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Landmarks?

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I have been adding local businesses as landmarks (I've done maybe a dozen or so). Is that the correct to update/add to the POI database? Just wanted to make sure before I did any more of them

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Post by AlanOfTheBerg
nathan_wv wrote:Is there any way I can help up the POI database? Or is that 100% 3rd party sourced (not crowd sourced)?
Right now 100% google, bing, 4sq, yp, yelp.
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Post by AlanOfTheBerg
gordonski wrote:Just asking out of curiosity: What harm do these landmarks do?
Clutter the map. And, it's not about "harm" but about "lack of good." Unless it's a major building, public building like a school, park, etc., there's no point of having it in Waze that I can see.
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Post by AlanOfTheBerg
DTF69 wrote:Why do we have all the options for landmarks if we don't use them???
I am sure Waze great plans for them, but other sources are much more mature and easily available from the app. Perhaps they have plans again for the future, but IMO, they should remove 90% of the types for new landmarks.
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Post by AndyPoms
No, do not add individual businesses as landmarks.

Waze uses outside providers for POI search.

There is one exception to this rule, Gas Stations (outside of the US) need to be added for the Gas Price system to work. Inside the US, they use a third party database, so the addition of Gas Station landmarks is not necessary (but does help with the suppression of Traffic Jams and Automated Problem Reports in the editor).
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Post by AndyPoms
mtlgab wrote:Any new editor would see that as an invitation to create all landmarks as they are available from the interface drop down menu for landmark type. That list is extensive, and yes a Store/Stall would be a valid choice. As would shopping Centers, however small they may be.
We need better rules.
Check out the discussion over here: viewtopic.php?f=276&t=26005 and weigh in with your thoughts...
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Post by gabmtl
If I look at the "official" position on landmarks ... http://www.waze.com/wiki/index.php/Crea ... a_landmark is see:
"Creating and Editing a landmark
Some landmark types have the property of suppressing traffic jams, and this may be an unintentional consequence of suppressing traffic jams on adjacent roads and highways. Therefore, best practice when creating or editing landmarks is that the landmarks should not be snapped to roads, or cover roads that are not part of the landmark."

Any new editor would see that as an invitation to create all landmarks as they are available from the interface drop down menu for landmark type. That list is extensive, and yes a Store/Stall would be a valid choice. As would shopping Centers, however small they may be.
We need better rules.

One question would arises: How accurate the landmark needs to be to the satellite images ?
Any new user would think that the landmark needs to be closer to reality instead of a big blob. We recognize some buildings by their shape so that does makes sense. Some landmarks include the parking lot so it becomes a bigger one, thus more visible on the client. How does that translate to reality ? If the landmark goes beyond the building limits that would mean it will cover some parking roads but that is against the rules (see above).

The client code may wish to use or not the landmarks information, but as the code gets better it could use the information to improve searches, or directions.
:?:
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Post by gordonski
mapcat wrote:
TruckOttr wrote:There are a lot of businesses that have been marked as landmarks. Should editors be deleting them as we come across them?
I would. Leaving them there would encourage others to start adding more.

If they're all the work of the same person, you may wish to send a note first explaining why they don't belong on the maps.
Just asking out of curiosity: What harm do these landmarks do?

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Post by Jpere
Karrows wrote:
mapcat wrote:
gordonski wrote:Just asking out of curiosity: What harm do these landmarks do?
If they appear on the client, they should be correct. Which means AMs would need to maintain them.

Businesses open and close all the time. When do you change them, and when do you delete them?

If there are 100 restaurants in the city, and only 50 show on the map, shouldn't the owners of the other 50 complain that Waze is treating the others better, giving them free advertising, or otherwise being unfair? Even the ones whose stores are physically too small to show?

How many more reasons do you want?

If a company decides to advertise on Waze, I have no problem with their stores being shown on the map for as long as they're paying for the advertising. But anyone else, no.
I like having them on the map and find them useful myself, and I think usability is the most important thing to focus on for waze. If I'm going to walmart or whatever other oversized retail giant, waze sometimes only directs me to the road in front of the store. But the store could be 1/2 mile off the road with the enormousness of the parking lots. If it shows up on the map, I know for sure where it is and what side of the road. So I like to mark the giant retail places as a parking lot landmark. Then also it fixes all the problem reports of people who go into the store with waze still on their phone, and prevents parking lot drivers showing up as traffic jams. That's enough resons to do it for me.

If a business complains they are not a landmark in waze, they can log in themselves and fix it.
This is actually a pretty fair point. Waze has never routed me into a shopping center, even though Parking Lot Roads exist that lead to a specific store I may searched for.

I always thought Waze would search for POI from Bing and then route you to the road closest that POI provided by Bing. However, many times we are just routed up to the main avenue that is near the POI, and if it's something like a store, the driver will never know what side of the road it's on since Waze is not like Google that sometimes says "your destination will be on the left/right."

I'm not sure that putting landmarks for stores is the solution, but I do think there is a pretty large limitation in Waze right now as far as routing to POI is concerned.

I wish they would just adopt Google's maps sometimes.
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Post by karrows
mapcat wrote:
gordonski wrote:Just asking out of curiosity: What harm do these landmarks do?
If they appear on the client, they should be correct. Which means AMs would need to maintain them.

Businesses open and close all the time. When do you change them, and when do you delete them?

If there are 100 restaurants in the city, and only 50 show on the map, shouldn't the owners of the other 50 complain that Waze is treating the others better, giving them free advertising, or otherwise being unfair? Even the ones whose stores are physically too small to show?

How many more reasons do you want?

If a company decides to advertise on Waze, I have no problem with their stores being shown on the map for as long as they're paying for the advertising. But anyone else, no.
I like having them on the map and find them useful myself, and I think usability is the most important thing to focus on for waze. If I'm going to walmart or whatever other oversized retail giant, waze sometimes only directs me to the road in front of the store. But the store could be 1/2 mile off the road with the enormousness of the parking lots. If it shows up on the map, I know for sure where it is and what side of the road. So I like to mark the giant retail places as a parking lot landmark. Then also it fixes all the problem reports of people who go into the store with waze still on their phone, and prevents parking lot drivers showing up as traffic jams. That's enough resons to do it for me.

If a business complains they are not a landmark in waze, they can log in themselves and fix it.
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Post by kickahaota
You also have to remember that Waze is a global app; the Waze infrastructure has to handle the whole world, but circumstances vary in different parts of the world. In some parts of the world, there are lots of really mature POI databases, so it makes sense for Waze to rely on those databases. In other parts of the world, POI databases may be spotty or nonexistent, so it makes sense for Waze to track that info itself. So the data entry options have to allow for all sorts of POIs to be entered; but that doesn't mean it's a good idea to enter them everywhere.

(Of course, yes, it would be possible -- and probably a good idea -- for Waze to hide the undesired landmark types for a given country when creating a new landmark in that country, even though the underlying map might continue to support those types.)
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