[Strategic] Fw: Adding additional tile layers to the osm.org website (e.g. the MapQuest ones)

[Mikel Maron]

Here's the email that touched off the issue of tile layers....

 == Mikel Maron ==
+254(0)724899738 @mikel s:mikelmaron
http://mapkibera.org/
http://wiki.openstreetmap.org/index.php/Haiti



----- Forwarded Message ----
From: Kai Krueger <kakrueger at gmail.com>
To: board at osmfoundation.org
Sent: Wed, October 27, 2010 11:16:19 PM
Subject: Adding additional tile layers to the osm.org website (e.g. the MapQuest 
ones)

Dear OSMF board,

I would like to write to you to ask if there is a policy under which conditions 
additional tile layers can be added to the layer switcher of the main page on 
openstreetmap.org? Currently there are 4 layers available, the "mapnik", 
"osmrender", "opencyclemap", and "noname" maps.

As OpenStreetMap is a lot about the diversity of things one can do with the 
data, it would be nice if more of this diversity could be show cased on the main 
page. Of cause, OSM is a lot more than map tiles and as such there have been 
various attempts to redesign the front page to enhance this (the most recent one 
currently ongoing on talk-de starting somewhere in the long thread 
http://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/talk-de/2010-October/077632.html 
http://osmtools.de/portal/), however short of a full redesign of the frontpage, 
adding a few more tile layers would be a great start to show case the diversity 
and the potential within OSM.

There are already many great (specialist) map-styles that would have been nice 
to include, like e.g. http://www.öpnvkarte.de/ ,http://openseamap.org/ or 
http://hikebikemap.de/ . So far the main concern with these has been of 
technical nature, i.e. can the servers that host these styles handle the load? 
Are they reliable enough? Are they world wide?

However with big organisations / companies like MapQuest, Wikimedia or CloudMade 
with their infrastructure now offering OSM tiles, the technical aspects are less 
of a concern for some and it is more of a policy question of who and under what 
conditions their tiles can be added into the layer switcher.

More directly, my question is would it be acceptable to include the MapQuest 
tiles as a fifth layer into the layer chooser on osm.org?

I have briefly spoken to TomH on irc and my understanding is that he sees no 
technical reason not to include them, however understandably he does not want to 
make the decision to include them, as it is one of policy and not of technical 
administration. Hence my question to you as the OSMF board if they can be 
included?

I think the MapQuest tiles would be, for the reasons listed below, a good 
addition to the main site. I have emailed Hurricane Coast, to ask if MapQuest 
would be OK with the tiles being included and the response has so far been 
positive. Including a (commercial) third party hosted tile set is not 
unprecedented either, as both the OpenCycleMap (sponsored by CloudMade) and the 
NoName layer (hosted by CloudMade), each with closed source style-sheets, has 
been on the main site for a while.

Imho, some of the advantages of including the MapQuest tiles that I can think of 
are

a) More diversity: The more styles new visitors get exposed to on the main site, 
the better they will hopefully understand that OSM is not about a single map, 
but about the data and the variation that can be done with it. (it also 
highlights why "tagging for the renderer doesn't work)
b) "localisation": The OSM-mapnik style is very nice, but has a distinct british 
touch to it. The MapQuest tiles instead use different styles in different 
countries giving a more localised feel to them. They show case the possibilities 
of localisation like the various US highway shields and that it is possible both 
with the mapnik tool set and the OSM data.
c) Speed of serving: Although the single OSMF tile server copes quite well with 
the load and is often blindingly fast if you are connected with a 1Gbit/s 
connection to the London academic network, for distant networks such as in 
America, Australia or Africa the latency might add up. MapQuest with its global 
Akamai CDN might provide a more pleasant and speedier experience.


On the other hand, there are also valid concerns, some of which were raised 
during the irc discussion.

Can anyone come and ask for their styles to be included? Could e.g. CloudMade 
come along and ask for all their styles to be included? Apart from that they 
might not want that, the current layer chooser would clearly be inappropriate 
for so many styles. Does it show (commercial) favouritism to include some and 
not others? Should the OSM main page contain any form of commercial aspects at 
all? Do styles have to be opensourced? Does it have to come "from the 
community"? Does the hosting have to be worldwide?  Up-to-date?

So far, I think there are so few examples that meet the technical criteria  that 
having too many styles isn't an issue yet, but having a clear set of policies 
under what condition new tile sets may be added would hopefully prevent bias in 
the future and counter any potential conspiracy theories that may emerge by 
adding tiles of companies like MapQuest.



Thank you and looking forward to your responses,

Kai
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