The inspiration for this diary comes from the email sent to the HOT mailing list. I must say that I’m not involved in Missing Maps anymore, so I don’t currently use the HOT Tasking Manager (TM). Also, I’m the author of the competing project. That’s the disclaimer.

I will start with the point since when the HOT Tasking Manager became unacceptable for me. That was when mappers began to be forced to provide their email addresses. The reason was: just 4% of the mappers shared it.

The purpose of a Tasking Manager is to divide big area into smaller squares that a human can map. Then, let mappers communicate on what they are working on by changing the states of the squares. So, TM helps with a group mapping management.

However, the changes go to the OpenStreetMap. You don’t have to use Tasking Manager to update OpenStreetMap, but you (must) use OpenStreetMap when working with a Tasking Manager. OpenStreetMap itself provides communication channels for mappers, particularly changeset discussions and private messages.

Changeset discussion is used to discuss changes mappers do in the OpenStreetMap. Private messaging is used to send direct messages between mappers. In both cases a notification is sent by email.

We are almost there. So, why is the communication within the HOT Tasking Manager wrong? Because the HOT TM duplicates the communication about things it does not manage – changes to the OpenStreetMap. Because it allows group and automated messages/emails that are, by definition, depersonalized. Because it confuses beginner mappers about which communication channels are really important.

I would like to end with a proposal for the HOT Tasking Manager developers. Please, keep the functionality of the HOT Tasking Manager non-overlapping with the OpenStreetMap. Please, do leverage OpenStreetMap for the rest.