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<body>Honestly I don't think it makes sense for OSM to have names at all on objects which has a Wikidata reference. We are just too small a community to keep this updated and it has little value to duplicate to the efforts made by others. <br>If any names I suggest we have a bot autoupdating all name tags according to the values in Wikidata. If there is no Wikidata item it should be found/created.<br>It really is'nt hard to populate a map with geographical data from OSM and query the names the user wants to see from WD.<br>This offloads a huge burden as I see it.<br>All our tools that currently invites our users to include a name could be adapted so that the user is aware that OSM is about geodata and names are for WD and best stored/updated there.<br>If we allow a name to be set only when no qid we avoid the bulk of these problems. <br>When a qid is set a bot could remove all names for languages already present in WD.<br><br><div class="gmail_quote">On March 25, 2020 10:45:03 AM GMT+01:00, Andrew Hain <andrewhainosm@hotmail.co.uk> wrote:<blockquote class="gmail_quote" style="margin: 0pt 0pt 0pt 0.8ex; border-left: 1px solid rgb(204, 204, 204); padding-left: 1ex;">
<div>Why on earth would we not (excluding exceptional copyright issues) want to have lots of different name:XX tags?</div>
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<div>Andrew<br>
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<div id="divRplyFwdMsg" dir="ltr"><font face="Calibri, sans-serif" style="font-size:11pt" color="#000000"><b>From:</b> Frederik Ramm <frederik@remote.org><br>
<b>Sent:</b> 25 March 2020 09:26<br>
<b>To:</b> Tag discussion, strategy and related tools <tagging@openstreetmap.org><br>
<b>Subject:</b> [Tagging] Which languages are admissible for name:xx tags?</font>
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<div class="PlainText">Hi,<br>
<br>
the "name:xx" tags are something of an exception in OSM because while we<br>
defer to "local knowledge" as the highest-ranking source normally, this<br>
is not being done for name:xx tags. It is possible for no single citizen<br>
of the city of Karlsruhe to know its Russian name, but still a Russian<br>
name could exist. Who is the highest-ranking source for that?<br>
<br>
My guess is that about 5% of name:xx tags in OSM actually represent a<br>
unique name in its own right; all others are either copies of the name<br>
tag ("this city does not have its own name in language XX but I want<br>
every city to have a name:xx tag so I'll just copy the name tag"), or<br>
transliterations (or, worst case, even literal translations).<br>
<br>
A while ago we had a longer discussion about Esperanto names; in that<br>
discussion, it was questioned whether Esperanto could be in the name tag<br>
but nobody disputed that adding name:eo tags is ok, even though<br>
Esperanto is an invented (or "constructed") language.<br>
<br>
Yesterday someone added a few dozen Klingon names to countries in OSM. I<br>
have reverted that because of a copyright issue, but I think we also<br>
need to discuss which languages we want to accept for name:xx tags.<br>
<br>
In my opinion, a name:xx tag should only be added if you can demonstrate<br>
that people natively speaking the living language xx are actually using<br>
this name for this entity. I think we have a very unhealthy inflation of<br>
names in OSM that are added by "single-purpose mappers" - they come in,<br>
stick a name:my-favourite-language tag onto everything, and go away<br>
again. Nobody knows if these names are even correct, and nobody cares<br>
for their maintenance. The country North Macedonia changed its name<br>
almost one year ago, yet roughly half of its ~ 170 name tags are still<br>
what they were before this change. Nobody cares; these names suggest a<br>
data richness that is not backed up by an actual living community that<br>
cares for them.<br>
<br>
What are your opinions on which languages should be accepted in name<br>
tags? What do you think about<br>
<br>
* niche constructed languages (say, FredLang which has 2 words I<br>
invented just now)<br>
* popular constructed languages (Klingon, Elvish) - note place names in<br>
these languages will often be algorithmically derived from the English<br>
or local name<br>
* "serious" constructed languages (Esperanto)<br>
* languages that once existed but are not natively spoken any more (Roman)<br>
* languages that are natively spoken but their speakers do not have<br>
their own name for the entity in question (instead they use the same<br>
name the locals use, possibly transcribed into a different alphabet)<br>
* ...<br>
<br>
Or if you don't have the time to think about this in detail, just answer<br>
the question: tlhIngan Hol - Hlja' or ghobe'?<br>
<br>
Bye<br>
Frederik<br>
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