Congratulations to weeklyOSM for publishing its 500th online newsletter! WeeklyOSM is a community project which publishes news from the OpenStreetMap world every week. It is independent from the OpenStreetMap Foundation [1]. With the help of awesome volunteers across the globe, it is on its tenth year and is available in multiple languages, including:
You can subscribe to weeklyOSM’s newsletter via email or via language-specific RSS/Atom feeds (CZ, DE, EN, ES, FR, JA, TR). You can also follow them on Mastodon/Fediverse at @weeklyosm@en.osm.town or on Twitter @weeklyosm.
The content is released under the liberal Creative Commons licence CC-BY-SA 3.0.
Medium time commitment Help in translations of one of the already featured languages. Or help by proofreading articles and read the news before anyone else does 😉 Contact weeklyOSM.
Regular time commitment Are you and your friends interested in translating each weekly newsletter in your own language? Contact weeklyOSM. Translating is of course a big part, but proofreading is also very important. Please note that each language team is free to add their language specific news as well.
Congratulations and many thanks to the weeklyOSM contributors. 🙂
OSM Communication Working Group
Do you want to translate this and other blogposts in your language..? Please send us an email to communication@osmfoundation.org with subject: Helping with translations in [your language]
[1] The OpenStreetMap Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation, formed to support the OpenStreetMap Project. It is dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free geospatial data for anyone to use and share. The OpenStreetMap Foundation owns and maintains the infrastructure of the OpenStreetMap project, is financially supported by membership fees and donations, and organises the annual, international State of the Map conference. It has no full-time employees and it is supporting the OpenStreetMap project through the work of our volunteer Working Groups. Please consider becoming a memberof the Foundation.
OpenStreetMap was founded in 2004 and is a international project to create a free map of the world. To do so, we, thousands of volunteers, collect data about roads, railways, rivers, forests, buildings and a lot more worldwide. Our map data can be downloaded for free by everyone and used for any purpose – including commercial usage. It is possible to produce your own maps which highlight certain features, to calculate routes etc. OpenStreetMap is increasingly used when one needs maps which can be very quickly, or easily, updated.
Drawing: “Balloon-Prospect”, featured in Thomas Baldwin’s Airopaidia (1786). Public domain. Image by the Communication Working Group.
Microgrants: enabling volunteers to do more by overcoming financial barriers.
The Microgrants project is ready for launch! When the OpenStreetMap Foundation received the Pineapple fund donation, the money was quickly earmarked as to be given back to the community. Now that’s finally happening, after a recent Board decision(plenty of background behind that link!). Any volunteer who thinks they can make an impact with a small grant will soon be able to apply.
But first we need the help of a few volunteers to manage the project. What do we expect of you?
Running the call for projects.
Making a selection of about ten projects.
Following up with the selected projects.
Anyone can apply to be on the selection committee, and the Board will then make a selection. We are looking for people who know how the OSM community works, who have experience with making an impact for OSM – but also people with practical experience running these kinds of projects.
The policy document offers a guideline to what the Board wants to see happen with this project, but it leaves a lot of leeway for the committee to implement as they see fit. For example, the committee is expected to work out their own rules of order. During the entire process, you will be able to rely on Dorothea for administrative assistance.
The most impactful job of the Microgrants Committee will be the selection itself. The decision is expected to be based on deep community consultation. The Board did keep a veto right over the selected applications.
The committee is also expected to guide the projects to fruition. However, it is encouraged for the committee to extend the group with more volunteers, so as to lighten the workload and diversify points of view. For example, it would be really helpful to have volunteers who speak the language or are culturally close to the selected projects.
When the projects are finished and have reported on their experience, the Committee is almost done. A final task will be to make recommendations to the Board for the next phase of the Microgrants project – we’ve only just begun!
Do you want to translate this and other blogposts in your language..? Please send an email to communication@osmfoundation.org with subject: Helping with translations in [your language]
The OpenStreetMap Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation, formed to support the OpenStreetMap Project. It is dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free geospatial data for anyone to use and share. The OpenStreetMap Foundation owns and maintains the infrastructure of the OpenStreetMap project, is financially supported by membership fees and donations, and organises the annual, international State of the Map conference. It has no full-time employees and it is supporting the OpenStreetMap project through the work of our volunteer Working Groups. Please consider becoming a memberof the Foundation.
