[OSM-talk] Can wikidata links help fight name inflation?

[Jochen Topf]

On Wed, May 27, 2015 at 11:13:11PM +0200, Frederik Ramm wrote:
>    we're seeing more and more "name:xx" tags on OSM objects.
> [...]

Generally I don't think having names in different languages on OSM objects is
wrong. We have done it that way for a long time and, lets face it, as long as
we allow it for some objects and languages, people will add names to other
objects and in other languages, too. Moving responsibility to a different
database is nice in theory, but not in practice. The common mapper will not
understand why *his* language should not appear, but only some other and he
will not understand how to edit a different database (especially not wikidata
with its horrible interface) unless we build something for him to make it easy
and seamless.

> Not only well-known tourist magnets carry foreign names; some dedicated
> language mappers have gone over and beyond the call of duty and added,
> for example, name:ru tags even to small villages:
> 
>  http://taginfo.openstreetmap.org/keys/name%3Aru#map
> 
> (This is a matter currently under investigation by Data Working Group
> and it is relatively certain that not all 582,653 name:ru tags will remain.)

Thats a different matter. While there are many names for "London" in different
languages, I don't think there are special Russian names for half a million
places on Earth. Chances are they are the result of automatic transliteration.
And results of automatic processes should not be mapped for obvious reasons.

Jochen
-- 
Jochen Topf  jochen at remote.org  http://www.jochentopf.com/  +49-351-31778688