[Imports] North Central Texas Microsoft Building Import

[OSM Volunteer stevea]

Hi Andrew:

Thank you for updating the wiki / Import Plan (for Microsoft's North Texas building data).  It is clear you put some effort into doing this, it shows, and I and the wider OSM community appreciate this.  Though to be accurate while I am polite, we actually EXPECT this effort before an import — these efforts are requirements, as data importations are a not-business-as-usual method for data to be entered into OSM.

I asked you to reconsider using Google Sheet as a technology, as it is proprietary and we are an "Open" data project, meaning we do and should strive to use open data tools and process (examples include wiki, which you do use already, our forum, the talk (-us, others) mailing list pages, and others).  Yet in this Import Plan, you continue to use Google Sheet, which I find disappointing.  There are perfectly good "home grown" and open data methods for you to do this, our Tasking Manager is one among many, in fact it is much more visually appealing than a "sheet," as it is geographically oriented (as is OSM) and instantaneously conveys progress visually.

Worse is your request that "for any questions, please use the use #dallas channel on the OSM-US Slack" (or to message you via our internal "missive" system, which I now do).  Slack has, at the very most, only several hundred users in this context, compared to the millions who already form part of the OSM community.  Slack is, once again, a proprietary technology, hobbled by what is legally a "contract of adhesion" (a "take it or leave it" approach with no room for negotiating your way out of its onerous terms) and makes such discussion a "walled garden," something I and many others are loathe to see in OSM.  I do not (can not) join Slack for these reasons (I find its contract terms offensive, as I believe many others do, too) and so with this suggestion you close the door on me for constructive discussion.  You do leave open the door of sending you a message, so here it is (and thank you for doing so).

While I can't force you to do so, I strongly suggest that you find superior methods of communication about project status (most of which I have already suggested to you) besides Google Sheets and Slack:  these are inappropriate communication technologies for an OSM Import.

Respectfully,
SteveA
California


> On Oct 29, 2018, Andrew Matheny <andrewdmatheny at gmail.com> wrote:
> From: Andrew <andrewdmatheny at gmail.com>
> To: imports at openstreetmap.org
> Subject: Re: [Imports] North Central Texas Microsoft Building Import
> 
> Hi all,
> 
> Thanks for the feedback.
> 
> I've updated the wiki page with the Instructions found in the Sheet and
> you'll now find the project in the Import Catalogue. An additional step has
> been included in the import process to review potentially overlapping
> buildings that may be missed by the JOSM validator.
> 
> Please feel free to review and I look forward to your feedback
> 
> Thanks,
> 
> Andrew Matheny