OpenStreetMap was founded in 2004 and is a international project to create a free map of the world. To do so, we, thousands of volunteers, collect data about roads, railways, rivers, forests, buildings and a lot more worldwide. Our map data can be downloaded for free by everyone and used for any purpose – including commercial usage. It is possible to produce your own maps which highlight certain features, to calculate routes etc. OpenStreetMap is increasingly used when one needs maps which can be very quickly, or easily, updated.
The OpenStreetMap Foundation and the global OpenStreetMap community welcome and encourage participation by everyone. Our community is based on mutual respect, tolerance, and encouragement, and we are working to help each other live up to these principles. We want our community to be more diverse: whoever you are, and whatever your background, we welcome you.
The Board then appointed the Diversity and Inclusion Special Committee to compile research and undertake new research on our diversity, identify root causes that contribute to any shortfalls, and make recommendations to help resolve issues and improve.
If you’re interested to take part, join one of the two upcoming starting meetings of the committee;
We’ll discuss the scope of work laid out by the Board, sketch initial work plans, and figure out logistics and timing and structure of future meetings.
Do you want to translate this and other blogposts in your language..? Please send an email to communication@osmfoundation.org with subject: Helping with translations in [your language]
The OpenStreetMap Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation, formed in the UK to support the OpenStreetMap Project. It is dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free geospatial data for anyone to use and share. The OpenStreetMap Foundation owns and maintains the infrastructure of the OpenStreetMap project, is financially supported by membership fees and donations, and organises the annual, international State of the Map conference. It has no full-time employees and it is supporting the OpenStreetMap project through the work of our volunteer Working Groups. Please consider becoming a memberof the Foundation.
OpenStreetMap was founded in 2004 and is a international project to create a free map of the world. To do so, we, thousands of volunteers, collect data about roads, railways, rivers, forests, buildings and a lot more worldwide. Our map data can be downloaded for free by everyone and used for any purpose – including commercial usage. It is possible to produce your own maps which highlight certain features, to calculate routes etc. OpenStreetMap is increasingly used when one needs maps which can be very quickly, or easily, updated.
State of the Map 2020 logo by Ed Nicolai,CC-BY-SA 4.0
State of the Map is the annual event for all mappers and OpenStreetMap users. We invite all OSM enthusiasts – whether you are a hobby mapper, a scientific researcher, a humanitarian, with an NGO or a government agency, a small business or a global company — to join us in Cape Town, July 3-5, 2020 as we share experiences and ideas of taking the OSM ecosystem forward.
We want to enable as many of you as possible to be part of State of the Map 2020. We are happy to announce that we can provide financial support, thanks to the generosity of our sponsors. This year we are offering new travel grants to reimburse a portion of travel costs, in addition to our previous program that fully covers all costs with a full scholarship.
If you are selected, we invite and expect participation at State of the Map. That could be a talk if selected by the program committee, or in lightning talk sessions we’ll make available for scholars. There are other ways to participate and support the operations of the conference while you attend too.
Each year we receive more scholarship applications than we are able to support. To help us best allocate the funds, please specify the minimum types of support you need to attend. If you are requesting a travel grant, then tell us the amount of money to cover a portion of your travel and make a difference to attending, or not.
Please review our privacy policy covering how we will handle the information in your application.
Here are some tips to help you complete your application. You can also check out Gregory’s post on how we selected scholars in 2017.
Select the minimum level of scholarship you need. This will help us to make the best use of limited funds and enable more scholars to join.
Make sure you clearly state your visa and travel requirements, as well as potential other funding sources.
Answer the question “Please describe your involvement in OSM and how will attending State of the Map benefit you, your local mapping community and the wider OpenStreetMap project” in 1500 characters maximum. Keep sentences short. Focus on the benefits to you and to OpenStreetMap.
