3rd bot wave or simply the most stupid reviewers? ... and a still not fixxed issue ....

Raachermannl-INGRaachermannl-ING Posts: 1,070 ✭✭✭✭✭

During the last week I got a bunch of really crazy rejections for usually foolproof candidates like info boards of educational trails. Further a bunch of very strange rejection reasons, that lead again to the problems with the bot rejection waves ....

So @NianticGiffard there is a some stuff for investigation, and a very old unsolved issue is also adressed.


Rejection reason "not visually unique"

First of all this rejection reason is a big hint for the bot rejections, according to the older threads about the German bot rejection waves. People from federal states Bavaria and Baden-Württemberg (so those, who lived closest to the abuse hub Kempten) got lots of rejections with the subcategory reasons. During that time I had also lots of rejections, but my region (federal state Saxony) was only at the edge of the reviewing area of the bots. So the bots influenced my submissions, but not fully dominated the results. So I had an unusual high amount of rejections, but not a single one with these subcategory rejection reasons.

But now I got three such rejections within a few days ....

But before we discuss another aspect of this rejection reason:

Afaik there was somewhere an old Nia-statement, that this rejection reason should not exist, or at least low stars in the subcategories cultural value and visual uniqueness should not lead to a rejecting vote. The statement about this should be older, I guess it was from @NianticCasey-ING .... But obviously this problem is still unresolved. Down there is an example, that does have "not visually unique" as its one and only rejection reason.

Very old example and my idea, what could be wrong in the code:

Iirc I had this rejection reason only once in the past:

These two wayspots are a townhall of a small medieval town, and right next to it a maypole with guild crests. The maypole was the older wayspot, and had another picture back then. So more of the townhall was in the picture. I submitted the townhall, and got a rejection

So we assumed, that a bunch of shallow reviewers, that didn't even read the texts, have voted for duplicate.

Then the duplicate votes weren't enough to reject the submission as duplicate. But maybe the duplicate votes are still counted as rejection votes, and only a few more weak rejections like "not visually unique" are then nethertheless the K.O. for the nomination ....

If I'm right, then it's easy to fix this: duplicate votes should count only towards a duplicate decision, and not as rejection votes for the further process.

The following examples underline this theory, since there are also existing wayspots nearby, that could have been reasons for wrong duplicate votes:


1st actual example for "not visually unique"

Hiking trail marker nominations have a hard time in Germany since ever. They get rejected on and on .... so surprisingly this one is without rejection reasons "Other rejection Criteria" or the other funny things, that I'm used to, like "Pedestrian Access" or "Natural Feature" .....

So it's nethertheless crazy, that this nominations is rejected only because of the subcategory. But again there are a bunch of other trail markers nearby:

This candidate is the northern exclamation mark, the southern one is also a rejected trail marker (a weaker one, but it's still the traditional minimum: directional sign with trail name on it)

So there are three other hiking trail markers nearby:

Obviously not a single one looks identical to justify a duplicate vote. Nethertheless shallow reviewers may have chosen that. To explain, why there are so many trail markers nearby: the trails there are arranged around a waterfall. There are two different named trail around there: educational trail "Wildes Erzgebirge" and the 40km trail "Drei-Talsperren-Wanderweg" (literally translated: three-river-dam-trail).

The second one is also used as a Marathon-route, but with a few changes of the route. You can see this in the initial example - on the signs you can see signs for "Drei-Talsperren-Wanderweg" and for "Drei-Talsperren-Marathon". The educational trail also has two different routes here - one along the steep paths around the waterfall, and one, that uses a flatter and better paved route to reach the waterfall.

2nd actual example for "not visually unique"

Location close to https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=50.57397,12.611372&z=17&pll=50.57397,12.611372

Temporary or seasonal display? Yes, snow is temporary. But not the god damn hiking trail marker.

Link from support text

3rd actual example for "not visually unique"

This infoboard is part of an educational trail about the local mining history, wiki-link. So the trail had roughly 3 dozens infoboards of this type. Another one is only 50-100m next to this one: https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=50.58756,12.625857&z=17&pll=50.58756,12.625857

Supporting picture is taken in a way, that especially this house can be seen in the photo. So obviously a different infoboard. To distinguish them the reviewer could read the texts, but that's unsuitable ... irony off....


A rejection, that is so stupid, that my own explanation for this is an AI ...

The rejection reason URL can be explained: I had a link to the wikipedia-article of the educational trail in the supporting statement. Nethertheless the persons, who vote this way, are qualified for a nice (explanatory!) mail from the staff and a (temporary?) ban.

Location: 100m south of https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=50.583656,12.628383&z=17&pll=50.583656,12.628383

But it's totally ridiculous for me, how a person with IQ above Celsius-room-temperature can vote Natural feature here. My only idea is, that the entrance signs of nature preserved areas in Eastern Germany have the same yellow color and nearly the same pentagonal shape, for example like this one:

But even a DAU would see on first glance, that there is no owl, and a lot of text. Further the hammer and chisel as symbol for mining history is everything, but not a natural feature. But an AI, that learned about these nature signs could decide based on color and pentagonal shape ....






Miscelleaneous other stupid rejections from the last days

Location: around https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=50.455414,12.647715&z=17&pll=50.455414,12.647715

Submitter identifiable by shadow? Srsly?

Low quality photo? What do they expect? Shall I cut down the trees, that are the topic of the educational trail for better light?

