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As Google has lost it's sheen of benevolence over the last decade public knowledge projects like this become ever more appealing. Wikipedia proves they can be w

As Google has lost it's sheen of benevolence over the last decade public knowledge projects like this become ever more appealing. Wikipedia proves they can be wildly successful all without capital investment and the perverse incentives that follow.

HotVector 6y ago
I used to think Google was the "good guy" by providing so many resources for free, but I've realized how they've exploited their market dominance by essentially manipulating the masses with their ad service. We need to move away from conglomerates and start using software that doesn't sell your soul to the devil.
- blackboxlogic 6y ago
  I thought I was helping the world by fixing things on google maps. That will be a perpetual reminder for how naive I can be.
  - themeiguoren 6y ago
    You were helping google, but you were also helping everyone who used their maps from that day into the future. Your comment gives off the air of someone upset they helped the wrong party in a zero-sum game. IMO, this is clearly a positive sum one, and you shouldn’t despair at improving little corners of the world just because actors you don’t like will also benefit.
    - blackboxlogic 6y ago
      I DO see it as zero sum. OSM and Google maps compete for a limited supply of users. It's the "wrong" team because when Google gets users, they make money. When OSM gets users, the map gets better and people are freer from abuse and manipulation.
      - thinkingemote 6y ago
        Apple and Facebook both use OSM data, so contributing to OSM helps them make money.
        blackboxlogic 6y ago
        don't forget Amazon (for shipping).
- konjin 6y ago
  You need to start paying for software because if you don't then you're the product. Payment might include leasing out your infrastructure to the project until cryptos become viable for something other than ponzi schemes.
  - matkoniecz 6y ago
    Are you aware of software developed as a hobby or as part of the actual product (without making the user a product) or as a limited version demonstrating full product?
    - konjin 6y ago
      There is a reason why we don't visit surgeons who do it as a hobby.
      - HotVector 6y ago
        I don't see anyone asking for professional knitters on Etsy
  - berkes 6y ago
    There is a fallacy in that conclusion though. When you pay, you may still be a product. There is no (economic) law that dictates that when you pay, your data may not be sold. Paying customers might dissapear if they find out you make additional profit through datamining or -sales. So there is more incentive not to sell or mine data, but it is no guarantee. The only guarantee is when technology ensures the service provider does not have the data at all. E.g. through e2e encryption.
    - HotVector 6y ago
      Exactly. It is more lucrative to provide a product for free and make money mining data rather than providing a paid product, and this is even making it harder for competitors to enter the market and not die instantly. The next logical step is not paid products, but rather open source ones with distribued data storage.
qwertay 6y ago
Wikipedia shows that average people are pretty good at assembling data. The problem is drive by contributors are not very good at developing software. Wikipedia is super basic software wise while GIS and everything around it is extremely complex. The data in OSM is pretty good but there are no apps for it that are actually good other than leaflet JS for embedding on sites. Have to remember that a maps app is way more than just data. Its efficient routing, its good text to speach, its pulling in data from multiple sources like the gps location of the bus I'm waiting for or the roads closed for construction currently. You would also need a whole bunch of heuristics for the OSM dataset that the current apps don't have. OsmAnd would not be able to tell the difference between the turning lane on an intersection and an entire road that just has no name because the way the data is entered is there is just an unamed path joining the roads so the text to speach would say "bear slightly left" instead of "turn right on to foo street".
- blendergeek 6y ago
  > Have to remember that a maps app is way more than just data. Agreed. > Its efficient routing, This is a hard one especially for long routes when calculated on a phone rather than on a server. > its good text to speach, Ummmm. Text-to-speech is almost always provided by the OS rather than the app. > its pulling in data from multiple sources like the gps location of the bus I'm waiting for There are surprisingly good apps for bus navigation using OSM in some parts of the world. Unfortunately, where I live, bus companies seem to "license" that data only to Google. > or the roads closed for construction currently. This is literally part of the OSM dataset. > You would also need a whole bunch of heuristics for the OSM dataset that the current apps don't have. OsmAnd would not be able to tell the difference between the turning lane on an intersection and an entire road that just has no name because the way the data is entered is there is just an unamed path joining the roads so the text to speach would say "bear slightly left" instead of "turn right on to foo street". Rather than "heuristics for the OSM dataset", we generally need a more complete dataset. A "turning lane on an intersection" and an "entire road that just has no name" should be mapped differently. The turning lane will probably be mapped as a "link" type road with a "destination:street" of the road that it is going to (if it is mapped as a separate road at all). The generic no-name street will be mapped as a road with "noname" (yes, there is a special tag for this). Further, in many cases, a "turning lane" will be mapped with the "turn:lanes" tag on a road leaving no room for confusion with generic unnamed roads. I will admit that in current mapping in many places you will often get "bear slightly left" rather than "turn right on to foo street". However, this is almost always caused by a (current) lack of completeness in the data rather than a need to create some sort of set of heuristics to figure out what is "actually" going on. I think the hardest part for a good maps app that you did not mention is search. Searching in OsmAnd (offline) is abysmal. In fact it is worse than that. It is so bad that I will switch to a web browser, search on DDG, open a link in GMaps, find the coordinates and copy them to OsmAnd for routing because I know Osmand search does not have a snowball's chance in h** of remotely finding what I want in any sane manner.

