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As Google Maps Renames Neighborhoods, Residents Fume (nytimes.com)
An anonymous reader shares a report: For decades, the district south of downtown and alongside San Francisco Bay here was known as either Rincon Hill, South Beach or South of Market. This spring, it was suddenly rebranded on Google Maps to a name few had heard: the East Cut. The peculiar moniker immediately spread digitally, from hotel sites to dating apps to Uber, which all use Google's map data. The name soon spilled over into the physical world, too. Real-estate listings beckoned prospective tenants to the East Cut. And news organizations referred to the vicinity by that term.
"It's degrading to the reputation of our area," said Tad Bogdan, who has lived in the neighborhood for 14 years. In a survey of 271 neighbors that he organized recently, he said, 90 percent disliked the name. The swift rebranding of the roughly 170-year-old district is just one example of how Google Maps has now become the primary arbiter of place names. With decisions made by a few Google cartographers, the identity of a city, town or neighborhood can be reshaped, illustrating the outsize influence that Silicon Valley increasingly has in the real world.
"It's degrading to the reputation of our area," said Tad Bogdan, who has lived in the neighborhood for 14 years. In a survey of 271 neighbors that he organized recently, he said, 90 percent disliked the name. The swift rebranding of the roughly 170-year-old district is just one example of how Google Maps has now become the primary arbiter of place names. With decisions made by a few Google cartographers, the identity of a city, town or neighborhood can be reshaped, illustrating the outsize influence that Silicon Valley increasingly has in the real world.
google renamed the street I grew up on by eliding a t. some time later, when the city went to remake the street signs, I'm guessing they checked google maps for the spelling rather than the records and suddenly Patterson became Paterson. At one point my mother had collected a 19th century city registrar book that had all the properties delineated, (and the street name correctly spelled...)
there was even a short period of time when you could use street view to look at an old and new street sign within a block of each other and see both spellings in the wild.
-- it's ridiculous how many people misspell ridiculous... (damn, damn, damn...)
Education (and largely healthcare) reflect demographics, not anything about the state per se.
Socialism: a lie told by totalitarians and believed by fools.
(many poor end up helping with parents work in some way, either directly or by picking up chores).
I am so sick of this mantra. It is total bullshit. The culture in the poor neighborhoods is to blame. I know you lefties love to say all cultures are the same, everybody is good at heart, and whatever else makes your heart warm up, but it is just not true. I have lived there, for decades, and the culture in poor neighborhoods is horrific. This culture from the street just bleeds into the classroom and dooms the kids to a life of repeating the same crap. Change the culture of the poor neighborhoods, and the kids in the schools will start to do better.