We want to hear about your contributions to OpenStreetMap, your project or your group. We do not want an account of a group’s work but your individual part in it. Try to use “I” not “we“.
You may include links to your OpenStreetMap profile, a local group you run, or software you created. If your written answer is satisfactory to get in our shortlist – we might take a look at these additional details.
What topics or views will you bring to SotM that are otherwise missing?
What do you plan to achieve through coming to the SotM?
What do you plan to do when you return home after SotM?
Are you applying to organise sotm?
We encourage all applicants to already have passports and they should be valid 30 days from exit from South Africa and 6 months from entry in South Africa.
Review process
Reviewing scholarships
You can read about the scholarship review process for 2019 here. For SotM 2020 we again asked community members to join the review process, and will be finalizing the review team in the coming weeks.
Here’s a list of factors that we will consider when reviewing the applications:
Is the applicant part of an under-represented minority group?
Are they from an under-represented location?
Are they contributing to OSM in a substantial way? (Not only OpenStreetMap edits, but contributed to wiki and documentation, trainers, developers).
Have they applied previously and not gotten a scholarship?
Do they have a unique story or experience to share?
Are they in a position to share their SotM experience with a larger group?
Will their attendance benefit their local community in some way?
How difficult will their visa application be?
How will attending State of the Map benefit them and OpenStreetMap?
Are they interested in organizing future OpenStreetMap events?
The State of the Map conference is the annual, international conference of OpenStreetMap, organised by the OpenStreetMap Foundation. The OpenStreetMap Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation, formed in the UK to support the OpenStreetMap Project. It is dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free geospatial data for anyone to use and share. The OpenStreetMap Foundation owns and maintains the infrastructure of the OpenStreetMap project and you can support it by becoming a member. The State of the Map Organising Committee is one of our volunteer Working Groups.
OpenStreetMap was founded in 2004 and is a international project to create a free map of the world. To do so, we, thousands of volunteers, collect data about roads, railways, rivers, forests, buildings and a lot more worldwide. Our map data can be downloaded for free by everyone and used for any purpose – including commercial usage. It is possible to produce your own maps which highlight certain features, to calculate routes etc. OpenStreetMap is increasingly used when one needs maps which can be very quickly, or easily, updated.
Allan Mustard, the new OSMF board chairperson, is asking the OSM community members to share their perspectives on OSM’s Strengths, Weaknesses and Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) that OSM faces. Strengths and Weaknesses refer to internal facets of OSM over which we, the community, have control. Opportunities and Threats are external influences with which we may and in some cases must deal.
Allan writes: “One usual practice in SWOT analysis is “brainstorming”. There are two rules of brainstorming. First, no idea is bad. All ideas are good and may be added to the list. We are in that phase, so no matter how crazy or unusual your idea may be, if you believe it is a genuine SWOT, put it down. We will sort out the good from the less good later. Second, no ad hominem (i.e., personal) attacks. If somebody puts something on this page that you don’t like, express your opinion politely later on.“
You are welcome to also translate the initial page in other languages and add them to the OSM wiki. If you don’t know how, please send us an email to communication@osmfoundation.org
Reference materials about this type of analysis are on the wiki page. Discussion about the analysis can take place at the OSM wiki and the OSM diaries.
Thanks for participating 🙂
OSMCommunication Working Group
Do you want to translate this and other blogposts in your language..? Please send us an email to communication@osmfoundation.org with subject: Helping with translations in [your language]
The OpenStreetMap Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation, formed in the UK to support the OpenStreetMap Project. It is dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free geospatial data for anyone to use and share. The OpenStreetMap Foundation owns and maintains the infrastructure of the OpenStreetMap project, is financially supported by membership fees and donations, and organises the annual, international State of the Map conference. It has no full-time employees and it is supporting the OpenStreetMap project through the work of our volunteer Working Groups. Please consider becoming a memberof the OSM Foundation.
