Hi Wazers,
In the next few days (hopefully less than two weeks) we are going to deploy the following changes in editing permissions:
Level 3 is a significant level that allows editing high risk segments and therefore requires extensive knowledge of map editing and a lot of experience. Currently, this level can be reached too fast. To avoid innocent mistakes on important segments, the number of edits required for level 3 will change from 10k edits to 25k edits.
Level 3 editors - permission radius around driven area will change from 4 miles to 3 miles
[Comment]In the future we plan to support different radius permission parameters for different countries but until this is supported - we chose numbers that are reasonable on a global scale.
Since no one else has replied to this, I will as it was posted in April. As someone who has joined the editing team in Brisbane Australia, I have found the editing restrictions a real pain, especially the rules and decisions displayed here.
It is now to the point where I have made these feelings very clear to level four editor in my city and I have taken the decision to not be an editor anymore.
The decisions taken by waze administrators have made it so difficult for level ones to advance up the ranks, no matter how much work they do, and have to spend so much time, when it is volunteer time, that it is not just not worth.
Quite frankly, I find it bordering on the abusive. Perhaps waze is useful in North America, but for out here in Australia, as someone who was willing to contribute to the editing team and was willing to work up the ranks to level four or five, I feel like I am just wasting my time and efforts.
I feel like there is no hope to ever get out of level one, never mind the ethics of other editors as well. So all in all, it is goodbye.
Hi GarvinGray, don´t feel frustrated about the editing levels, that´s something that can be work out with your Country Coordinator, how many edits you have so far?. Let´s talk to see if there is way for you keep contributing to this project.
garvin, i knew exactly how u feel.
i made the exact same point as a junior edditor
nearly all in the local area has been filled
go for a long sunday drive n open up areas
i know its a pain in the arse
but before u know u can apply for area manager,
hell if ur good enuff regional manager
stick with it
I’ve had the exact same thoughts about Waze Australia
In New Zealand the whole of the South Island is locked at level 1 and State highways level 2. (There might be a very short section of motorway at level 3?)
North Island is much the same except Auckland motorways is locked at level 4
The reason for low lock levels is to encourage new editors.
As for local editing rules…New Zealand has half the rules but a more completed roading network as a percentage…
After some damage to the Brisbane suburbs a couple of months ago, I do agree with our locking policy, it ensured no damage to the main routes. This limited the number of Waze users, our customers, who were affected by the damage.
I could be convinced to agree that some of our Level 3 roads should be dropped to Level 2, but I wouldn’t go as far as Level 1 for any primary route.
The difficulty with obtaining edits is that most of the capital cities are largely filled in, I will put my hand up to filling most of the holes in Brisbane in a dedicated effort last year. It is for this very reason that I support protecting the road networks in this city, I filled in the suburban streets with the intention of attracting a larger user base in Brisbane. I don’t like to see our users leave because their mates street is missing or the local intersection that was working yesterday is not working today.
I would have thought there was still quite a bit to do in terms of elevations and incorrect turn restrictions in Brisbane. Also GG you could apply to be an AM for a rural area (as I have) and go crazy filling it all in! You get to help those in the bush as well as get your points up for the major centres.
Seeing that ispyisail is trying to drag up old discussions from last year that we thought were all settled, I will reiterate why it was suggested to have Level Locking and stricter UL levels than what Waze suggested.
Waze wants the community to grow and all the CM’s here back that 100%, after all, that’s what Waze is all about.
However, there are some ‘bad wazers’ out there hell bent on destroying what others have created so hard to work. Also the majority of our roads are Lvl-1 (or set on Auto Level), so I can’t understand some people are complaining about. Most of the primary roads/highways have been locked at higher levels because they are the lifeblood of the Waze roads.
We also know that even ‘Baby’ Lvl-1 wazers who wish to do editing on here are sometimes misguided and accidentally cause more damage than good (this is another point why we wanted higher road levels).
With all due respect to New Zealand, Ispyisail had the majority of roads all set to Lvl-1 (yes, to encourage new editors). As New Zealand grew, they also encountered problems with rouge editors and Lvl-1 editors breaking roads/turns/etc… and even Ispyisail was forced to change his view on a Lvl-1 system and change the Level of certain types of roads to higher levels to ‘protect’ them.
Keep in mind that Australia is 7,424,003 km2 larger than New Zealand (thats 28.7 times larger).
Australia has around 810624 km of roading, whereas New Zealand has around 93460 km of roads.
Yes, Australia (compared to NZ) is probably going to have a few more issues with roads and rogue editors, hence why we suggested tougher measures for Lvl-1, 2 editors to get up the ranks, rather than just helicopter wazing. We were more interested in protecting our hard earned work. Yes it will probably annoy some ‘lower’ level editors, but there are plenty of higher level editors around who can quickly address these issues.
Saying that, there is stack loads of roads still to be edited in Australia which can boost your editing points and raise your UL. You just need to find them…
The same discussions over and over again…
Tell you what, we’ll go for activating autolocks, then we are done for having this discussion, because the necessary level of protection for streets is coming from the system itself. To have freeways on L5 and highways on L3 is standard, has not to be explained and is even a check/suggestion function of your beloved validator.
Your quote, Shane, of Amits reply is taken out of context, it was not on locking roads but on assigning ranks to functions.
Nice trick, but it didn’t work, for I remember well.
Add on: personally for me locks higher than my rank was a push for me to earn the right to edit them too, so a motivation rather than a source of frustration.
I wanted to be part, so I bowed to the rules of the game…without a momentmoment of regret.
I consider this a necessary form of team spirit in a global system.
My interpretation is (he can correct me if i’m wrong) his comments are out of frustration of the inability to edit roads out side his own backyard.
My understanding he has been offered/suggested area to edit outside the urban area he lives to get his points up. But my understanding is is wants to be a casual editor only for the area that he lives/drives and is not interesting Area management AM or points.
He says there is an unlock process but he found the system overly complex for something he could have done very quickly.
I myself can see both sides of the story on this one.
I think the locks in Oz over zealous but WazeHQ have put locks in place for map protection.
I have always thought Wikipedia has the perfect solution. Any man can edit but if your interested in an area you are emailed about changes and work get audited that way rather than a rank system.
Yes, but Wikipedia also makes it incredibly easy to roll back bad or malicious changes. Without that option, we cannot allow free reign over the entire map by novices, because it’s very easy to damage a map and very hard to fix up again.