[OSM-talk] OSM the mediocre alternative (was: don't like you etc.)

[Lars Aronsson]

Frederik Ramm wrote:

> This ensures that almost anyone clever enough to operate a GPS is a 
> potential OSM community member; you don't need to read volumes of 
> documentation or pass an IQ test before you can contribute.

It's not so much the IQ as the experience from development work in 
GIS applications that we lack.  All active developers here are 
assumed to have programmed in 2-3 programming languages.  Not 
necessarily Ruby, but any of C++, Java, Python or Perl.  All are 
assumed to have taken the basic SQL/database course where you 
learn the relational model, creating a few tables with indexes and 
external keys, to create something like an employee file.  Some of 
us undoubtedly know how the UNIX/Linux kernel works on the inside. 

But very few of us know how the PostGIS extension to PostgreSQL 
works internally or how you should program geographic datatypes 
and indexes on your own.  The result from this is Steve's current 
data model and the fact that the rest of us accept this as a 
viable solution.  Those who don't, because they know more of GIS, 
like Christopher Schmidt, are repelled by everything they find 
under the hood of OSM.

In fact, the only way to get this project started is *not* to be 
carrying the burden of GIS knowledge.  And that's exactly why 
people like Christopher haven't started OSM, despite having so 
many years of head start in the field.

The same goes for Wikipedia.  Experienced encyclopedia writers are 
even more remote from Wikipedia than experienced GIS programmers 
are from OSM.  The exception is the ex-head of Britannica, Robert 
McHenry.  I still haven't figured exactly what he expected to 
achieve with the criticism he launched against Wikipedia.  Another 
example is Andy Tannenbaum's early criticism of Linux.

Indeed, there is no lack of IQ here.  Even if OSM (and Wikipedia) 
can look like an amateurs' project where "anybody" can help, the 
people who contribute substantially are very far from "anybody".



-- 
  Lars Aronsson (lars at aronsson.se)
  Aronsson Datateknik - http://aronsson.se