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Hi Nelson, maybe you can explain this to me: why so much hate towards what3words? Chris once came to our office to see if there was a fit for us to use their in

Hi Nelson, maybe you can explain this to me: why so much hate towards what3words? Chris once came to our office to see if there was a fit for us to use their invention. We did not find that it solved a pain point for us, so nothing came out of it... but the amount of rage that I see that they have been accumulating towards the years. Is there a story behind it beyond "I want to do something similar and can implement it, but <patent>?" Thanks in advance

wwalexander 5y ago
A standard for global addressing should not rely on a proprietary algorithm or wordlist, as it means that there is no legal method for using the standard besides using (paying for) What3Words’ API. This fits the common definition of rent-seeking behavior. This couples with the technological issues outlined in the article above. I believe the vitriol against W3W is fueled by the combination of rent-seeking behavior on a standard of poor technical quality. I’m also bothered that one of the main use cases W3W’s marketing highlights is for specifying locations in emergencies, a totally non-commercial/public-good application. W3W presents itself convincingly to laymen as this sort of public-good open standard, but they’re just another startup with a proprietary product they’re hoping to monopolize.
jedberg 5y ago
The hate is because they patented it. It is a useful idea, but it would be far more useful if the algorithm and wordlist were public domain and didn't require a license to use it.
myself248 5y ago
Furthermore, there's a payola scheme behind the scenes, to make sure automakers implement it in their infotainment systems and stuff, which they hope will force others to license it. It's a great idea, a mediocre implementation, and a set of business practices that make the antichrist jealous. On top of that, their bloodthirsty pursuit of any criticism means that legitimate discussions of the system's flaws can't happen in the open. The lack of that criticism may have encouraged some services to adopt W3W without realizing its flaws, and there's already some hinting that such a flaw may have already interfered with actual rescue operations: https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-56901363 https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-56901363 Thankfully the rescue was able to proceed once they switched to another coordinate system, and that case didn't result in a fatality. How many other such cases are there? We might never know. The company may have literal blood on its hands at this point, but fixing the flaws would require discussing them first, which we can't do as long as they're empowered to shut down discourse.
DyslexicAtheist 5y ago
W3W has sent a legal threat to a security researcher[1][2] for tweeting about and sharing the open-source software alternative WhatFreeWords. Great way to make friends! and here[3] is a long article of why w3w isn't safe for the use-cases they're peddling. tl;dr: they're a garbage company, with a garbage product, run by ghouls. [1] https://techcrunch.com/2021/04/30/what3words-legal-threat-whatfreewords/ https://techcrunch.com/2021/04/30/what3words-legal-threat-wh... [2] https://twitter.com/AaronToponce/status/1387933438305394690 https://twitter.com/AaronToponce/status/1387933438305394690 [3] https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what3words-confusion-suitable-emergency-response-gary-delaney/ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what3words-confusion-suitable...
NelsonMinar 5y ago
Hi Ragi! My complaint with What3Words is 85% their proprietary business model. They are literally trying to convince less developed countries to adopt their system in lieu of developing their own addressing systems. So that What3Words can forever force that country and anyone sending mail to it to pay them fees. It is evil. This is not theoretical; back in 2017 they were bragging at how they'd convinced the nations of Kiribati, Mongolia, Sint-Maarten, Côte d’Ivoire, Djibouti, Tonga, Nigeria and the Solomon Islands to use them as a national standard. I'm certain that the actual usage is exaggerated on their part but imagine if it were really true. Addressing is far too important to be held by a proprietary company. Addressing is a national service that countries should provide as part of being a nation, and there's a long history of countries developing addressing systems that does not rely on some predatory intellectual property system. 5% of my annoyance is What3Words pretends like they invented some brilliant new idea that's unique and should be IP protected. No, the idea is older than them. And the implementation is obvious to anyone with ordinary skill in the art of addressing. Anyone competent with GIS concepts can design a similar system in a few days' work. And there are many better alternatives. The other 10% of my complaint is their static addressing model. It's not good that two houses nearby have completely different addresses; real addressing always has hierarchical names and there's a reason for that. There's also a problem using words in that they are localized to the country's language. That's better than forcing English everywhere but makes interoperability way more confusing. Finally there's all the problems people keep finding with their word lists; that's covered well by other writers so I won't go into it. PS: I misspoke when I said Geohash is the oldest similar system. MGRS dates to the 1940s. There may be older ones, too.

