Another instance of this is nudging mappers toward tagging houses more specifically. building=detached could be used where building=house in many cases, particularly in large swaths of the USA where most residential properties are single-family homes.

My suggestion is a popup in iD (of course with an “ignore for 3 months” or “ignore forever” button) that suggests to mappers building houses that there are more granular values.

IMHO, one of OSM’s greatest strengths is the data quality in areas that are well mapped and maintained. I believe such a popup could be used for a plethora of confusing tags: surface=gravel vs. compacted, bleachers vs. grandstands, storage tanks vs. silos vs. water towers, different types of residential real estate (house/detached…), garden allotments vs. community garden, basins vs. reservoirs, etc. Helping accelerate mappers knowledge of tagging without requiring them to navigate to the wiki would help the project improve.

Thanks for the replies! I think you’ve both made good points for keeping the suggestion as-is. Appreciate the dialogue.