[Wikimedia-l] TomTom does a Britannica

[David Gerard-2]

TomTom press release:
http://www.tomtom.com/en_gb/licensing/newsletter/201205/didyouknow/

OpenStreetMap volunteer response:
http://www.systemed.net/blog/index.php?post=23 Flags TomTom
quote-mining.


- d.

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[Richard Symonds-3]

Ha, makes for a good read. Thanks for sharing, David!

Richard Symonds
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On 29 May 2012 12:28, David Gerard <[hidden email]> wrote:

> TomTom press release:
> http://www.tomtom.com/en_gb/licensing/newsletter/201205/didyouknow/
>
> OpenStreetMap volunteer response:
> http://www.systemed.net/blog/index.php?post=23 Flags TomTom
> quote-mining.
>
>
> - d.
>
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>

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[Deryck Chan-2]

I was skeptical with parent-like satnavs when they were first
introduced back then; I still am skeptical today. What's inadequate
about "Read map*, pay attention to the road, use brain"?

Deryck

*I'm a big fan of using the automatic route-planning features of map
systems like Google Maps or even TomTom to help me plan routes. It's
just that the assumption that a machine is correct about the real
world is simply wrong.

On 29 May 2012 12:32, Richard Symonds <[hidden email]> wrote:

> Ha, makes for a good read. Thanks for sharing, David!
>
> Richard Symonds
> Wikimedia UK
> 0207 065 0992
> Disclaimer viewable at
> http://uk.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikimedia:Email_disclaimer
> Visit http://www.wikimedia.org.uk/ and @wikimediauk
>
>
>
> On 29 May 2012 12:28, David Gerard <[hidden email]> wrote:
>
>> TomTom press release:
>> http://www.tomtom.com/en_gb/licensing/newsletter/201205/didyouknow/
>>
>> OpenStreetMap volunteer response:
>> http://www.systemed.net/blog/index.php?post=23 Flags TomTom
>> quote-mining.
>>
>>
>> - d.
>>
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>>
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[Anthony-73]

The difference is that Wikipedia is usable in the real world, whereas
OSM, for the most part, is not.

Yes, TomTom is dying.  But it's because of Google, not because of OSM.

On Tue, May 29, 2012 at 7:28 AM, David Gerard <[hidden email]> wrote:

> TomTom press release:
> http://www.tomtom.com/en_gb/licensing/newsletter/201205/didyouknow/
>
> OpenStreetMap volunteer response:
> http://www.systemed.net/blog/index.php?post=23 Flags TomTom
> quote-mining.
>
>
> - d.
>
> _______________________________________________
> Wikimedia-l mailing list
> [hidden email]
> Unsubscribe: https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimedia-l

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[Tom Morris-5]

On 29 May 2012 13:08, Anthony <[hidden email]> wrote:
> The difference is that Wikipedia is usable in the real world, whereas
> OSM, for the most part, is not.
>
> Yes, TomTom is dying.  But it's because of Google, not because of OSM.
>

I'd say OSM is beginning to be pretty usable in the real world. It's
usable for a lot of things where there's not so much commercial
interest in the map data...

Wheelchair accessible maps: the work done by wheelmap.org that takes
OSM and lets you tag which businesses are wheelchair accessible.

Footpaths and cycle paths. There is a market for pedestrian and cycle
navigation tools, but it's a small fraction compared to the motorist
market. If you go out into rural Britain and want to know where the
footpaths, bridleways or cycle paths are, Google won't tell you. You
either have to pay Ordnance Survey for a map, or rely on OSM.

Even in cities, OSM is very, very useful for pedestrians. Here is Old
Street roundabout on Google Maps and OpenStreetMap.

http://www.openstreetmap.org/?lat=51.525611&lon=-0.086892&zoom=18&layers=M

https://maps.google.co.uk/maps?q=Old+Street,+London&hl=en&ll=51.525724,-0.08722&spn=0.001799,0.005284&sll=51.022157,0.280645&sspn=0.003638,0.014656&oq=Old+Street,+&hnear=Old+St,+London,+United+Kingdom&t=m&z=18

Note how OSM shows the location of underpasses, traffic lights, ATMs,
petrol station and bike storage... that's what you get when you are
creating maps with a bit of love, care and attention. ;-)

--
Tom Morris
<http://tommorris.org/>

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[David Gerard-2]

On 29 May 2012 13:08, Anthony <[hidden email]> wrote:

> The difference is that Wikipedia is usable in the real world, whereas
> OSM, for the most part, is not.
> Yes, TomTom is dying.  But it's because of Google, not because of OSM.


I'd actually flag smartphones as the culprit. They're the good-enough
cheap alternative that's disrupting the satnav business. TomTom's
article is actually about an Android app that uses OSM data.

