5 ms·

For your own benefit. Millions of people regularly improve Google Maps because doing so makes it easier for them to commute and find local resources.

cscurmudgeon 13y ago
Won't it make more sense to improve openstreetmap since it seems to be already better. It is also open.
- GFischer 13y ago
  I usually add to both :) .
javajosh 13y ago
Right. Now go back to 1994 and s/Google Maps/CDDB/g [1] The lesson was clear: you contribute to proprietary databases at your great peril. People access Google Maps at the whim of Google. They could decide tomorrow to deny access, and you'd have no say in the matter. So, contribute to Open Street Maps instead! [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CDDB https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CDDB
- jws 13y ago
  Precisely. I remember when the track names for some of my CDs vanished because CDDB had taken the data I created for for them private and I was no longer able to see the information I typed in.
- hawkharris 13y ago
  I enjoy HN and have lots of respect for this community, but there's a strong contradiction in the way we discuss I.P. On one hand, we're a community of people who found and contribute to software businesses. Most of these companies depend on selling intellectual property in the form of code and data. Yet, as makers or hackers, some of us despise the companies that attempt to profit from selling I.P. We expect that all components of software be free for us to tinker with and repurpose. "Well...wait a minute," one might say, "There doesn't have to be a dichotomy between totally closed and totally open." Exactly! That's precisely what Google is trying to achieve with its mapping initiative. The firm is investing heavily in community tools (not to mention SDKs for developers) that give us an opportunity to participate: posting, querying and modifying data. Being both entrepreneurs and makers, we should be a little more realistic about our relationship with IP. You can't always have your cake and eat it, too.
  - maxerickson 13y ago
    There isn't really anything contradictory about being cautious of doing free work for a huge for profit corporation. If Google shared the data you would be getting different responses, but they only use the data to improve their products. (I can totally see submitting a change to get rid of an annoyance; I don't get warm fuzzies from 'helping Google make maps a better product'.)
  - clarry 13y ago
    > Being both entrepreneurs and makers, we should be a little more realistic about our relationship with IP. You can't always have your cake and eat it, too. Why not? We can always demand more, and what is wrong with that? And if we set out to make and eat that cake, chances are we can do it. It is not unrealistic at all. So far crowdsourcing has worked really well for many projects, and I can only see it getting bigger as we as a community realize the potential of open data and our ability to collect & manage it in numbers that few companies can afford to challenge. The point made by GP is a perfectly valid one, and many of us have been screwed in some way or another by corporations that hold the keys. I do not see why playing along with such schemes has anything to do with being realistic.
  - javajosh 13y ago
    >some of us despise the companies that attempt to profit from selling I.P. If I despised Google, or any company that profits from selling IP, I would have said so. If you can either contribute to an open dataset or a closed one, you contribute to the open one because the benefit no longer relies on the goodwill of any dataset owner. This principle underlies not only Open Street Maps, but OSS in general, and with a little finagling, things like Bitcoin. If the last few years have taught us anything, it's that we cannot rely on the basic decency of any institution. I'm not happy about it. I wish I could trust institutions to be decent. But time and again they act indecently, and weather the (short) media storm, and keep going, business as usual, and we must protect ourselves from that. To do otherwise is to ignore the lessons of the past.
  - wetafur 13y ago
    The problem is that corporations are not just satisfied with making a profit but tend to progress towards squeezing the last penny out of users at all costs. For example, Google is rolling out tracking which stores Android phones visit, and if you turn location services off, a lot of things including Google Now stop working[1]. Why would I want to work for free on improving maps so they can track where people go for advertising purposes? It is the difference between contributing to Wikipedia versus Encyclopaedia Brittanica.Not to mention doing user hostile things like making ads look like search results[3] >That's precisely what Google is trying to achieve with its mapping initiative. The firm is investing heavily in community tools (not to mention SDKs for developers) that give us an opportunity to participate: posting, querying and modifying data. So is OpenStreetMap, Navteq(commercial again) [2] and other mapping companies. Atleast Navteq/Nokia allows you to download complete offlline maps for their Here maps on supported devices unlike Google which wants to force people to be online for tracking/advertising purposes. [1] http://digiday.com/platforms/google-tracking/ http://digiday.com/platforms/google-tracking/ [2] https://mapreporter.navteq.com/#dashboard https://mapreporter.navteq.com/#dashboard [3] http://blog.dynamoo.com/2013/10/google-ads-and-fff7ed-whats-wrong-with.html http://blog.dynamoo.com/2013/10/google-ads-and-fff7ed-whats-...

cscurmudgeon 13y ago

Won't it make more sense to improve openstreetmap since it seems to be already better. It is also open.