OpenStreetMap was founded in 2004 and is a international project to create a free map of the world. To do so, we, thousands of volunteers, collect data about roads, railways, rivers, forests, buildings and a lot more worldwide. Our map data can be downloaded for free by everyone and used for any purpose – including commercial usage. It is possible to produce your own maps which highlight certain features, to calculate routes etc. OpenStreetMap is increasingly used when one needs maps which can be very quickly, or easily, updated.
Preparation for State of the Map 2020, Cape Town is underway and the organizing team is calling upon you to join the scholarships review and selection team. We would like to set up a diverse team with a wide geographic scope, ethnic and gender diversity, and different kinds of experiences in the OpenStreetMap community.
State of the Map 2019 scholars. Photo by Thomas Skowron, CC BY 2.0
What does being part of the review team mean? Being on the scholar selection team means that you will read and rate most or all of the SotM 2020 scholarship applications. You will learn about interesting projects and about the contributions of other OSMers first hand. We will help you by providing the criteria to judge the applications. We expect the scoring to take a half day to a full day all together, spread out over several days. We will send you a spreadsheet or a link to an online spreadsheet and you will be asked to i) provide a single rating for each application and ii) add a note why you gave that rating. We will use those comments during the final selection.
After scoring the applications you can participate in the team’s discussions about the final selection – but this is not an absolute requirement. So, if you do not feel comfortable or have technical difficulties, do not worry. Please note that we expect any personal information provided by the applicants, or by other team members, to be kept confidential.
What is the timeline? Submissions for scholarship applications will open on January 15, 2020 and close on February 15, 2020 so you will have to read and rate the applications up to March 1, 2020. During the last week of February, you will be asked if you want to participate in the discussions about the final selection.
Are you interested?
If you are interested in being considered as a member of the selection team, please fill this form by January 7, 2020.
The State of the Map conference is the annual, international conference of OpenStreetMap, organised by the OpenStreetMap Foundation. The OpenStreetMap Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation, formed in the UK to support the OpenStreetMap Project. It is dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free geospatial data for anyone to use and share. The OpenStreetMap Foundation owns and maintains the infrastructure of the OpenStreetMap project and you can support it by becoming a member. The State of the Map Organising Committee is one of our volunteer Working Groups.
OpenStreetMap was founded in 2004 and is a international project to create a free map of the world. To do so, we, thousands of volunteers, collect data about roads, railways, rivers, forests, buildings and a lot more worldwide. Our map data can be downloaded for free by everyone and used for any purpose – including commercial usage. It is possible to produce your own maps which highlight certain features, to calculate routes etc. OpenStreetMap is increasingly used when one needs maps which can be very quickly, or easily, updated.
As of now we are accepting your talks and presentations in the following State of the Map 2020 tracks:
OSM Basics: Information dedicated to newcomers
Community & Foundation: Bringing people together, working group experiences, strategies & vision
Mapping: All about making the mapping easier and better
Cartography: Your ideas on how to create good-looking manifestations of the OSM dataset
Software Development: Software for processing and editing data
Data Analysis & Data Model: Reflections about the OSM data, its model and analysis of quality and completeness
User Experiences: Tell your surprising story of using OSM as an end-user
Art & Creativity: Creative projects with OSM
Academic Track: There will be a proper academic track, it will be announced separately
Art & Creativity is a completely new track at SotM. It provides a space to present your artistic and creative projects that use OpenStreetMap data or the OpenStreetMap theme to e.g. create clothing, jewellery, 3D printed objects, engravings, visualizations, computer or mobile games, virtual worlds, augmented reality, flyers, postcards, etc.
You will also find an additional submission type called Panel. Panels are for hot, controversial discussions around the OSM community, mapping and data. Topics may cover for example diversity, legal questions or the future of the database.
You will find the Call for Participation and the link to the submission form at:
If you’re reading this but giving a presentation is not your preferred way of helping make a great SotM conference, the SotM working group is also looking for your help. Please take a look at our recent blog post to read more about what we do and to find out where you could bring in your talents: https://blog.openstreetmap.org/2019/11/07/the-state-of-the-map-working-group-is-looking-for-you/
We are looking forward to your fresh ideas and beautiful maps!
