OpenStreetMap in Serbia

Član
Učlanjen(a)
04.07.2010
Poruka
1
Good evening,

please apologise, I don't speak any serbian. I am Thomas and live in Germany. I have some special questions to you. If you prefer, you can write/answer in german as well. Don't worry, I don't want to talk about football. But you can be proud to have won against us, which the Brits and Argies wasn't able to do. ;-)

My main question is why OpenStreetMap (OSM) seems to be so unpopular in Serbia? OSM is like Wikipedia for maps.
I know a very pretty girl from Vrsac -just met her today in Germany- and I had taken a look at the city in OSM. As you may know, Vrsac has roundabout 33.000 inhabitants. In OSM is just one street
OpenStreetMap

My town with roughly 20.000 inhabitants looks like this (with comparison to Google Maps)
Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
As you can see it is much more detailed.

Going to two random cities in other countries (always in comparison with Google Maps)

Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
Alkmaar (Netherlands), never heart, just as an example, or

Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
Folkestone(England)

Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
Viciebsk (Ukraine)

or even North Korea
Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
no street at all in Google

Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
North Korea's capital


Russia is also somehow difficult as you need a license to map streets and so on (I have heart so). And many areas are far away from being perfect. But in some areas it is still better than Google Maps
Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools

So why is OSM so unpopular in Serbia?

Usually the question came up why to do this with having Google Maps etc for free in the internet. First of all, do you like to give so much power to one single US based company? Second, Google Maps is not so "free" as you may think. If you want to print a party invitation with a marker on the location, you're not allowed to do that with Google Maps. I know, usually no one cares, but at least in if you run a business, you don't want to be sued by Google, or the map data providers behind (namely NAVTEQ and Tele Atlas). You can do this with OSM for free -even commerical- just by printing the name of licence below the map (its one sentence).
You can't load the Google maps to your outdoor GPS. You can do with OSM. Okay, it only makes sense if there are footpaths in OSM. It takes a while, but it could look like this
OpenStreetMap

Lastly, GPS navigation for cars have cost at least 100 Euro in Germany. The company Skobbler (Locations und Freunde finden - skobbler) started to offer a GPS for 3,99 Euro for the iPhone and a totally free solution for Android phones. Since then, GPS navigation for phones became much cheaper in Germany. At the end it will effect stand alone GPS navigation devices too.

How can you help?
The easiest solution is to provide some GPS tracks. You can record it with GPS mobile phones or outdoor GPS unist like Garmin and upload it to OSM. Or you can help to map your area. If you want to improve the map, this would be good starting point
Serbia - OpenStreetMap Wiki


Thanks a lot.
Thomas

P.S. One last thing please. Don't copy from Google. Companies like Google (or the map makers behind Google) would be more than happy to sue OSM for hundreds of millions for copyright infringement, just to destroy a competitor that offer map data for free.











 
Član
Učlanjen(a)
16.06.2010
Poruka
51
Good evening,

please apologise, I don't speak any serbian. I am Thomas and live in Germany. I have some special questions to you. If you prefer, you can write/answer in german as well. Don't worry, I don't want to talk about football. But you can be proud to have won against us, which the Brits and Argies wasn't able to do. ;-)

My main question is why OpenStreetMap (OSM) seems to be so unpopular in Serbia? OSM is like Wikipedia for maps.
I know a very pretty girl from Vrsac -just met her today in Germany- and I had taken a look at the city in OSM. As you may know, Vrsac has roundabout 33.000 inhabitants. In OSM is just one street
OpenStreetMap

My town with roughly 20.000 inhabitants looks like this (with comparison to Google Maps)
Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
As you can see it is much more detailed.

Going to two random cities in other countries (always in comparison with Google Maps)

Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
Alkmaar (Netherlands), never heart, just as an example, or

Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
Folkestone(England)

Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
Viciebsk (Ukraine)

or even North Korea
Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
no street at all in Google

Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools
North Korea's capital


Russia is also somehow difficult as you need a license to map streets and so on (I have heart so). And many areas are far away from being perfect. But in some areas it is still better than Google Maps
Map Compare | Geofabrik Tools

So why is OSM so unpopular in Serbia?

Usually the question came up why to do this with having Google Maps etc for free in the internet. First of all, do you like to give so much power to one single US based company? Second, Google Maps is not so "free" as you may think. If you want to print a party invitation with a marker on the location, you're not allowed to do that with Google Maps. I know, usually no one cares, but at least in if you run a business, you don't want to be sued by Google, or the map data providers behind (namely NAVTEQ and Tele Atlas). You can do this with OSM for free -even commerical- just by printing the name of licence below the map (its one sentence).
You can't load the Google maps to your outdoor GPS. You can do with OSM. Okay, it only makes sense if there are footpaths in OSM. It takes a while, but it could look like this
OpenStreetMap

Lastly, GPS navigation for cars have cost at least 100 Euro in Germany. The company Skobbler (Locations und Freunde finden - skobbler) started to offer a GPS for 3,99 Euro for the iPhone and a totally free solution for Android phones. Since then, GPS navigation for phones became much cheaper in Germany. At the end it will effect stand alone GPS navigation devices too.

How can you help?
The easiest solution is to provide some GPS tracks. You can record it with GPS mobile phones or outdoor GPS unist like Garmin and upload it to OSM. Or you can help to map your area. If you want to improve the map, this would be good starting point
Serbia - OpenStreetMap Wiki


Thanks a lot.
Thomas

P.S. One last thing please. Don't copy from Google. Companies like Google (or the map makers behind Google) would be more than happy to sue OSM for hundreds of millions for copyright infringement, just to destroy a competitor that offer map data for free.



OSM is not popular because we have google maps.
View this example:
GOOGLE 3-D MAPE - KARTE | BALKAN RSS - MOJBUK.COM

Click on the button to open the map.
 
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