OpenStreetMap

Introduction

I have been walking the Mumbai back alleys and streets lately. I have noticed a lot of businesses. Either B2C or B2B setups, but small ones. They definitely do not have computers. Some setups do not even have a name board. They are industrious and produce useful products. For e.g. the Leather Industry in Dharavi produce export quality products.

Problem / Issue

It is very probable that an outdated system of selling through middle men is the one prevalent by which the artisans and skilled / semi skilled labourers get money. If we connect them with people who would be interested in directly dealing with them, they might make more money and possibly lead improved lives. Possibly.

Initial Thoughts on Mapping solutions

I was wondering about making a mapping project where we put such shops / businesses on the map with 2 tags : 1. A phone number 2. A list of words describing the products / services provided

Feedback ?

I would appreciate feedback on this - at a technical execution level, your comments on feasibility, references to similar work done in other places, best way to approach this etc. Apart from this, is there any value in collecting more data along the way which might be useful for other work? Some advice?

Discussion

Comment from escada on 10 February 2016 at 11:44

I don’t like a tagging scheme with only phone and description tags. I would try to fit them into a scheme with a shop or craft tag. Maybe even man_made=works, product=xxx

Another solution is making a umap (http://umap.openstreetmap.fr) and then you have to freedom of mapping the businesses as you want.

Comment from SK53 on 10 February 2016 at 16:55

If these are small shops or small craft workshops then tag them as such. It would be an excellent exercise to have one or two such places mapped in detail: only in doing so does one discover exactly what might need to be tagged.

I’d slightly take issue with the idea that selling good through a middle man is outdated. Many OSM contributors in North America & Europe, likely sell their labour exactly that way as contractors in IT industries. Certainly friends who run craft shops in Britain also need the middle men to provide them with work when tourists aren’t around during the winter.

Direct selling can often be much more expensive than using intermediaries, and particularly so for smaller businesses, but I applaud your sympathy for these folk. It’s worth talking to some of them: I think you might be surprised how well they know the marketplace they are in. Certainly I’ve had some really illuminating conversations with people running fast food outlets and local stores in the UK whilst out mapping.

Comment from ArunMaharajan on 11 February 2016 at 04:11

Hi @escada , how is Umap different from the regular maps? Sorry for asking such basic questions. I am only a couple of days old to open source mapping.

Comment from ArunMaharajan on 11 February 2016 at 04:13

@SK53 … Thats a good point you make. Middle men are useful only as long as they do not control the prices and use the workers as slaves of some sort. Such things tend to happen here. But you are correct about me actually doing some field work to discover the ground reality…then the tagging scheme which will be most effective will reveal itself. Thank you for that tip.

Comment from escada on 11 February 2016 at 06:18

With umap, you can add your own “layers” with data that does not have to be part of the OpenStreetMap database. You could e.g. add a layer with your customers (when you are a business).

Since the data is not part of the OpenStreetMap (OSM) database, you can use any tags/format you like. Of course, the drawback is that other people will not be able to use your data, they can only look at your “umap”.

When you add data to OSM, you need to follow certain rules, one of them is that you need to classify the things you want to add, e.g. by adding the shop or craft tag. (which is also mentioned by SK53).

Comment from ArunMaharajan on 11 February 2016 at 07:18

Thanks @escada! Its clear now.

Comment from dieterdreist on 23 February 2016 at 11:49

I think it’s perfectly fine to add them to OSM. You can also add a phone-numer with the tag “phone”, an Email with the tag “email” and a website with the tag “website”, but I’d consider these as attributes to a main tag. This main tag should tell what it is about, e.g. with the tags “shop” and/or “craft” (wouldn’t use shop for exclusive B2B I think). If these tags are not sufficient to describe what this is about, add subtags, try to formally describe what they are and what they offer. The tag “description” can be used as a last resort (free text, no formalization), but it isn’t very suitable for describing stuff the osm way because it is working bad for semantic searches. I suggest you better extend the tagging system if the current tags are not sufficiently detailed rather than stuffing evering into the description.

Comment from ArunMaharajan on 23 February 2016 at 13:16

Thanks dieterdresit for your comments. I am studying the way OSM works right now. How easy is it to extend the tagging system?

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