SotM 2020 Program Committee
The State of the Map conference is the annual, international conference of OpenStreetMap, organised by the OpenStreetMap Foundation. The OpenStreetMap Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation, formed in the UK to support the OpenStreetMap Project. It is dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free geospatial data for anyone to use and share. The OpenStreetMap Foundation owns and maintains the infrastructure of the OpenStreetMap project and you can support it by becoming a member. The State of the Map Organising Committee is one of our volunteer Working Groups.
Organising the international State of the Map conference is a huge effort! But it can be broken down to small and straightforward tasks. We are looking for you! Are you interested in taking over one of our tasks? This post shows you what we’re doing – maybe there’s something here that you can help with. Or ask us for more details of tasks you are interested in!
What we’re doing
Next year’s SotM is usually announced at the end of the previous one. That means that work on next year’s SotM already starts before the current SotM even begins! We have to publish a call for bids and sort out the options with the local teams. And to make a well-founded and often difficult decision.
Preparing phase – shortly after SotM
Once a SotM is done, the SotM working group starts working with the local team for next year. The first steps are creating the logo and the prospectus for sponsors. Also, the website is launched around this time, and we sort out the possibilities for the social event.
The program committee start their work by setting up the call for papers. The scholarship committee also have to do a lot of preparation before they can publish their offer.
In the middle of the year – growing phase
Finding sponsors, the call for papers, and scholarships or travel grants are the activities that dominate this phase. Then the review phase for both talk submissions and scholarship applications starts. Finishing the schedule and adjusting with the speakers can be a challenge. The website team has to include the sponsor logos and provide content about the venue, and later the schedule.
The hot phase before the conference
Ticket sales is opened. We have to ensure that all speakers have tickets. This year we were sold out and we had to answer a lot of questions.
Catering has to be ordered. The social event has to be fixed.
Scholars have to be managed. In the past we arranged travel for them and helped apply for a visa if necessary. Also accommodation has to be sorted out for them.
Sponsors have to be taken care of. They get vouchers for conference tickets, and they can provide input for the booklet. Some sponsors may have special requirements.
A lot of design work comes our way in this phase too: signs, banners, but also the T-shirts.
Also, the the program booklet is considerable work until it is perfect.
The video recording (and, if possible, streaming) has to be arranged, and we need to check the local internet access situation.
Shortly before the conference we set up a Telegram group. We have to coordinate a lot of volunteers who help during the conference at the welcome desk, at catering, in the sessions, or with the video cameras.
How you can help
Design work
Logo
Website layout
Sponsor prospectus layout
Booklet layout
Banners, signs
T-Shirt design
Certificate of attendance
Sponsorship
Preparing the sponsor packages
Finding sponsors
Communication with sponsors
Collecting the logos and booklet ads
Issue ticket vouchers to sponsors
Sponsor logo on slides and banners
Preparing sponsor booths at the conference
Administrative work
Budget planning
Financial coordination with OSMF
Planning the timeline
Preparing group meetings
Setting up the registration system
Administration of group mailing lists
Conference insurance
Legal and permission issues
Safety considerations
Program
Call for presentations
Looking for interesting speakers
Setting up the talk submission system
Review of the submissions
Working out a proper schedule
Communication with speakers
Coordination with scholarship team
Canceling, changing, rearranging talks
Poster competition
Keynote speakers
OSM Awards
Travel Grant
Call for scholarship
Review of the submissions
Travel management, accommodation
Invitation letters
Preparing a travel guide for scholars
Local work
Social event (space, catering, music)
Conference catering
Organizing a pre-event
Hotel reservations
Name badges, lanyards
Ordering of T-Shirts
Ordering of banners
Printing out of Posters and Signs
Preparing the venue (video, wifi)
Communication
Website content: sponsors, venue, accommodation, attendees, call for presentations, etc.
Creating texts for Twitter, blog posts, mailing lists, newsletter etc.
Translation into other languages
Answering mails of attendees
Telegram groups (during the conference)
Conference work
Managing the volunteers
Preparing tables, poster walls
Setting up banner, signs etc.
