Hi all,
As an OpenStreetMap contributor, I was wondering if Komoot offers any free map packs. I noticed I have to buy the world map for 30 euros, which feels a bit strange to me. I think OSMAnd handles this better where you get free offline maps if you contribute every month.
I was hoping Komoot offers something similar? Anyone contacted them already?
Komoot has been acquired by Bending Spoons:
This probably makes free world maps less likely?
Could you be confused about the application?
You don’t have to buy a world map from komoot; the komoot vector map can be used anywhere in the world. It has a premium subscription of US$4.99 per month and US$59.99 per year.
From my region I am seeing the differences between free and premium accounts and they are=
Maps for each sport
Multi-day route planner
Weather
Personal collections
Live Tracking
Komoot maps for Garmin
I don’t see anything related to a world map.
Ahh. Different plans. Offline maps.
I wouldn’t give them anything right now, until we see if they replace the 120 laid-off employees or simply cut costs and plan to continue operating with only 30 employees. A company with aggressive strategies that lay off 120 people who brought Komoot to the top of the outdoor apps list will no longer be getting rich at my expense.
I’m worried about what will happen in the future with Photon.
No company should profit from OpenStreetMap data, certainly previously and as recognition of the work of the developers it was okay to pay for these plans, but now that everything has changed, charging you for what you have created with hours of effort is not fair, and if you add to that the fact that you already know that your money will go into the pockets of people who do not care about the fate of the 80% of a working group…
And yes, at this point OsmAnd management is much better, they charge for extra functions not for OSM data
The ODbL allows commercial use of the data, so if you don’t want others to profit from your contributions you’ve joined the wrong project.
that seems going way too far
I fully agree with this part
I don’t think Komoot have done much on Photon for a long time.
Other cycling apps are of course available!
Why not?
Honestly i dont care a second. I’d like to have OSM be in the Public Domain/CC0 and i tell you why and why i think the ODbL is a hinderance.
I used to work with commercial geodata a long time ago, and i added addresses when they were missing. And i gave them back to the provider. Every 6 Month we got an update of the Map data and all addresses were gone again as they refused to add them.
So i switched to OSM as an additional address source and i added the Addresses to OSM instead of the commercial Dataset. Still our service (Geolocating Addresses for Emergency Number routing) was a commercial service within an ISP.
If you say i may not profit from it i wouldnt have used OSM in the first place, and thus i hadnt given back addresses.
I am a Linuxer of the first years (Linux only since '94) and the Open Source/Free Software for me is a state of mind, not some licensing/commercial aspect.
I dont care what people do with my Code, my OSM Data whatever. I want to make the world a better place with the stuff i do.
I have been disappointed by map data and presentation and age/sparseness in the past so often that i want EVERYONE to use OSM. Just make it a true unique global project.
If you say “should not profit” you divide the world again. So 95% of map users will see broken, sparse, out of date, incomplete maps.
Map presentation is a business and today the OdBL makes it hard to incorporate other datasets. Thats one of the reasons Overture exists. And thats why people still have to look at Google Maps. The attitude of “should not profit” and the language the OdBL speaks causes 95% of the people to still look at broken maps.
I started with OSM to fix that. We do have a HUGE Dataset. Much better than anything commercial which people from Apple, Microsoft etc admit. Still we havent fixed it for the majority of people.
Flo
the reason why people uise gugle maps over osm is
– if you wanna have aerial photos, you gotta pay for em, so you often choose your map users to cover the cost via premium features
– searchbox is a nobrainer, but requires development and OSM focus on its dataset development over being usable app by itself, but it rather allow other companies to build their own apps and thus participate in costs?
– there is mapilary, although it is significantly worse and should OSM integrate it into its mainpage functionaly similiar to gmap? maybe see reasoning in point above.
Actually komoot or strava allow trail photos already as their own databases and unlike gmap, they may put it as a premium feature.
As for komoot charging people to use their app…
Well, they charge for using it and not for OSM data which is free for anyone to use. If you pay for komoot, you pay for the ability to see the maps in their own app. You pay for routing, which is their own.
OSM is successfull primarly because it allows people to profit from using our data in their own apps.
A great example is strava here. Sure they charge their users for premium features… but at the same time they allow us in osm to use their worldwide geolocalised data known as heatmap, so we are free to use it, build osm data from it and allow other companies to profit. Is Strava asking money for it? No. They understand that it mutually benefits them even if other people take advantage of it and possibly return nothing while making their own profits.
Because it is embedded in all apps and on every phone.
How do you fix that - or better - the map data on that phone?
And no - LineageOS and the like are no solution. People use Stock Android or iPhones. Both come by default with propritary maps (the one more the other less) you cant fix.