GFischer 13y ago
I usually add to both :) .

javajosh 13y ago

Right. Now go back to 1994 and s/Google Maps/CDDB/g [1] The lesson was clear: you contribute to proprietary databases at your great peril. People access Google Maps at the whim of Google. They could decide tomorrow to deny access, and you'd have no say in the matter. So, contribute to Open Street Maps instead! [1] https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CDDB https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/CDDB

jws 13y ago
Precisely. I remember when the track names for some of my CDs vanished because CDDB had taken the data I created for for them private and I was no longer able to see the information I typed in.
hawkharris 13y ago
I enjoy HN and have lots of respect for this community, but there's a strong contradiction in the way we discuss I.P. On one hand, we're a community of people who found and contribute to software businesses. Most of these companies depend on selling intellectual property in the form of code and data. Yet, as makers or hackers, some of us despise the companies that attempt to profit from selling I.P. We expect that all components of software be free for us to tinker with and repurpose. "Well...wait a minute," one might say, "There doesn't have to be a dichotomy between totally closed and totally open." Exactly! That's precisely what Google is trying to achieve with its mapping initiative. The firm is investing heavily in community tools (not to mention SDKs for developers) that give us an opportunity to participate: posting, querying and modifying data. Being both entrepreneurs and makers, we should be a little more realistic about our relationship with IP. You can't always have your cake and eat it, too.
- maxerickson 13y ago
  There isn't really anything contradictory about being cautious of doing free work for a huge for profit corporation. If Google shared the data you would be getting different responses, but they only use the data to improve their products. (I can totally see submitting a change to get rid of an annoyance; I don't get warm fuzzies from 'helping Google make maps a better product'.)
- clarry 13y ago
  > Being both entrepreneurs and makers, we should be a little more realistic about our relationship with IP. You can't always have your cake and eat it, too. Why not? We can always demand more, and what is wrong with that? And if we set out to make and eat that cake, chances are we can do it. It is not unrealistic at all. So far crowdsourcing has worked really well for many projects, and I can only see it getting bigger as we as a community realize the potential of open data and our ability to collect & manage it in numbers that few companies can afford to challenge. The point made by GP is a perfectly valid one, and many of us have been screwed in some way or another by corporations that hold the keys. I do not see why playing along with such schemes has anything to do with being realistic.
- javajosh 13y ago
  >some of us despise the companies that attempt to profit from selling I.P. If I despised Google, or any company that profits from selling IP, I would have said so. If you can either contribute to an open dataset or a closed one, you contribute to the open one because the benefit no longer relies on the goodwill of any dataset owner. This principle underlies not only Open Street Maps, but OSS in general, and with a little finagling, things like Bitcoin. If the last few years have taught us anything, it's that we cannot rely on the basic decency of any institution. I'm not happy about it. I wish I could trust institutions to be decent. But time and again they act indecently, and weather the (short) media storm, and keep going, business as usual, and we must protect ourselves from that. To do otherwise is to ignore the lessons of the past.
- wetafur 13y ago
  The problem is that corporations are not just satisfied with making a profit but tend to progress towards squeezing the last penny out of users at all costs. For example, Google is rolling out tracking which stores Android phones visit, and if you turn location services off, a lot of things including Google Now stop working[1]. Why would I want to work for free on improving maps so they can track where people go for advertising purposes? It is the difference between contributing to Wikipedia versus Encyclopaedia Brittanica.Not to mention doing user hostile things like making ads look like search results[3] >That's precisely what Google is trying to achieve with its mapping initiative. The firm is investing heavily in community tools (not to mention SDKs for developers) that give us an opportunity to participate: posting, querying and modifying data. So is OpenStreetMap, Navteq(commercial again) [2] and other mapping companies. Atleast Navteq/Nokia allows you to download complete offlline maps for their Here maps on supported devices unlike Google which wants to force people to be online for tracking/advertising purposes. [1] http://digiday.com/platforms/google-tracking/ http://digiday.com/platforms/google-tracking/ [2] https://mapreporter.navteq.com/#dashboard https://mapreporter.navteq.com/#dashboard [3] http://blog.dynamoo.com/2013/10/google-ads-and-fff7ed-whats-wrong-with.html http://blog.dynamoo.com/2013/10/google-ads-and-fff7ed-whats-...