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Why is this Google's fault? I walk through The East Cut nearly every day, and I admit I was confused by the rebranding. But it wasn't done by Google. There are

Why is this Google's fault? I walk through The East Cut nearly every day, and I admit I was confused by the rebranding. But it wasn't done by Google. There are people cleaning the sidewalks in East Cut shirts, banners that say East Cut, real estate companies that call it East Cut. It would be a little weird if Google ignored the name. Yes, "The East Cut" is a strange name. But that area as never part of South Beach (which is also a strange name given that there is no beach). It wasn't really Rincon Hill, it is the area below Rincon Hill and is at sea level. The East Cut is part of the larger South of Market area, and some of it could be considered to be the southern part of the Financial District[1]. But the neighborhood has evolved into its own thing, and deserves its own name. [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_neighborhoods_in_San_Francisco#Financial_District_South https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_neighborhoods_in_San_F...

deleted 8y ago
[deleted]
larkeith 8y ago
It's somewhat problematic when Google starts to become an arbitrator of real-world boundaries, as there is functionally no oversight or recourse for those affected. Google was not appointed by the residents, is not incentivized to avoid damaging changes, and is functionally impossible to hold responsible - they're an opaque monolith to anyone who tries to effect change or revert their decisions, and their black box-esque tendencies make it impossible to know the policies or algorithms that determine their actions, making it infeasible to work around or prevent behaviors with a negative impact. While in this case the impacts are fairly minor (with the exception of the border incident mentioned), this article is emblematic of the greater problem with tech giants in the information era: They cannot be regulated, managed, or held responsible for their behaviors, and have gained - and continue to gain - nigh-unprecedented influence over a staggering number of aspects our daily lives, without being chosen to do so by the people affected.
- mbell 8y ago
  From the article: > The East Cut name originated from a neighborhood nonprofit group in San Francisco that residents voted to create in 2015 to clean and secure the area. The nonprofit paid $68,000 to a “brand experience design company” to rebrand the district. > Mr. Robinson said his team asked Google to add the East Cut to its maps. A Google spokeswoman said employees manually inserted the name after verifying it through public sources. The residents voted to create a non-profit to improve the area, the board of the non-profit voted on the name and then asked google to add it to the map. What is the problem here? How is google in any way at fault?
  - munk-a 8y ago
    I am strongly suspicious that the contingent of residents that hired the nonprofit is not all of the residents, and the people objecting to the new name decided to try and use google maps as their battle ground. I am not trying to assign correctness, it might be that a developer came in and started the rebranding project to raise property values in objection to other residents, or the objectors might just be curmudgeons, the article doesn't provide enough information to tell.
- kzrdude 8y ago
  The same old problem with Google's dominance. In this case, Google is just another publisher of such a map, there are others with equivalent services; that way it doesn't seem troubling.
- duxup 8y ago
  You can't operate a map site and not be: > become an arbitrator of real-world boundaries, as there is functionally no oversight or recourse for those affected. If you do what people ask, you're being the arbiter. If you do what people don't ask, you're still being the arbiter.
  - munk-a 8y ago
    Yea, a fine example is the china-india border which google displays differently to residents of china, india and pakistan. This is one of those edge cases I love to hate in software dev. It's nice to imagine everything has a real value out there somewhere, but some data points don't actually have a clear definition _anywhere_.
mxfh 8y ago
Most importantly the neighborhood names are spatially non-exclusive. So the first paragraph is already somewhat incorrect. SOUTH OF MARKET, SOUTH BEACH and RINCON HILL are all clickable labels, which assigned areas are at least partially overlapping with what is labelled THE EAST CUT. https://www.google.com/maps/place/South+of+Market,+San+Francisco,+CA,+USA/ https://www.google.com/maps/place/South+of+Market,+San+Franc... https://www.google.com/maps/place/South+Beach,+San+Francisco,+CA,+USA/ https://www.google.com/maps/place/South+Beach,+San+Francisco... https://www.google.com/maps/place/Rincon+Hill,+San+Francisco,+CA,+USA/ https://www.google.com/maps/place/Rincon+Hill,+San+Francisco... https://www.google.com/maps/place/The+East+Cut,+San+Francisco,+CA,+USA/ https://www.google.com/maps/place/The+East+Cut,+San+Francisc...
_jal 8y ago
It is not the East Cut. It will never be the East Cut. That is Rincon, and the real-estate marketeers can bite me. Put another way, you can call things whatever you want, but a marketing campaign does not obligate me to accept your silly branding nonsense.
- tyu100 8y ago
  Rincon was almost certainly a real estate marketing name a hundred years ago.
  - _jal 8y ago
    No, it is named for Rincon Point, which took its name from Rincón, the Spanish word for 'corner'. Bored cynicism kinda requires the underlying reality support one's cynicism.
    - kevinh 8y ago
      But that name certainly wasn't the name the natives gave it before the Spanish expedition came around. Names change over time. Sometimes because of rebranding, sometimes because of hostile takeover of foreign land. Call it what you want, but I don't see the point of being concerned over the change.
      - soylentcola 8y ago
        Why did Constantinople get the works?
      - codebje 8y ago
        Did you think of the mailman? I get postal mail for someone living a few blocks away because they're technically in another suburb with a slightly worse reputation, and their real estate agent sold them on the idea they were in my suburb instead. The post office, however, isn't paying attention to marketing or non-profit interest groups, it's paying attention to council zoning and regulation. So every so often, I get mail addressed to a street name similar to mine, but in the next suburb over. Names change over time, but when there's a central registry of names with a democratically founded process for managing those names, and the names are a public utility for locating things, it's best we don't just shit all over it and make up whatever we like because it suits us at the time.
huebnerob 8y ago
Indeed, the article complains about names 'just being made up' but fails to provide any evidence of that actually happening. Instead, all the other odd names they call out actually originated somewhere in the community, albeit perhaps from esoteric sources. What's more, NYT seems to willfully ignore that place names change and evolve constantly through natural social processes just like these. That Google is indexing this makes them no more the arbiter of it than a library is the arbiter of all knowledge.
- tyu100 8y ago
  Yes, another article from the Times complaining that they don't get to make up neighbourhood names anymore ("newspapers used to disseminate new names") but Google does.
  - concam 8y ago
    Can you point me to the other articles where the NYT complains that they don't get to make up neighborhood names anymore but Google does?
    - singlow 8y ago
      https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/20/opinion/new-york-neighborhood-names.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/20/opinion/new-york-neighbor... https://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/21/nyregion/procro-sobro-fidi-bococa-a-lawmaker-says-enough.html https://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/21/nyregion/procro-sobro-fid...
      - yellowcherry 8y ago
        What I'm noting in these articles is an absence of mentions of Google or newspapers.
- SideburnsOfDoom 8y ago
  > names 'just being made up' Ultimately, is there any other possible source of names?
dekhn 8y ago
Isn't the East Cut referring the old name for the area (Second Street Cut) when it was the location of all the mansions before the cable cars enabled them to move to Russian Hill?