wwalexander 5y ago

A standard for global addressing should not rely on a proprietary algorithm or wordlist, as it means that there is no legal method for using the standard besides using (paying for) What3Words’ API. This fits the common definition of rent-seeking behavior. This couples with the technological issues outlined in the article above. I believe the vitriol against W3W is fueled by the combination of rent-seeking behavior on a standard of poor technical quality. I’m also bothered that one of the main use cases W3W’s marketing highlights is for specifying locations in emergencies, a totally non-commercial/public-good application. W3W presents itself convincingly to laymen as this sort of public-good open standard, but they’re just another startup with a proprietary product they’re hoping to monopolize.

jedberg 5y ago

The hate is because they patented it. It is a useful idea, but it would be far more useful if the algorithm and wordlist were public domain and didn't require a license to use it.

myself248 5y ago

Furthermore, there's a payola scheme behind the scenes, to make sure automakers implement it in their infotainment systems and stuff, which they hope will force others to license it. It's a great idea, a mediocre implementation, and a set of business practices that make the antichrist jealous. On top of that, their bloodthirsty pursuit of any criticism means that legitimate discussions of the system's flaws can't happen in the open. The lack of that criticism may have encouraged some services to adopt W3W without realizing its flaws, and there's already some hinting that such a flaw may have already interfered with actual rescue operations: https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-56901363 https://www.bbc.com/news/technology-56901363 Thankfully the rescue was able to proceed once they switched to another coordinate system, and that case didn't result in a fatality. How many other such cases are there? We might never know. The company may have literal blood on its hands at this point, but fixing the flaws would require discussing them first, which we can't do as long as they're empowered to shut down discourse.

DyslexicAtheist 5y ago

W3W has sent a legal threat to a security researcher[1][2] for tweeting about and sharing the open-source software alternative WhatFreeWords. Great way to make friends! and here[3] is a long article of why w3w isn't safe for the use-cases they're peddling. tl;dr: they're a garbage company, with a garbage product, run by ghouls. [1] https://techcrunch.com/2021/04/30/what3words-legal-threat-whatfreewords/ https://techcrunch.com/2021/04/30/what3words-legal-threat-wh... [2] https://twitter.com/AaronToponce/status/1387933438305394690 https://twitter.com/AaronToponce/status/1387933438305394690 [3] https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what3words-confusion-suitable-emergency-response-gary-delaney/ https://www.linkedin.com/pulse/what3words-confusion-suitable...

NelsonMinar 5y ago

Hi Ragi! My complaint with What3Words is 85% their proprietary business model. They are literally trying to convince less developed countries to adopt their system in lieu of developing their own addressing systems. So that What3Words can forever force that country and anyone sending mail to it to pay them fees. It is evil. This is not theoretical; back in 2017 they were bragging at how they'd convinced the nations of Kiribati, Mongolia, Sint-Maarten, Côte d’Ivoire, Djibouti, Tonga, Nigeria and the Solomon Islands to use them as a national standard. I'm certain that the actual usage is exaggerated on their part but imagine if it were really true. Addressing is far too important to be held by a proprietary company. Addressing is a national service that countries should provide as part of being a nation, and there's a long history of countries developing addressing systems that does not rely on some predatory intellectual property system. 5% of my annoyance is What3Words pretends like they invented some brilliant new idea that's unique and should be IP protected. No, the idea is older than them. And the implementation is obvious to anyone with ordinary skill in the art of addressing. Anyone competent with GIS concepts can design a similar system in a few days' work. And there are many better alternatives. The other 10% of my complaint is their static addressing model. It's not good that two houses nearby have completely different addresses; real addressing always has hierarchical names and there's a reason for that. There's also a problem using words in that they are localized to the country's language. That's better than forcing English everywhere but makes interoperability way more confusing. Finally there's all the problems people keep finding with their word lists; that's covered well by other writers so I won't go into it. PS: I misspoke when I said Geohash is the oldest similar system. MGRS dates to the 1940s. There may be older ones, too.