[OSM-talk] Without an address, an Icelandic tourist drew this map of the intended location (Búðardalur) and surroundings on the envelope. The postal service delivered!

[Oleksiy Muzalyev]

On 30.08.2016 17:03, Iván Sánchez Ortega wrote:
> ... Tell me what's not affordable about spray-painting letters
> on the sides of buildings?
>
> ...

If it were as simple as this. An address, currently a street name and 
house number, is to be present in a property title, so it should be 
unambiguous and recognized legally. Besides, streets could be renamed 
from time to time due to changing political moods. Letters painted with 
a cheap paint fade quickly under the sun light. There is an issue of 
illegal construction, - there are cities where about half of an urban 
agglomeration may be an illegal slum. And so on and so forth. So it is 
an expensive system which requires maintenance and enforcing.


Though you may be right, - maybe it is not possible to invent anything 
better than a system of addresses based on street names and house 
numbers. May be it is the final system, where the human ingenuity 
reached the Wall of Physical Laws, and no other progress is possible.


I just saw this envelope with the map, and it was something new and 
original.