Welcome desk
Video & streaming
Video cutting, upload
Collecting slides of speakers
Catering
Session moderation
Technical assistance in sessions
Code of Conduct team
Looking for the next venue
Call for bids
Communication on mailing lists etc.
Communication with applying teams
Review and decision process
Communication
We mainly collaborate via email and on Github in English. The core SotM team has voice meetings on Mumble.
The State of the Map conference is the annual, international conference of OpenStreetMap, organised by the OpenStreetMap Foundation. The OpenStreetMap Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation, formed in the UK to support the OpenStreetMap Project. It is dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free geospatial data for anyone to use and share. The OpenStreetMap Foundation owns and maintains the infrastructure of the OpenStreetMap project and you can support it by becoming a member. The State of the Map Organising Committee is one of our volunteer Working Groups.
Joining the OpenStreetMap Foundation used to always require a membership fee (£15 per year, which you can pay by PayPal or bank transfer). However, if you are involved in the OpenStreetMap project, and cannot pay this membership fee, it can be waived. Some OSMers live in a country under economic sanction/embargo (and thus without PayPal). Others are in nations where the bank transfer costs themselves exceed the cost of membership. Others live under circumstances where this fee alone would constitute a substantial personal financial hardship. One of the main reasons for the Membership Fee Waiver program, is a wish to be more representative of mappers from around the world.
To address this, the Fee Waiver Program was created, which, for those who qualify, will grant an Associate Membership in the Foundation at no cost, subject to annual renewal.
Some reasons to join the OSMF
As a member of the Foundation you can influence the future direction of the project by
voting in the annual OSM Foundation elections for the board that steers the project.
Without being a member you can still edit OpenStreetMap, by creating a free account at https://www.openstreetmap.org and help the Foundation by joining one of the Working Groups.
Eligibility
Currently you are eligible to apply for a fee waiver if:
You are an active mapper, and are from a country which lacks suitable money transfer.
You are an active mapper, and paying the membership fee would present an unreasonable burden to you because of financial hardship
Please note that there might be changes after the 2019 Annual General Meeting.
Languages
You can apply in a language other than English.
Where to find more information
Please read the Fee Waiver manual on the OSM wiki, to find out how to fill the forms, the procedure and the links to the forms.
How to help
If you are interested in helping more people from your community become members of the Foundation, please:
Contact the Communication Working Group (communication@osmfoundation.org) if you are willing to translate submissions in your native (or other languages) to English. You will have to sign a non-disclosure agreement.
The fee-waiver program has been developed under the Board’s direction by the volunteers of the Membership Working Group, with particular thanks to Joost Schouppe, Michael Spreng and Steve Friedl who have kept up the regular work with the Registrar.
Do you want to translate this and other blogposts in your language..? Please send an email to communication@osmfoundation.org with subject: Helping with translations in [your language]
The OpenStreetMap Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation, formed in the UK to support the OpenStreetMap Project. It is dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free geospatial data for anyone to use and share. The OpenStreetMap Foundation owns and maintains the infrastructure of the OpenStreetMap project, is financially supported by membership fees and donations, and organises the annual, international State of the Map conference. It has no full-time employees and it is supporting the OpenStreetMap project through the work of our volunteer Working Groups. Please consider becoming a member.
It’s difficult to detect patterns in the huge variety of experiences and perspectives in the responses to the OSM community survey. What is clear from the responses of over 300 people (thank you all!) is that community is valued, important and desired; as well as complicated, and energy and time consuming. One common thread is the need for more support for community building efforts. The specific ideas for that support vary so much, as well as who and how to marshal the effort.
Communities vary from isolated mappers who only see others editing on the map but don’t connect online or offline in person, to places with a full formal organized presence. But an organization doesn’t guarantee a growing, connected and vibrant community. Most places are in between, from a few friends coordinating together closely, to a core group with ‘fly by tourist mappers’, to places with regular meetups and local conferences. The scope of what people consider their community varies from an individual city or region, to an entire country, to being a part of several places. Many feel disconnected or unconcerned with the “global community”, though some feel the global community is their community, with unique issues and dynamics of its own. The communication channels people prefer are probably only going to grow from the large list we have already.
