Versão em Português link
Disclaimer: All the text you read below is based on an online research aimed at the Brazilian market. survey link
It isn’t news - or shouldn’t be - that OpenStreetMap has a great value in sharing local information. It is a social impact tool for minorities and humanitarian aid policies. Despite the big efforts thousands of mappers who dedicate themselves every day to improve the maps, added to the diligent efforts by the BigTechs to promote their own services, the OSM is far from being the most ppopular map in the world. Or, at least a reference as big as its sister, Wikipedia.
A Hidden Gold Mine
Out of a group of geotech enthusiasts, the OSM is totally unknown to the general public. As we could see in the survey, about 68% of the participants had never heard about OpenStreetMap. Although most likely having had previous experiences with one of the various contact points (Tesla, SnapMap, BigMaps, Apple Maps, Facebook, Strava, Mapbox), most people still didn’t know about OpenStreetMap.
If you’re concerned about whether people see or not your work on OpenStreetMap, the answer is simple as that: Of course they do. They just don’t know where it comes from!
The main reason for this omission is that companies often try to hide our contributions in the smallest and most obscure lines of terms of service while building their own proprietary database, giving grumbs to the community. No need to name names, right?
But this isn’t an exclusive practice of large corporations. How often do apps like Maps.me, OSMAnd, OrganicMaps stop to remind their users that the data they’re using came from OpenStreetMap?
Truth is, no one wants to tell you about their Goose that laid the Golden Eggs!
