Google Maps

Please see "Fun with Google Maps"
cirhomepage.boards.net/thread/560/fun-google-maps

The short answer is that you can edit Google Maps listings directly and should! Google doesn't really have a coherent way of romanizing Japanese place names. Basic geographical info and names are taken from the Zenrin map data Google Maps in Japan are based on.

It's up to the users/owners of facilities to fix English listings through crowdsourcing. I think the more you do the more Google will accept your changes. Including pictures with the English name is helpful if they exist. Other Google Guides users can also vote on your changes and affirm they are correct or not.

If you/the government is doing this officially maybe register yourself as the "owner of this businesses" so that others can't change these listings.
I do most of my edits as just a third-party (on behalf of businesses/ tourist attractions in town).

I just wanna say, wow marudate your Google Maps guide is spot on about the semi-automated approval algorithm and actual ppl involved with fact checking. I used to do temp-work for Google Maps while they were coming up with the algorithm and I was one of the many many ppl approving edits and calling places to confirm info.

This looks like a good project for a lot of CIRs. Do you usually do your editing in your capacity as a CIR, or voluntarily on your own account? I'm thinking about how to sell this to my department as an idea for the future, since we're doing a lot with multilingual info of city facilities nowadays.

This is a project that I do at work as part of my duties and whenever I find a nice place other English speakers might enjoy (while waiting for food upload a pic, add an English name, confirm hours, etc.) It's also something I can do when I'm tired or have nothing else to do at work.

I work in the tourism division, so one of my duties was to create a standardized list of English place names and terms for my town. We have standardized English pamphlets, on-site tourist information maps, Google Maps and more using these names. For any facility I directly work with as part of our English Consulting program, fixing the maps/names on sites like Google Maps is one of the first things I do.  

We don't want people to come to town and get lost, be unable to search for a place they want because of non-standardized spellings, and want maps and word of mouth to help propel people to visit less famous places. After registering a not-well known panoramic viewpoint and adding a picture from it to Google Maps we've seen a burst in popularity. 50,000+ people have seen this picture on the maps in a year!

I presented about our use of Google Maps at a forum on images (movies, stills, design, etc.) and how the pictures on it get more views than Instagram, etc. I was told afterwards that one of the attendees was with the regional branch of a economic promotion ministry (can look up which one it was) and that they are now doing grants to add images/fix up Google Maps.

I also uncovered long-gone places still registered, a beautiful panoramic park whose mailing address is located at town hall having the map marker also be at town hall (nope), places not on the underlying Zenrin maps excluded (most famous island in the area not on it because it was originally a driving map), etc.

Message me for details as it's something the town/region here is proud of and would like to see other places do, too.

How did the buses make it onto the Yahoo app? Somebody contacted them and got the info on it. There are bus schedules for some localities in Japan on Google Maps.
maps.google.com/landing/transit/index.html

Here is a list of participating cities: maps.google.com/landing/transit/cities/index.html

Hey all, Google Maps rolled out amazing machine translation for user comments! Awesome! Here's a fine example of it in action (NSFW)

(Translated by Google)
I went three years ago. A shabby grandmother who is fucking with a fucking father and using it carefully. Because it came different from what I asked, when I talked to the ordering grandmother to talk about it to me, I shouted yesterday when I shouted "Why did I hear so! Because it is saying with too much sword curtain, "I'm fine with it" I said. Orange juice I asked the grandmother because I asked, but from behind I said 'I do not!' It was on the menu, though. The grandmother is solely dedicated to her honorific language. That grandma really looked pretty.

I saw that this fine establishment has closed (tear)
So as not to lose this fine example of Engrish I have decided to quote its entirety (and the shocking Japanese it is based on)

Yes, it is glorious! All hail machine intelligence. BIG DATA + MACHINE LEARNING = fucking fuckety!

I do not!

So I've been mucking around a bit with some places on Google Maps in my city, adjusted a few wrong names and added a few places which were missing. There are, however, a number of my corrections that have been 'Pending' for a while now, while others get accepted pretty much instantly. I first thought it might have something to do with businesses being 'claimed', but with some of my pending-edits the facilities are still up for grabs, so to speak. I'm wondering if it's a matter of the difference between data Google has received from Zenrin or from other sources.

marudate, has your city hall claimed all the facilities they manage through the city on Maps? For most city facilities like 公民館 and sports facilities, the places are still unclaimed in Koriyama.

I verified some Koriyama spots, I hope it helps. There are a lot sitting there. Be sure to check other people's contributions too if you have time!

marudate, thanks for verifying edits in Koriyama! I'm still waiting for the approval of the 市民文化センター and the ヨーク開成山スタジアム. The latter changed its name recently and the Japanese name was edited soon enough, but it's not accepting the addition of its official English title (York Kaiseizan Stadium).

Let me know if you need verification on anything btw!

Hi.

*hacker voice* I'm in.

Do I just assume everything in Koriyama is correct, and approve everything?

Excellent work, agent Mumbles.

Yeah just click on things where the name was changed and if it's a fixed English name it's probably our man on the ground.