Yes, you can say that anyone who bothers to answer this survey would be a biased self selected sample, and of course would care about community. Someone happily mapping without talking to anyone wouldn’t care about a survey, and certainly there are some people who are happy to edit OSM without talking to others. But, these community connections — online and offline in person — are widely agreed as the key to what makes OSM work. A bunch of disconnected people editing a database without talking to each other would fail. We can do more together than apart. The means to connect and support all these communities is the major challenge.
Below we present some of the numbers from the quantitative questions, and some individual reflections from the Board. We don’t anticipate this is the only post from this survey; there’s a lot to work through here, so likely more to come.
You are welcome to read and draw your own conclusions from the anonymous answers to the set of narrative questions on community; find those shared at the bottom of this post.
Stats
This survey was filled in by people who saw the link and decided to fill it out. So it is obviously not a random sample of the OSM community. That was always the plan, but it means we should tread with care to generalize. For example, if we see that many Latin Americans in our sample are using Telegram, that might just mean that by chance the link has only been visibly shared on that network.
Although we had 310 useful responses, not everyone filled out the interesting free text questions. For example, the first block of open questions was answered (at least partially) by 204 people.
Volunteers translated the survey itself, as well as the answers. This was a huge job, as there were 139 people who filled in the survey in Spanish, German, French, Italian, Hungarian, Portuguese, Farsi, Chinese and Lithuanian.
Background
People could mark any of the below to describe their involvement in OSM. People who didn’t mark anything aren’t included in the graph below.
Communications channels
The graph below shows the communication channels sorted by number of readers. Thematic and local mailing lists together are the most widely read, as well as contributed-to channels.
We look forward to dig further into the data. One thing we already did, was have a look at how the communication channels differ by region. The below graph shows the percentage of people by region who follow a certain channel. This brings up some interesting data points. For example, mailing lists seem most popular in Asia and least in Africa. The Weekly and the blog are underrepresented in Latin America. Telegram is popular there (and to a lesser extent in Asia), Slack in North-America and Facebook in Asia and Africa. The forum stands out by being so consistent. There were only 3 responses from Oceania, so can not draw any pattern from those.
Countries
People from 45 different countries filled in the survey.
Germany – 35 US – 33 Italy – 17 France – 16 UK – 15 Spain – 11 Argentina – 7 Hungary – 7 Switzerland – 7
5 or less respondents Brazil Guinea Philippines Australia Belgium India Portugal Canada Colombia Denmark Japan Lithuania Nigeria Paraguay Poland Sweden Belarus Bolivia Europe Indonesia Iran Ivory Coast Kazakhstan Luxembourg Malaysia Mexico Panama Peru Romania Russia South Africa Taiwan Thailand Togo Uganda Ukraine
Reflections from board members
from Joost
Is there a community? Do you meet other mappers? Some of you seemed surprised by the very question. And in other places, there is more going on than you can follow. But national activity is not enough. Even if there’s for example an Italian community, people organize in their own more local area. Some of these groups are really inspiring – and though the OSM weekly does a great job highlighting what’s happening everywhere, we still picked up things we hadn’t heard of. A suggestion was a yearly report on what is happening locally. We were pleasantly surprised to hear about what is happening in for example Bretagne or Piedmonte. But then in a place like New York City, even if a lot of things happened in the past, current heavy mappers might feel rather alone. A different kind of struggle happens in low population places, where mappers are just too far apart.
from Mikel
In the early years of OpenStreetMap, it was easy to just do it. If you had an idea and energy, there was nothing but space to try things out. After 15 years, OSM has grown enormously, accreted data, communication channels, cultural practices and history, and its harder to see ideas through to actualization. There’s still no shortage of inspiration, as the ideas in the survey show. How can we cultivate the space to make it easy to just try things out again?
To name a few ideas that stuck out for me: annual reports, grants, “twinning” chapters, individuals who “bridge” communities, community building training, informal planned live chats between communities.