Heck, my Blackberry doesn't have a GPS, but I can navigate usably with
the Vodafone app that just triangulates off the cell towers.
Resolution is terrible (on the order of 100-200 metres), but it turns
out to be mostly sufficient.


- d.

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[Yaroslav M. Blanter]

On Tue, 29 May 2012 13:23:25 +0100, Tom Morris wrote:

> On 29 May 2012 13:08, Anthony <[hidden email]> wrote:
>> The difference is that Wikipedia is usable in the real world,
>> whereas
>> OSM, for the most part, is not.
>>
>> Yes, TomTom is dying.  But it's because of Google, not because of
>> OSM.
>>
>
> I'd say OSM is beginning to be pretty usable in the real world. It's
> usable for a lot of things where there's not so much commercial
> interest in the map data...
>

 From my personal experience: Twice per year I travel into middle-size
towns of Russia, usually visiting several of then on a single trip.
Google maps suck badly; Google's Russian counterpart, Yandex Maps, are
better, but they suck as well; TomTom is nonexistent, and OSM had for
all places I visited in 2010 (with one exception - for the record, this
was the city of Tayga, Kemerovo Region in Siberia) reasonably good maps,
often with reliable house numbering.

Cheers
Yaroslav

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[Richard Symonds-3]

Tom: Is there a way to find out where OSM isn't very accurate/complete?

Richard Symonds
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On 29 May 2012 13:29, Yaroslav M. Blanter <[hidden email]> wrote:

> On Tue, 29 May 2012 13:23:25 +0100, Tom Morris wrote:
>
>> On 29 May 2012 13:08, Anthony <[hidden email]> wrote:
>>
>>> The difference is that Wikipedia is usable in the real world, whereas
>>> OSM, for the most part, is not.
>>>
>>> Yes, TomTom is dying.  But it's because of Google, not because of OSM.
>>>
>>>
>> I'd say OSM is beginning to be pretty usable in the real world. It's
>> usable for a lot of things where there's not so much commercial
>> interest in the map data...
>>
>>
> From my personal experience: Twice per year I travel into middle-size
> towns of Russia, usually visiting several of then on a single trip. Google
> maps suck badly; Google's Russian counterpart, Yandex Maps, are better, but
> they suck as well; TomTom is nonexistent, and OSM had for all places I
> visited in 2010 (with one exception - for the record, this was the city of
> Tayga, Kemerovo Region in Siberia) reasonably good maps, often with
> reliable house numbering.
>
> Cheers
> Yaroslav
>
>
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[Anthony-73]

On Tue, May 29, 2012 at 8:27 AM, David Gerard <[hidden email]> wrote:

> On 29 May 2012 13:08, Anthony <[hidden email]> wrote:
>
>> The difference is that Wikipedia is usable in the real world, whereas
>> OSM, for the most part, is not.
>> Yes, TomTom is dying.  But it's because of Google, not because of OSM.
>
>
> I'd actually flag smartphones as the culprit. They're the good-enough
> cheap alternative that's disrupting the satnav business. TomTom's
> article is actually about an Android app that uses OSM data.

Well, yeah.  Smartphones were what allowed Google to create its free
satnav app.  And it's hard to compete with free.

And yeah, there are apps that use OSM data.  And there will probably
be more now that OSM has abandoned copyleft for data.  But most of
them won't be free, let alone libre, so it's hard to consider them
part of OSM.  If there's a usable free satnav app based on OSM data,
I'd certainly like to see it.

> Heck, my Blackberry doesn't have a GPS, but I can navigate usably with
> the Vodafone app that just triangulates off the cell towers.
> Resolution is terrible (on the order of 100-200 metres), but it turns
> out to be mostly sufficient.

I guess we have a different notion of "usable" :).

And yes, I'm talking about for driving navigation, which is TomTom's
main market.  Although, while OSM shines in some places in terms of
walking navigation, it is woefully inadequate in others.

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[Anthony-73]

On Tue, May 29, 2012 at 8:38 AM, Richard Symonds
<[hidden email]> wrote:
> Tom: Is there a way to find out where OSM isn't very accurate/complete?

Sure, but they all require comparison to something (a data source,
memory, the real world) which is accurate/complete.

