-based, not prerendered tiles. They were waiting for device processors speeds and 3D abilities to become suitable. If you travel in the same area again, data from the cache is used. You can scroll around an area you intend to travel, too, to preload the data.
Newsflash: carriers, like power, gas, and water companies - are most interested in conservation, because it means more customers on the same infrastructure.
Please help metamoderate.
Let's see, where would you find elephants on the map? Oh, right, Google says they're located at 1600 Pennsylvania Ave, 20006, and the population of them has tripled in the last few years since Barnum and Bailey came to town.
It's easy enough to confirm - just look at all the geotagged photos on Flickr and Google that show circus tents and elephants out front.
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Google: So I use my own time and effort and contribute to the quality of your map data. What do I get out of it? Do I get freely usable map data?
Ahhhh. I didn't think so.
I'll keep contributing to openstreemap.org thanks. Now if only there was quality navigation software (for Android) with quality POI data to go with it.
Google Maps has had a "report a problem" link for years.
Not that it ever did a lick of good. But it was there.
Didn't Google have a thing about two years ago where people could photograph storefronts, send them in to Google, and get paid?
They have a "submit your content" thing now, but of course Google doesn't actually pay for the content.
The Holiday "station-store" at the Mall of America doesn't actually have gasoline, and I'm tired of it showing up when I'm searching for gas stations.
Does this mean I can actually fix it with some faint hope that the fix will actually stay fixed?
Adherence to the truth is a form of disloyalty.
My property should be about 20 times bigger than they show it.
The changes here will be definitive, right?
Well, it depends. Is the CIA agent hot, and will she wear leather?
A while back I added the hours for a business near where I live (their schedule is a little bit odd - they're only open Wednesday-Saturday). And you've always been able to report a problem with the map, as long as I can remember (although I don't think in some countries it allows that).
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Sure, you don't get paid, but at least you get the satisfaction and sense of accomplishment that comes from seeing someone else's stock price rise.
Ok, so you won't be allowed to directly query the data yourself after you give it to them, but at least you'll know that it might come up on your page, along with their ads, if you embed their javascript.
As copyright owner of this comment, I authorize everyone to defeat any technological measure which limits access to it.
We have 3 building on our HQ campus, I went in to outline each building and tag it with the appropriate address to make it easier for people to find the correct building when they visit the campus. There's no apparent way to do that as you have to specify a type of business when you select the drawing tool and none of the categories fit.
There are 4 boxes to use in the defense of liberty: soap, ballot, jury, ammo. Use in that order. Starting now.
You done broke it.
Slashdotted that is.
Map Maker has been around for years and has been active in over 180 countries since then. It just finally opened up to the USA.
Damn right I know my neighborhood better.
Yes, google maps. I am certain that my ex girlfriend lives on Whore Avenue.
And my boss does happen to live on Penis Street.
-Styopa
Exactly how is this different from Wikimapia (http://wikimapia.org)? That's a community-driven map-places-editing site that's been active for several years now...
Instead of linking to the Official Google Blog homepage, it would be better to link to the relevant blog post: Official Google Blog: Add your local knowledge to the map with Google Map Maker for the United States
The possbilities are endless - and inspiring. And need not be limited to that named after the finite but innumerable cipher (or would that be - uncountable?).
Reminds one of the WWII invasion of Scandinavia, for some strange reason, or other.
update their maps and still be forbidden to use it offline.
There is still no designation for seasonal roads, and truck trails which Google maps and most GPS's send people down to get stuck in the winter and spring.
Star Trek, there maybe hope.
I wish they'd let us correct the cell/wi-fi location database so my location on maps.google would be plausible without gps.
Really, "dog poop dispensers?"
I hope they also include data about dog poop waste bag dispensers so that people can dispose of the dispensed dog poop decisively! LOL! ;-)
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I'm a bit worried, but from your wikipedia ref, about Gracenote "many listing contributors believed that the database was open-source", which it never was.
Openstreetmap is.
You can even, like me, enter the supporting Foundation: rather than just donating, you'll get some control, you'd be able to vote against openness change if it ever comes (currently, the recent licence evolutions are definitely towards more openness in fact)
But indeed, OSM is geared so that legally speaking, each single streetpoint you may add cannot but be open, with a CC-BY-SA Creative common license.
This is *intended* so that no one, nowhere, never can buy or sell OSM data.
Within a few years, like the large, private and costly encyclopedias did in front of Wikipedia, the private GPS map resellers will slowly vanish.
(and now I'll be modded fanboi -but I stand by ;-)
Herve S.
I bought a more open phone than Android or iOS
Which phone was it, and which United States carrier do you recommend for use with it?
But how come Android does not have a decent off line map application?
Because most Android-powered devices sold in the United States are mobile telephones, not PDA/PMP devices such as Archos 43. Devices without a cellular radio are more likely to not have a GPS receiver either. They're also likely to run AOSP Android, which doesn't come with Android Market, instead of OHA Android, which does. As for using a phone with only a voice plan and no data plan, only recently have those become available in the United States. The United States market is relevant because it is the home of Google, Slashdot, and tepples.
GPS is free.
The receiver is not, and storage and bandwidth for a set of map data for the entire United States is not.
In fact first few phones with GPS were totally offline operations with the maps cached locally not forcing a data plan. But pretty quickly the carriers and hand set makers colluded to make it non workable
This probably happened because end users didn't want to manually download map data for individual cities before traveling there.