Exciting and exhausting. It’s takes energy for all these things. Take one example: microgrants. The jury is out on whether this will help build community or not, but that’s certainly the intention. The OSMF Board have wanted to do this for years. We’re actually fairly close to launching this finally, but it’s taken so long.
In the middle of reviewing the responses, I had to do something, so I built an interactive map from of the OSM Community Index. Yet another map solves nothing, but satisfying to see our presence across the globe, and think about better ways to share what’s happening between us.
Excited to talk about this all in Heidelberg! Especially think the Local Chapter Congress can be a place to pick up some of these topics.
from Heather
OSMF should consider a community engagement plan to further delve into the needs of the ‘community of communities.’ There is a large potential to, with a data-enabled process, make some ‘light-touch’ adjustments to improve the health of the network. This should be done in consultation with the various groups across OSM. We need to buid on activities, events, and surveys to a more inclusive, distributed plan.
from Frederik
Browsing through the answers we got here, I see a serious need for arbitration in the future. The issues people want prioritized are often contrary – one person wants more of something, the other wants to ban the same thing altogether. There are many issues on which the OSMF hasn’t defined for themselves a clear standpoint, and for good reason – because even without a survey it was clear that opinions differ greatly. Many people seem to expect things from the OSMF that would far exceed its current, established mandate. Does that mean the OSMF should expand its influence – or have those who want the OSMF to stand back and shut up simply not participated?
from Tobias
The survey responses seem to demonstrate a considerable appetite for a more unified OSM community communication platform. At the same time, they also make it clear that we often look for very different things in communication channels, and that preferences regarding the existing ones also vary wildly between contributors, making this a challenging situation for our project. I believe it’s important to continue improving OSM’s own communication platforms, which might mean technological updates as well as working on our social dynamics. Our goal should be spaces that people enjoy visiting and productively contributing to. If we succeed in this effort, we might even win over some contributors who currently choose to use third-party tools.
Several participants shared their insights about local events and meetups: The benefits for motivation and community building, but also their struggles in getting regular meetings off the ground or keeping existing groups alive. While these initiatives must ultimately be run by local community members, the OSMF should explore possibilities to offer support. Suggestions from the survey included making existing groups more visible on the OSM website, providing tools for finding other local contributors interested in such events, and improving the osm.org messaging tools.
Although not strictly about communication and communities, the more open-ended questions saw many of the pressing issues from our previous survey brought up again – which should remind us that the OSMF, and the board in particular, must make faster and more visible progress on addressing them.
Finally, kudos to WeeklyOSM! While reading through the responses, it stood out to me how often this channel was mentioned in a positive light, especially given the controversial opinions on many other platforms. Providing an overview of the vast OSM landscape with its fractured platforms and sub-communities is an invaluable service.
Partial Dataset released
Many community members have allowed us to share their answers publicly, aggregated and anonymously. We are now sharing the answers to the first set of questions:
What is happening in your local community?
What about your local community should be more widely known? What can other communities learn from yours?
Do you meet other mappers in person? Is there a local community beyond mapping?
Are you engaged in the “global community”. If you aren’t, why not?
What do you think could improve the interaction between global and local communities? How can you help?
Do you know who organises the global State of the Map conference? If you’re going to SotM, why? If you’re not going to SotM, why not?
There were 158 individuals that have answered at least one of those questions and gave us permission to share their answers. You can find that partial dataset at the OSMF website.
If you prefer an online spreadsheet, we have also put them at framacalc, but please note that the OSMF spreadsheet is the definite reference.
The OpenStreetMap Foundation is a not-for-profit organisation, formed in the UK to support the OpenStreetMap Project. It is dedicated to encouraging the growth, development and distribution of free geospatial data for anyone to use and share. The OpenStreetMap Foundation owns and maintains the infrastructure of the OpenStreetMap project, is financially supported by membership fees and donations, and organises the annual, international State of the Map conference. It has no full-time employees and it is supporting the OpenStreetMap project through the work of our volunteer Working Groups. Please consider becoming a member and read about our fee-waiver program.