deleted 8y ago

[deleted]

larkeith 8y ago

It's somewhat problematic when Google starts to become an arbitrator of real-world boundaries, as there is functionally no oversight or recourse for those affected. Google was not appointed by the residents, is not incentivized to avoid damaging changes, and is functionally impossible to hold responsible - they're an opaque monolith to anyone who tries to effect change or revert their decisions, and their black box-esque tendencies make it impossible to know the policies or algorithms that determine their actions, making it infeasible to work around or prevent behaviors with a negative impact. While in this case the impacts are fairly minor (with the exception of the border incident mentioned), this article is emblematic of the greater problem with tech giants in the information era: They cannot be regulated, managed, or held responsible for their behaviors, and have gained - and continue to gain - nigh-unprecedented influence over a staggering number of aspects our daily lives, without being chosen to do so by the people affected.

mbell 8y ago
From the article: > The East Cut name originated from a neighborhood nonprofit group in San Francisco that residents voted to create in 2015 to clean and secure the area. The nonprofit paid $68,000 to a “brand experience design company” to rebrand the district. > Mr. Robinson said his team asked Google to add the East Cut to its maps. A Google spokeswoman said employees manually inserted the name after verifying it through public sources. The residents voted to create a non-profit to improve the area, the board of the non-profit voted on the name and then asked google to add it to the map. What is the problem here? How is google in any way at fault?
- munk-a 8y ago
  I am strongly suspicious that the contingent of residents that hired the nonprofit is not all of the residents, and the people objecting to the new name decided to try and use google maps as their battle ground. I am not trying to assign correctness, it might be that a developer came in and started the rebranding project to raise property values in objection to other residents, or the objectors might just be curmudgeons, the article doesn't provide enough information to tell.
kzrdude 8y ago
The same old problem with Google's dominance. In this case, Google is just another publisher of such a map, there are others with equivalent services; that way it doesn't seem troubling.
duxup 8y ago
You can't operate a map site and not be: > become an arbitrator of real-world boundaries, as there is functionally no oversight or recourse for those affected. If you do what people ask, you're being the arbiter. If you do what people don't ask, you're still being the arbiter.
- munk-a 8y ago
  Yea, a fine example is the china-india border which google displays differently to residents of china, india and pakistan. This is one of those edge cases I love to hate in software dev. It's nice to imagine everything has a real value out there somewhere, but some data points don't actually have a clear definition _anywhere_.