HotVector 6y ago

I used to think Google was the "good guy" by providing so many resources for free, but I've realized how they've exploited their market dominance by essentially manipulating the masses with their ad service. We need to move away from conglomerates and start using software that doesn't sell your soul to the devil.

blackboxlogic 6y ago
I thought I was helping the world by fixing things on google maps. That will be a perpetual reminder for how naive I can be.
- themeiguoren 6y ago
  You were helping google, but you were also helping everyone who used their maps from that day into the future. Your comment gives off the air of someone upset they helped the wrong party in a zero-sum game. IMO, this is clearly a positive sum one, and you shouldn’t despair at improving little corners of the world just because actors you don’t like will also benefit.
  - blackboxlogic 6y ago
    I DO see it as zero sum. OSM and Google maps compete for a limited supply of users. It's the "wrong" team because when Google gets users, they make money. When OSM gets users, the map gets better and people are freer from abuse and manipulation.
    - thinkingemote 6y ago
      Apple and Facebook both use OSM data, so contributing to OSM helps them make money.
      - blackboxlogic 6y ago
        don't forget Amazon (for shipping).
konjin 6y ago
You need to start paying for software because if you don't then you're the product. Payment might include leasing out your infrastructure to the project until cryptos become viable for something other than ponzi schemes.
- matkoniecz 6y ago
  Are you aware of software developed as a hobby or as part of the actual product (without making the user a product) or as a limited version demonstrating full product?
  - konjin 6y ago
    There is a reason why we don't visit surgeons who do it as a hobby.
    - HotVector 6y ago
      I don't see anyone asking for professional knitters on Etsy
- berkes 6y ago
  There is a fallacy in that conclusion though. When you pay, you may still be a product. There is no (economic) law that dictates that when you pay, your data may not be sold. Paying customers might dissapear if they find out you make additional profit through datamining or -sales. So there is more incentive not to sell or mine data, but it is no guarantee. The only guarantee is when technology ensures the service provider does not have the data at all. E.g. through e2e encryption.
  - HotVector 6y ago
    Exactly. It is more lucrative to provide a product for free and make money mining data rather than providing a paid product, and this is even making it harder for competitors to enter the market and not die instantly. The next logical step is not paid products, but rather open source ones with distribued data storage.

qwertay 6y ago

Wikipedia shows that average people are pretty good at assembling data. The problem is drive by contributors are not very good at developing software. Wikipedia is super basic software wise while GIS and everything around it is extremely complex. The data in OSM is pretty good but there are no apps for it that are actually good other than leaflet JS for embedding on sites. Have to remember that a maps app is way more than just data. Its efficient routing, its good text to speach, its pulling in data from multiple sources like the gps location of the bus I'm waiting for or the roads closed for construction currently. You would also need a whole bunch of heuristics for the OSM dataset that the current apps don't have. OsmAnd would not be able to tell the difference between the turning lane on an intersection and an entire road that just has no name because the way the data is entered is there is just an unamed path joining the roads so the text to speach would say "bear slightly left" instead of "turn right on to foo street".

blendergeek 6y ago
> Have to remember that a maps app is way more than just data. Agreed. > Its efficient routing, This is a hard one especially for long routes when calculated on a phone rather than on a server. > its good text to speach, Ummmm. Text-to-speech is almost always provided by the OS rather than the app. > its pulling in data from multiple sources like the gps location of the bus I'm waiting for There are surprisingly good apps for bus navigation using OSM in some parts of the world. Unfortunately, where I live, bus companies seem to "license" that data only to Google. > or the roads closed for construction currently. This is literally part of the OSM dataset. > You would also need a whole bunch of heuristics for the OSM dataset that the current apps don't have. OsmAnd would not be able to tell the difference between the turning lane on an intersection and an entire road that just has no name because the way the data is entered is there is just an unamed path joining the roads so the text to speach would say "bear slightly left" instead of "turn right on to foo street". Rather than "heuristics for the OSM dataset", we generally need a more complete dataset. A "turning lane on an intersection" and an "entire road that just has no name" should be mapped differently. The turning lane will probably be mapped as a "link" type road with a "destination:street" of the road that it is going to (if it is mapped as a separate road at all). The generic no-name street will be mapped as a road with "noname" (yes, there is a special tag for this). Further, in many cases, a "turning lane" will be mapped with the "turn:lanes" tag on a road leaving no room for confusion with generic unnamed roads. I will admit that in current mapping in many places you will often get "bear slightly left" rather than "turn right on to foo street". However, this is almost always caused by a (current) lack of completeness in the data rather than a need to create some sort of set of heuristics to figure out what is "actually" going on. I think the hardest part for a good maps app that you did not mention is search. Searching in OsmAnd (offline) is abysmal. In fact it is worse than that. It is so bad that I will switch to a web browser, search on DDG, open a link in GMaps, find the coordinates and copy them to OsmAnd for routing because I know Osmand search does not have a snowball's chance in h** of remotely finding what I want in any sane manner.