Who Really Owns OpenStreetMap? A Personal Concern About Big Tech in OSM

Most online maps have “improve this map”, “send product feedback” or similar. That is often used by people wanting to get false data into online maps. With OSM-based maps we’ve seen users banned from OSM for vandalism using that mechanism with third parties to try and get their desired content into OSM, and I’m sure Google get the same. Often those third parties assume good faith (since obviously the reporter does not say “this is false, I’ve been banned from OSM and so am asking you to add it”) and sometimes those edits make it into OSM**. I’ve no idea what level of QA there is behind Google’s “Send product feedback”, but sometimes the accompanying evidence can be quite elaborate (fake photos, fake online listings/reviews) so it wouldn’t surprise me if they were taken in some of the time.

** although not always; in the most recent example I saw the review chain at the third party smelt a rat and contacted OSM directly to check.