[Talk-GB] Potentially incompatible edits in West London

[Robert Skedgell]

While cleaning up @alisonlung's mess in that area (which will keep me 
busy for a couple more weeks at least), I've come across a few of 
@Mikhail1412's edits. I've treated them as suspect where they can't be 
confirmed by OSM-compatible sources (they of course have never stated 
their actual sources). I've only really been looking at highway-related 
stuff, so no idea of the potential impact on buildings and POIs.

On 30/01/2023 00:27, Andy Townsend wrote:
> Hello Andrew, hello everyone else.
> 
> 
> I've not done a "big revert" yet; I've concentrated on trying to work 
> out how to do that without adversely affecting everyone else's work, and 
> as I'm sure you've guessed, it's been more of a background job rather 
> than originally intended.  Despite warning of a "potential hole 
> appearing in the data in West London in a few days time" back in April 
> last year, I now hope that I'll be able to restrict changes to problem 
> keys only, and only deal with problem imagery where specific problems 
> have been reported, like https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/144667839 in 
> the example below (note that https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/996697879 
> in the same changeset matches the claimed Bing imagery).
> 
> 
> Best Regards,
> 
> 
> Andy
> 
> 
> 
> On 29/01/2023 18:01, Andrew Hain wrote:
>> Is the mapping in West London now in a state where mappers can build 
>> on it without risking their edits getting lost?
>>
>> --
>> Andrew
>> ------------------------------------------------------------------------
>> *From:* Andy Townsend <ajt1047 at gmail.com>
>> *Sent:* 18 April 2022 12:44
>> *To:* Talk Gb <talk-gb at openstreetmap.org>
>> *Subject:* [Talk-GB] Potentially incompatible edits in West London
>> Hello - especially to mappers in London.  Andy from OSM's Data Working
>> Group here.
>>
>> There's been a suggestion that mapper that has been very active in West
>> London* https://www.openstreetmap.org/user/Mikhail1412 has been using
>> various sources that aren't compatible with OSM. Attempts to contact the
>> mapper via
>> http://resultmaps.neis-one.org/osm-discussion-comments?uid=2055614 have
>> mostly been unsuccessful, although a local mapper has managed to get
>> replies to some private messages (which unfortunately do also suggest
>> that they're using incompatible sources).  It has been suggested that
>> https://www.openstreetmap.org/user/Mik1412 is another account by the
>> same person.
>>
>> Attempts by the DWG to get the mapper to interact with the community
>> have failed: https://www.openstreetmap.org/user/Mikhail1412/blocks ,
>> hence a "block until they engage with us" message at
>> https://www.openstreetmap.org/user_blocks/5919 .
>>
>> I had hoped that we'd be able to revert and redact certain classes of
>> data only (see e.g. comment on
>> https://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/113072980 ).  However, the
>> problematic changes include geometric changes too - it has been said
>> that the latest change to https://www.openstreetmap.org/way/144667839
>> (see the top-right corner of
>> https://overpass-api.de/achavi/?changeset=113007152 ) isn't possible
>> based on imagery available to OSM because of tree cover. That edit is
>> unlikely to be based on survey as the mapper concerned apparently hasn't
>> been in London since late 2019 (due to the pandemic etc.).  Some other
>> changes seem to match Google Street View and not a more recent survey.
>>
>> It therefore looks like we'll have to revert (and likely redact) most or
>> all of this mapper's changes since the beginning of 2020, unless we get
>> a reason not to from a reply to
>> https://www.openstreetmap.org/user_blocks/5919 .  I'm sending this
>> message for a few reasons:
>>
>> * to encourage mappers in West London to comment on this user's
>> changesets, both where the data appears not to be based on sources
>> available to OSM but also where it can be validated by e.g. survey.  I
>> don't expect that you'll get a reply, but those comments will be
>> extremely useful to us and to everyone else in the area.
>>
>> * to give everyone a chance to tell me if I've got anything wrong
>> (please reply on this list if that's the case).
>>
>> * to give everyone a bit of a warning of a potential "hole" appearing in
>> the data in West London in a few days time.
>>
>> I won't start any wide-scale revert for a week or so to give the mapper
>> concerned yet another chance to reply.  I have already reverted (and
>> redacted) some changes in
>> https://www.openstreetmap.org/changeset/115296538 where there were
>> specific reports about individual pieces of data.
>>
>> Best Regards,
>>
>> Andy
>>
>> * more recently the same mapper has been active in France - I've also
>> asked them for the sources of their edits there.
>>
>>
>>
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