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[Tom Morris-5]

On 29 May 2012 13:38, Richard Symonds <[hidden email]> wrote:
> Tom: Is there a way to find out where OSM isn't very accurate/complete?
>

Well, there's OSM "bugs". Basically, there is a way you can file a bug
on the map, sort of like how you might leave a note on a talk page
(only there is some actual bug semantics) or whack a big warning
template on the top of an article. If you are editing in Potlatch,
it'll show the bugs as little red ladybugs! ;-)

Of course, the only way to really know is to compare OpenStreetMap to
reality or to another map or to a data source. Comparing to reality is
time-consuming, and is basically what OSMers do every time they go out
and trace new paths. Comparing to another map is hard because of
copyright issues and getting the data from that map in a usable form.
Comparing to a data source is a very limited way of measuring
completeness. One way that would be fairly good for the United
Kingdom, for instance, would be to get hold of some dataset from the
government of every institution of a similar type (hospitals and
doctor's surgery information is available from the NHS, for instance,
and I believe school data might be available also) and then write a
script to see if there is something with a very similar name in the
vicinity on OSM.

Personally, I find that whenever I look something up about somewhere I
know, work or live, OSM is pretty good. There are issues: occasionally
I'll find a street name that's wrong. But when using Google Maps, I
find all sorts of inaccuracies, mostly derived from SEOers spamming
Google Maps. I saw an SEO consultant who managed to get their business
listing bang in the centre of the Houses of Parliament once.

--
Tom Morris
<http://tommorris.org/>

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[Strainu]

2012/5/29 Anthony <[hidden email]>:
> The difference is that Wikipedia is usable in the real world, whereas
> OSM, for the most part, is not.

I see it the other way around: OSM, for the most part, IS usable in
the real world. One can easily navigate using OSM data on the main
roads in a country, and even on major boulevards within the cities.
The problems appear "in the last kilometer".

And that's just the tip of the iceberg (i.e. the rendered data).
Invisible data, for instance road quality, can lead to impressive
mashups, such as http://openmap.ro/auto/ (click on one of the top
buttons to see the "comfort speeds", which is basically how messed up
a road is).  I never go for a long drive around Romania without
consulting this. While some of the data is old, more often than not
you can tell if you'll wreck your car on a road or not.

2012/5/29 Anthony <[hidden email]>:
> And yeah, there are apps that use OSM data.  And there will probably
> be more now that OSM has abandoned copyleft for data.

Why do you say that? ODbL is still a copyleft license, although a much
weaker copyleft.

Strainu

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[Anthony-73]

On Tue, May 29, 2012 at 9:22 AM, Strainu <[hidden email]> wrote:
> 2012/5/29 Anthony <[hidden email]>:
>> The difference is that Wikipedia is usable in the real world, whereas
>> OSM, for the most part, is not.
>
> I see it the other way around: OSM, for the most part, IS usable in
> the real world. One can easily navigate using OSM data on the main
> roads in a country, and even on major boulevards within the cities.
> The problems appear "in the last kilometer".

I just tried osmand.  I can't even figure out how to put in an
address.  I then tried navfree usa.  I eventually put in an address
(why I can't just type in, or better yet speak, the address, i don't
know).  But the route it gave me included tolls.  When I told it to
avoid tolls, it failed to do so.  (Either the app is broken, or the
information about what roads have tolls is broken.)

There's probably some other app I just don't know about.  But so far I
find it impossible to use OSM data to get the route that I follow
every day to work (which Google's navigation app finds readily, and
even updates on the fly due to changing traffic conditions).

> 2012/5/29 Anthony <[hidden email]>:
>> And yeah, there are apps that use OSM data.  And there will probably
>> be more now that OSM has abandoned copyleft for data.
>
> Why do you say that? ODbL is still a copyleft license, although a much
> weaker copyleft.

Rather than nitpick over details, I'll go with "much weaker copyleft".

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[Anthony-73]

On Tue, May 29, 2012 at 9:29 AM, Anthony <[hidden email]> wrote:
>  I then tried navfree usa.

Looking more closely at the directions it did give me, it is having me
get off the toll highway at basically every exit and then getting back
on it.  And the destination is off by 13 blocks (about a mile).

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[Strainu]

2012/5/29 Anthony <[hidden email]>:
> I just tried osmand.  I can't even figure out how to put in an
> address.  I then tried navfree usa.

You're limiting yourself to Android, which isn't very fair. Try to get
hold of a Garmin device with OSM maps and see if that makes a
difference. I suspect it will. (Garmin also has some GPS apps for
iPhone, but not for Android. I have no idea if you can load OSM maps
on those apps)

Strainu

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[Anthony-73]

On Tue, May 29, 2012 at 9:43 AM, Strainu <[hidden email]> wrote:
> 2012/5/29 Anthony <[hidden email]>:
>> I just tried osmand.  I can't even figure out how to put in an
>> address.  I then tried navfree usa.
>
> You're limiting yourself to Android, which isn't very fair. Try to get
> hold of a Garmin device with OSM maps and see if that makes a
> difference. I suspect it will. (Garmin also has some GPS apps for
> iPhone, but not for Android. I have no idea if you can load OSM maps
> on those apps)

I'm not doubting that someone can take OSM data and make it into
something usable.  I'm not even doubting that someone *has* taken OSM
data and made it into something usable.

