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I wonder if the OSM Community will draw any long-term conclusions about trusting especially VC-backed companies from the fate of both Mapillary and MapZen in th
by ATsch 6y ago
I wonder if the OSM Community will draw any long-term conclusions about trusting especially VC-backed companies from the fate of both Mapillary and MapZen in the last year as well as earlier back-turns such as MapQuest.
In these cases, it always seemed to me, as an occasional editor, like the OSM community was maybe overly eager to rely on services provided by external companies with not enough concern given to long-term risks. But beggars can't be chosers of course.
- maxerickson 6y agoI never really got into mapillary, but the uploads I have done have been with the mindset that they will be useful for a while and it's fine if exactly how long is hard to predict and so on. It'd be nice if there was an alternative where it was reasonable to think of the upload as a digital artifact. But there isn't, and street level photos are really useful for improving OSM.
- formercoder 6y agoThe only thing guaranteed about VC backed companies is that their investors are looking for outsized returns.
- jmkb 6y agoI doubt this will be any kind of soul-searching moment for the OSM community. OSM contributors make use of hundreds of different imagery sources from volunteer, corporate, and government sources. Few mappers will be particularly interested in the nitty-gritty of the funding. If the imagery is available with a compatible license, it will be used in mapping. If not, mapping will still happen, possibly more slowly. (On-the-ground survey is always the gold standard.)