![[personal profile]](https://www.dreamwidth.org/img/silk/identity/user.png){kind=small}
Betrayal By Google
Apr. 12th, 2008 10:03 pmSo, I'm in DC for AAAS placement interviews. I'm looking forward to a long, intense week of talking to EPA, NSF, and DOE officials. But, to get to my subject heading: after a 2.5 hour flight delay due to lacking a stewardess (that's longer than the flight itself) I take the Metro into DC and head to my hotel.
Only to end up in a somewhat sketchy neighborhood. Eventually I figure out that I'm about 9 blocks away from where I want to be, and correct myself. Then I went back to Google Maps to see why I went wrong. And, lo and behold, when I typed in "1015 L St NW, Washington, DC" I didn't get my real hotel location, but rather the sketchy neighborhood. And then, I notice that Google has this handy "Edit: NEW!" button, and below that, in small, greyed out type "last edited by eh... on Dec 27". I go and look at the edit, and basically Mr. Eh moved the Google Maps arrow from the correct location to this new incorrect location 0.7 miles away. Worse than that, if I look for nearby hotels, it claims that my hotel is indeed right there (which I had done to double check the location the first time). (If I just look for my hotel in the DC area, I get both the correct and incorrect location).
So, while I wasn't paying attention, it seems like "Google Maps" has become "Google Wiki-Maps". Have a grudge against someone's company? Change its google maps location!
While I appreciate that wikis can be useful, I think it is rather important to note clearly any information that is user-generated so that one cannot move an address willy-nilly across town to see which clueless tourist follows it there.
Only to end up in a somewhat sketchy neighborhood. Eventually I figure out that I'm about 9 blocks away from where I want to be, and correct myself. Then I went back to Google Maps to see why I went wrong. And, lo and behold, when I typed in "1015 L St NW, Washington, DC" I didn't get my real hotel location, but rather the sketchy neighborhood. And then, I notice that Google has this handy "Edit: NEW!" button, and below that, in small, greyed out type "last edited by eh... on Dec 27". I go and look at the edit, and basically Mr. Eh moved the Google Maps arrow from the correct location to this new incorrect location 0.7 miles away. Worse than that, if I look for nearby hotels, it claims that my hotel is indeed right there (which I had done to double check the location the first time). (If I just look for my hotel in the DC area, I get both the correct and incorrect location).
So, while I wasn't paying attention, it seems like "Google Maps" has become "Google Wiki-Maps". Have a grudge against someone's company? Change its google maps location!
While I appreciate that wikis can be useful, I think it is rather important to note clearly any information that is user-generated so that one cannot move an address willy-nilly across town to see which clueless tourist follows it there.