But I think the analogy between being able to take OSM data, probably
add a lot of your own data (espectially for the geolocation
information, which is fantastic in some locations, and horrible in
others), and being able to go to en.wikipedia.org and just use it, is
a very weak analogy.

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[Strainu]

2012/5/29 Anthony <[hidden email]>:
> I'm not doubting that someone can take OSM data and make it into
> something usable.  I'm not even doubting that someone *has* taken OSM
> data and made it into something usable.

You obviously have already made up you mind, so I doubt anything I'll
say will change that, but...

>
> But I think the analogy between being able to take OSM data, probably
> add a lot of your own data (espectially for the geolocation
> information, which is fantastic in some locations, and horrible in
> others), and being able to go to en.wikipedia.org and just use it, is
> a very weak analogy.

...if you wanna go this way, I wonder if you "go to en.wikipedia.org
and just use it" if you want to plant tomatoes in your garden. I know
I wouldn't.

Strainu

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[Anthony-73]

On Tue, May 29, 2012 at 10:06 AM, Strainu <[hidden email]> wrote:
> 2012/5/29 Anthony <[hidden email]>:
>> I'm not doubting that someone can take OSM data and make it into
>> something usable.  I'm not even doubting that someone *has* taken OSM
>> data and made it into something usable.
>
> You obviously have already made up you mind, so I doubt anything I'll
> say will change that, but...

It's not so much what you say.  Possibly you, or someone else, can
point me to a free OSM-based android app which I can use in my daily
driving.  If so, I will change my opinion.

If you're going to refer me to commercial products which were based
(in part) on OSM data, then that's not what I was talking about.

And if you're going to point to the places where OSM beats the
commercial products, that was already acknowledged in the very tomtom
article we're talking about:

"Open source mapping certainly has its benefits and can be extremely
useful, particularly for pedestrians and in city or town centres. The
way that the maps incorporate input from a wide community of
contributors can result in impressive international coverage, whilst
also driving down costs of production. However, when it comes to
automotive-grade mapping, open source has some quite serious
limitations, falling short on the levels of accuracy and reliability
required for safe navigation."

> ...if you wanna go this way, I wonder if you "go to en.wikipedia.org
> and just use it" if you want to plant tomatoes in your garden. I know
> I wouldn't.

I wouldn't use Britannica either.  The context of the article is GPS
navigation for automobiles.

One thing I do have to admit is that my experience with OSM has mostly
been in the United States, which I hear is a place that OSM has been
especially poor, and a place where Google (which is what I do use) is
especially good.

And I don't foresee OSM ever being able to catch up.  Google is very
much a moving target.  While OSM is working on catching up on
geolocation (address to lat/lon) information, Google is micromapping
to the level of detail needed to program a self-driving auto.

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[Strainu]

2012/5/29 Anthony <[hidden email]>:
>> ...if you wanna go this way, I wonder if you "go to en.wikipedia.org
>> and just use it" if you want to plant tomatoes in your garden. I know
>> I wouldn't.
>
> I wouldn't use Britannica either.  The context of the article is GPS
> navigation for automobiles.

I'm sorry, I don't quite get it. When you said that Wikipedia was
usable in the real world, I assumed you meant that you can use
Wikipedia as an encyclopedia for reference in different aspects of
daily life. Now you're saying that you can somehow use Wikipedia for
GPS navigation for automobiles?

>
> One thing I do have to admit is that my experience with OSM has mostly
> been in the United States, which I hear is a place that OSM has been
> especially poor, and a place where Google (which is what I do use) is
> especially good.

That appears to be the case. In Romania, as well as most Eastern
European countries and some Asian countries, the Google development
model is _identical_ to the one used by OSM: crowdsourcing.

Before Google Mapper, the number of roads in Romania on Google maps
was a staggering... 3. Now the number of paved roads is indeed better
than OSM (due mainly to better satellite imagery), but the level of
details doesn't even come close, and geolocation is at street level
for both.

Strainu

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[Tom Morris-5]

On 29 May 2012 15:28, Anthony <[hidden email]> wrote:
> And I don't foresee OSM ever being able to catch up.  Google is very
> much a moving target.  While OSM is working on catching up on
> geolocation (address to lat/lon) information, Google is micromapping
> to the level of detail needed to program a self-driving auto.
>

OpenStreetMap is working on whatever the contributors want. ;-)

For some of us, that's footpaths, for some of us it's business
metadata, for some it's mapping out baseball fields, or adding post
boxes or any number of other things.

--
Tom Morris
<http://tommorris.org/>

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