[Talk-ca] OSM New-York - Import de contours de batiments et adresses

Richard Weait richard at weait.com
Mon Jan 6 00:52:13 UTC 2014


I would point to the NYC building import as another example of how
imports can go badly, and be damaging for OpenStreetMap.  To be
beneficial, any import must be handled with extreme care.  NYC has not
done that. You'll have to read a very long thread to understand what
is going on, from those who are involved.  (on the us imports list)

https://lists.openstreetmap.org/pipermail/imports-us/2013-December/000447.html

My summary is that the NYC building import is as flawed as most every
other attempt to "Get a bunch of data in OSM in a hurry".  Just a few
users are responsible for the bulk of the edits.  Those few users are
creating data at a rate that far exceeds their ability to curate the
data on the way in; and so the data is poor in terms of quality. And
the rate far exceeds the ability of the real mapping  community to
repair the imported data in a timely manner; and so the local mappers
are overwhelmed and frustrated by the damage done by some small number
of importers.

The New York City building import is an example of an import gone
wrong.  I hope that the parties involved will continue to work on
fixing their efforts, rather than just blasting bits into the data
base.

Improving address coverage in OpenStreetMap is a great benefit to the
project, especially to those who wish to consume OpenStreetMap data.
You can make an impact and improve OpenStreetMap data in your
neighbourhood by surveying address data as you improve other data.  No
imports required.  Just map it.  :-)

Building outlines are very pretty, but are not as broadly useful as
addresses; we navigate to an address, not to "a building rectangular
in form, 32m on one side and 36m on the adjacent..."  That said, once
you draw a building outline, that is a great place to hang the address
tags.

Mappy New Year.



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