Flo
This is just a personal opinion of a simple OpenStreetMap contributor. By joining this project I accepted everything that comes with it. My opinion is independent of any political or commercial affiliation or influence.
In other communication spaces related to OSM I read complaints about how Google copies or incorporates some OSM elements into its maps, complaints that are well-founded or unfounded or simply be a coincidence. The reactions are immediate and are generally related to a dislike for Google and its products. They all have different opinions for or against, some controversial or conciliatory opinions, what I don’t find is someone telling another person “…you’ve joined the wrong project.”
What you should keep in mind is that this is a community space where all kinds of comments, opinions, ideas and nonsense will be read, and yes, I’m on the right project.
Mapillary integration? Good luck since some OSMers are allergic to anything that’s remotely proprietary…
In that case you’ll have to be satisfied with a license that allows people to use the data (including your contributions) for commercial purposes.
I can accept a lot of uses, free and commercial. With commercial use of OSM, I like to see some contribution to the OSM project in return. If not, I am sad but not mad.
I get mad when concerns try to lure OSM contributors into correcting the mistakes on their commercial, proprietary and copyrighted maps, suggesting that the changes will also benefit OSM. A cigar from our own box, that is not a real contribution!
Also:
Very hard for anyone to compete with that.
point of interest ↩︎
on almost every Android phone but not e.g. Huawei.
It’s not preinstalled (any more) on Apple’s ios since 2012. So it’s maybe two thirds of all phones.
Fun fact: Google pays Apple $20 billion a year to be the default search engine. To discourage the competition from trying.
My opinion is related to a fair exchange and is not a criticism against any type of business based on OpenStreetMap but specifically against charging for the data itself when it is inherently free.
Two diametrically opposed types of companies related to OpenStreetMap come to mind:
If a company charges for data that is accessible and free, there should be a return, either a percentage of money or support for the OpenStreetMap ecosystem such as data improvement, tool development, support for local communities,… and this helps to ensure that this free data continues to exist, evolve and improve. Charges should be justified by additional functions, not by access to osm data.
I currently work as a contractor for the official statistics entity of my country in the operational area of information collection in rural areas for a socioeconomic study; I have been with this entity for 6 continuous years in different statistical studies and previously I worked with several private consulting companies performing the same information collection work in all types of studies (social, economic, agricultural and studies focused on victims of the armed conflict) throughout my country. This type of work that I have done for 11 years was what brought me closer to OpenStreetMap; my country does not have decent official cartography and this means that the entity for which I work relies more on census cartography, which is not optimal for location and movement in the field. Searching for alternatives to cover these shortcomings led me to the use of OpenStreetMap maps and subsequently to being a collaborator or mapper. I love my work, going up and down mountains, crossing rivers, traversing jungles, forests and moors, traveling on impossible roads and I take all this to OpenStreetMap and I can say that I use what I map because it is useful to me and others who later have to make the same journeys.
For the collection of information we use DMC (Mobile Data Capture) Android devices and various data capture applications. If I make a small calculation taking into account the number of regional offices, the number of studies that are carried out per year and the number of contractors that are required to carry out these studies, I can say that the entity has in inventory an approximate of 10,000 dmc, between new and old equipment.
OsmAnd is one of the apps that are installed on the dmc, the latest apk available for each Android version, this would be 10,000 osmand apks, apks that I don’t know where they came from, one of the officials of the cartography area had the great idea of installing OsmAnd as field support, I don’t know the exact date of this, but in the 6 years that I have been in the entity, OsmAnd has always been installed on the dmc that I have used and this month I was assigned a new equipment (10" rugged tablet), so now I have 2 dmc and 2 OsmAnd apks that I have never used and I will never use because I don’t want to be part of that type of abuse. I use my mobile with OruxMaps and MapsForge and Garmin .img maps.
Between 2019 and 2024 the entity has had an approximate budget of 300 million dollars.
Could you guess what percentage of this money was allocated as recognition to the OsmAnd guys for their work and/or to OpenStreetMap for the data?
I know perfectly well that the entity is not obligated to donate money to OpenStreetMap, but it does have to use OSM data and its derivatives responsibly and appropriately. At least a “Thank you guys!”
Although the entity does not profit from or resell OpenStreetMap data, it does make a great saving by reducing costs by using OpenStreetMap and derived products.
I don’t want to generate controversy and I am saddened by what I have just written, but this is the context under which my opinion on the matter has been formed.
Where we can beat that is that when businesses cease to exist we remove them or update them to reflect the latest use of the premises.
Business owners are very quick to add their business but not so much to remove them when they close.