mxfh 8y ago

Most importantly the neighborhood names are spatially non-exclusive. So the first paragraph is already somewhat incorrect. SOUTH OF MARKET, SOUTH BEACH and RINCON HILL are all clickable labels, which assigned areas are at least partially overlapping with what is labelled THE EAST CUT. https://www.google.com/maps/place/South+of+Market,+San+Francisco,+CA,+USA/ https://www.google.com/maps/place/South+of+Market,+San+Franc... https://www.google.com/maps/place/South+Beach,+San+Francisco,+CA,+USA/ https://www.google.com/maps/place/South+Beach,+San+Francisco... https://www.google.com/maps/place/Rincon+Hill,+San+Francisco,+CA,+USA/ https://www.google.com/maps/place/Rincon+Hill,+San+Francisco... https://www.google.com/maps/place/The+East+Cut,+San+Francisco,+CA,+USA/ https://www.google.com/maps/place/The+East+Cut,+San+Francisc...

_jal 8y ago

It is not the East Cut. It will never be the East Cut. That is Rincon, and the real-estate marketeers can bite me. Put another way, you can call things whatever you want, but a marketing campaign does not obligate me to accept your silly branding nonsense.

tyu100 8y ago
Rincon was almost certainly a real estate marketing name a hundred years ago.
- _jal 8y ago
  No, it is named for Rincon Point, which took its name from Rincón, the Spanish word for 'corner'. Bored cynicism kinda requires the underlying reality support one's cynicism.
  - kevinh 8y ago
    But that name certainly wasn't the name the natives gave it before the Spanish expedition came around. Names change over time. Sometimes because of rebranding, sometimes because of hostile takeover of foreign land. Call it what you want, but I don't see the point of being concerned over the change.
    - soylentcola 8y ago
      Why did Constantinople get the works?
    - codebje 8y ago
      Did you think of the mailman? I get postal mail for someone living a few blocks away because they're technically in another suburb with a slightly worse reputation, and their real estate agent sold them on the idea they were in my suburb instead. The post office, however, isn't paying attention to marketing or non-profit interest groups, it's paying attention to council zoning and regulation. So every so often, I get mail addressed to a street name similar to mine, but in the next suburb over. Names change over time, but when there's a central registry of names with a democratically founded process for managing those names, and the names are a public utility for locating things, it's best we don't just shit all over it and make up whatever we like because it suits us at the time.

huebnerob 8y ago

Indeed, the article complains about names 'just being made up' but fails to provide any evidence of that actually happening. Instead, all the other odd names they call out actually originated somewhere in the community, albeit perhaps from esoteric sources. What's more, NYT seems to willfully ignore that place names change and evolve constantly through natural social processes just like these. That Google is indexing this makes them no more the arbiter of it than a library is the arbiter of all knowledge.

tyu100 8y ago
Yes, another article from the Times complaining that they don't get to make up neighbourhood names anymore ("newspapers used to disseminate new names") but Google does.
- concam 8y ago
  Can you point me to the other articles where the NYT complains that they don't get to make up neighborhood names anymore but Google does?
  - singlow 8y ago
    https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/20/opinion/new-york-neighborhood-names.html https://www.nytimes.com/2017/07/20/opinion/new-york-neighbor... https://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/21/nyregion/procro-sobro-fidi-bococa-a-lawmaker-says-enough.html https://www.nytimes.com/2011/04/21/nyregion/procro-sobro-fid...
    - yellowcherry 8y ago
      What I'm noting in these articles is an absence of mentions of Google or newspapers.
SideburnsOfDoom 8y ago
> names 'just being made up' Ultimately, is there any other possible source of names?

dekhn 8y ago

Isn't the East Cut referring the old name for the area (Second Street Cut) when it was the location of all the mansions before the cable cars enabled them to move to Russian Hill?