The title may sound weird. I initially wrote it as “fuck over the billionaires”. But it is not only billionaires, but also multi-millionaires and people who think themselves hierarchically superior.
So:
- Are you doing something to fuck over “the powerful”? If so, what?
I decided to move away from big american tech companies. When I started, the hardest part was finding an alternative to Google Maps.
I decided to be the change I want to see and have been contributing to OpenStreetMap nearly every day for 5 years as I update my local community.
Hey! That is great!
What sort of apps/software do you use to update OpenStreetMap? I would also love to do something like that. Can you do a brief explanation on how you do it, please?
There are lots of apps, desktop software, and websites. I prefer to use the default editor on openstreetmap.org called iD. Zoom in to your neighbourhood and click ‘Edit’ and it will open.
wiki.openstreetmap.org includes best practices and documentation for how to map each real world thing.
In iD, you can click on something in the map, on the left side it will tell you what type of feature it is. There will be a little ‘i’ symbol that you can click for more details and documentation that links to that specific type of thing on wiki.openstreetmap.org
community.openstreetmap.org is the place to ask questions and get help from others.
For actually using the map for finding places and getting directions, I like CoMaps best.
To add to this, Street Complete and Every Door are great for getting started. They ask straightforward questions like what’s the house number of this building, or does this bus stop have seating. If you can’t answer a question you don’t have to, you can just go back and answer a different question instead :)
Oh, both of those (street complete and every door) are great! I have just answered a few questions. This is a really easy way to improve OSM. We should probably do a “You Should Know” somewhere. I don’t think these apps are well known.
How long until the changes are accepted, do you have any idea? I already published them (by logging in my OSM account).
I’m not sure how long they take off the top of my head, but I think it’s quite quick. A lot of the apps only update once a month though, so it can feel like longer
Any change is updated immediately. End users (apps) may only update every month or so, that’s up to them.