[Osmf-talk] Alternative Strategic Plan

Tue May 16 20:22:44 UTC 2023

Oh I think you aren't understanding what I wrote. And you're quoting the plan out of context. Let me try to explain.

I don't want another disconnected tool either. The website needs help being mapper focused, and that means everything from getting the site technical fundamentals in order, to developing an experience that meets mapper and community needs, to making easier for more code contributions to be absorbed. Your suggestion to turn on map notes by default wouldn't take a large bug bounty -- it looks like just a few lines of code. You were there at the start of this code base way back, helping direct CloudMade resources, so you should be able to see that. What's hard is all the stuff around managing and developing a codebase with so much history. We can definitely do better on openstreetmap-website now, and this is part of the strategic plan. I do think this could be better communicated in the plan, so it's more clear how individual parts deliver toward ultimate goals.

OSM is good for display and road routing. I'll also add that OSM is more than the street map, and there's many many niches where OSM is the best like railways, hiking, etc. But you're right that addresses and POI are lacking, and for commercial use and other street map use cases, this is a major gap. I don't think it's for lack of trying over the past 20 years (and btw if we are still talking about OSM at all in 20 years from now, you should consider that an amazing legacy).

I'm not sure decrees would make a difference, but I'll give it some thought to your suggestion. Maybe we should take that "hard look in the mirror" and try to understand what makes this kind of data especially hard -- not only OSM but for proprietary data too (even today Google Maps directed me to a store that had closed; no OSM was no better [1]). I'd love for us to get creative, and I think that's where Grab among others could make a great contribution.

-Mikel

[1] https://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/136185004 

* Mikel Maron * +14152835207 @mikel s:mikelmaron

On Monday, May 15, 2023 at 05:13:29 PM EDT, Steve Coast <steve at stevecoast.com> wrote: 

It’s great that you see a role for companies, as I put it in the plan.

However, “life as usual”, adding another tool scattered and unused by the vast majority of mappers won’t help us achieve any goals, or give OSM and the community any agency.

“Cluster A” is largely life as usual, putting small band-aids on a sinking ship.

Personally I don’t want to be here in another 20 years having the same conversation. Let’s just finish the map and replace Cluster A with something actionable that will unify the community behind a goal we all believe in.

There will be plenty of time after finishing to "Split required actions into subtasks” (A305) or "Set up regular meetings” (A408).

What could the board do at its next meeting to help complete the map? My suggestions:

* Declare that address data is the main thing missing in OSM, and that the project will focus on this
* Declare a large bug bounty to turn on map notes by default, and get it deployed
* Invite the largest address contributor from the prior month to speak

Best

Steve

> On May 15, 2023, at 9:26 AM, Mikel Maron <mikel.maron at gmail.com> wrote:
> 
> Hey everyone
> 
> Replying here personally, not in my OSMF Board capacity.
> 
> Steve as usual shares a lot of cool ideas. Alternate renderings are a great idea, and like many of us I've wanted to see alternate renderings that recapture the excitement of the early days when the map was largely a blank slate. Good and accessible metrics of the quality of the map would be really helpful. There's lots of ways to bring these ideas into reality.
> 
> This kind of experimentation is well supported in the technical development and resilience cluster of the strategic plan [1]. With investment in osm-website maintenance, we can implement long overdue features focused on mappers and the community. Vector tile infrastructure will make trying out new renderings much easier than today.
> 
> I don't think we need to reset OSMF into a corporate structure to achieve this, or anything. The idea shared here makes OSM extremely single focus goal directed, makes seats in decision making determined by financial investment, and generates revenue through product licensing fees. That might work for a startup company, but not a community. There's no realistic pathway to this kind of change anyway, and it wouldn't be effective at support a global community.
> 
> I do share Steve's concerns about OSMF's effectiveness, financing, and governance. If you are paying close attention, you'll see we are in a very different place than just a few years ago. I don't advocate for revolution of our structure, rather for continued evolution, toward a small number of well considered paid roles facilitating global volunteerism, proactive engagement with organizations in OSM, and more substantial seat at the table for local chapters. Would love to talk more about this.
> 
> Steve, an approach that was effective during my time at Mapbox was investment of time and money into OSM community projects. Particularly, OSMCha was adopted by Mapbox because it was both useful to the data work there and for the broader community. Maybe there's a play here for Grab and the incompleteness map and quality metrics? We could talk at SotM US about strategies.
> 
> -Mikel
> 
> [1] https://wiki.osmfoundation.org/wiki/Cluster_A
> 
> 
> * Mikel Maron * +14152835207 @mikel s:mikelmaron
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> 
> On Saturday, May 13, 2023 at 11:46:48 AM EDT, Steve Coast <steve at stevecoast.com> wrote:
> 
> 
> Dear all
> 
> 
> We formed OSMF to take care of the map. Let’s reset and focus on that with a strategic plan by the mappers for the mappers:
> 
>  
> 
> 1.    The website will focus on completing the map. The map currently shows the “best” view of the map, it will be changed via voluntary or paid efforts to show the “worst” view of the map to encourage completion, like in the beginning when it was blank, and it led to huge efforts to fill the map in:
> 
> a.    We will decide what the main thing to complete is. For example, if we decide it’s address data then we will do the following:
> 
>                                                i.    OSM will only render roads with a new tag “addr:complete", where mappers manually will have to mark roads as address complete. This will immediately make the map go very blank and create a large global project to finish addressing, which is the main thing missing in OSM.
> 
>                                              ii.    Once complete, we will take similar steps to map, for example, PoIs and only show roads will all PoIs added.
> 
> b.    OSM will only render features newer than 24 months to encourage refreshing and revisiting. A tag “feature:verified_2023” or equivalent will be used to do this, along with the last edit date of the feature. 
> 
> c.    Map notes will be turned on by default.
> 
> d.    Social and map quality features will be built in to osm.org which will drive engagement and mapping towards completion, for example alerting users to edits or routing problems near where they edit.[2]
> 
> e.    Leaderboards of editors, countries, states, regions and counties will be front and center to encourage editing, for example percentage of “addr:complete” roads per country.
> 
> 2.    Funding will focus on completing the map:
> 
> a.    By having a clear metrics-based plan above we can seek funding to build specific tools and features towards map completion.
> 
> b.    A paid “OpenStreetMap Approved” program will standardize corporate membership by certifying a company uses OSM data in a way that respects the license and community.
> 
> c.    A certified version of OSM will be released quarterly that has been semi-automatically checked for validity and correctness. Paid corporate members can be involved in the process.
> 
> d.    OSM conferences and local chapters will pay OSMF a small fee per attendee or member and in exchange also be “OpenStreetMap Approved”, once the board is shown to be effective.
> 
> 3.    The board will focus on completing the map:
> 
> a.    Reduce the board size and require regional representation.
> 
> b.    Board members must make a public financial and time commitment.
> 
> c.    The board will build completion metrics for the map, by using existing tools and working with companies who already have many tools, and engaging with the community. These will be the main agenda of the board meetings.
> 
> d.    All discretionary funding will go to projects and community members who build credible plans to help complete the map.
> 
>  
> 
> If this is interesting, I’d love feedback. We can run some BoF sessions at SOTM US, EU and Africa in July, November and December. Then SOTM Asia when it is confirmed.
> 
>  
> 
> Best
> 
>  
> 
> Steve
> 
> 
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