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Lcoation: in the garden of the museum complex around https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=50.587503,12.625276&z=17&pll=50.587503,12.625276

An infoboard fulfills no criteria?

This 3° angle for "Orientation"? Srsly?

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Location: 100m north of https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=50.578847,12.620907&z=17&pll=50.578847,12.620907 where the two country lanes fow into the street. Background with the characteristic mine dump and double fence is easy verifiable from sat view ....

Fake Nomination? In Germany most trail marker submissions are rejected against the criteria. Why should someone start faking them, especially if its proven by a wikipedia link in the supporting statement? OR did the reviewer reject because of a winter photo during summer? Did someone tell them, that nominations can last for years in the reviewing process? I have open stuff from summer 2020 ....

Low quality photo? Maybe I could have gone closer, but I didn't want to jump over the trench .... with snow and ice ...

----------------------------------------------------

Low quality photo? because of a bit vandalism?

Mismatched Location? ..... it's difficult in taht case, but I explained evrything in the supporting statement. Reading it might be helpful ....

closest existing wayspot: https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=50.599529,12.652382&z=17&pll=50.599529,12.652382

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Comments

  • MargariteDVille-INGMargariteDVille-ING Posts: 2,846 ✭✭✭✭✭

    3rd bot wave or simply the most stupid reviewers?

    Neither. Niantic's system is not working as expected. This is Niantic's NORM, not evil or stupid actions from Wayfinders.

  • LukeAllStars-INGLukeAllStars-ING Posts: 4,625 Ambassador

    Ive got a lot of such rejections, too:

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    Those are like all of my last rejections. SOme of them are reaaaaaally sad.

  • BitKloepplerin-INGBitKloepplerin-ING Posts: 92 ✭✭✭
    edited July 2022

    And there are more examples of stupid rejections in that region.

    The boat house of the rowing team of the local university

    Description

    In Jena wird seit etwa 100 Jahren gerudert. Der Ruderverein der FSU nimmt sowohl an Wettkämpfen teil, ist aber auch offen für Freizetsportler. Trainiert wird in der Rudersaison im einer, zweier und vierer. Und im Drachenboot.

    (1) no, the members of the rowing teams don`t fly to their boats.

    (2) no, rowing and canoeing and ride a dragon boat have to do a lot with sports and sports with friends

    (3) no, Photo is NOT pitch black/blurry photos or photos taken from a car.

    (4) maybe the boat house the home of a mouse but the boat house is NOT a farm.

    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    (1) No, we don`t remove our hiking trails or their signs in the wrong season.

    (2) these are signs for 4 named trails outside of a village.

    (3) Photo is low quality (e.g., pitch black/blurry photos or photos taken from a car) - ??? - cars are not even allowed there.

    ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------

    (1) one star in "visually unique" should not be a rejection reason for a trail marker.

    (2) The hiking trails (or the sign) ... "appears to have explicit or inappropriate activity" - only if you hate hiking.

    (3) the second marker reads: "Rundwanderweg 3,4,5" - these are 3 local trails.

    Post edited by BitKloepplerin-ING on
  • THEROOKlE-PGOTHEROOKlE-PGO Posts: 41 ✭✭✭

    I hate it personally but agree those trail markers should not have been hit with a 1*-2* for not being visually unique but some of those photos for the noms rejected for low quality photo I do agree should have been denied. If you still have trouble reading them after zooming in because the pic was taken from a good distance away and most likely the submitter had to zoom in which made it blurry. As far as the info boards go most if not all of your pictures are too close and do not include the entire object being submitted. In pogo if they were accepted even more of the desired object would have been cropped out of the pic leaving only a very small portion of the targeted object left. Ex.If pictures of people were acceptable poi would you accept them if the picture of the person had part of their head and body parts like shoulders not included or a historical sign that had part of the description on the sign cut out because it was taken too close to the object causing it to have missing words from the description and impossible to read it or make sense of what it says? And disagree that duplicate votes should not count. Most likely a good portion of reviewers do not investigate the surrounding noms for duplicate if they plan on rejecting the poi for any reason immediately. They hit it with a 1* immediately instead of scrolling down to check for duplicates when in fact it is already on the map for some crazy reason.

  • JakubB24-PGOJakubB24-PGO Posts: 1 ✭✭

    I have noticed it happening in my city in Czech Republic aswell, so many legit pokestops as info boards, plaques etc. being rejected as seasonal, low quality or even natural phenomenon. I do wonder if i should even keep on nominating after this.

  • Raachermannl-INGRaachermannl-ING Posts: 1,070 ✭✭✭✭✭

    @NianticGiffard

    Now an Unesco world heritage (!!!!) infoboard rejected ..... please ban those misfits/bots....

    Again for URL in the supporting text:

    And mismatched location is also a bad joke .... the orange headline of the infoboard (also in submissions title) is "Siebenschlehener Pochwerk" (translates roughly to hammer mill Siebenschlehen) and there is a google marker with "Technisches Museum Siebenschlehener Pochwerk" (technical museum hammer mill Siebenschlehen)


    That's simply disgusting ....

  • Raachermannl-INGRaachermannl-ING Posts: 1,070 ✭✭✭✭✭

    This one is also "funny":

    Fully valid hiking trail marker. Maybe not obvious for foreigners, but that's how it works here. For example here an sign from the German-Czech border, which shows, how trail markers look like in each country, and how specific named trails are marked, what means that trail names are often hidden behind special symbols instead of being written down:

    But back to the rejection reasons:

    Inappropriate location? Didn't know that this is the local red light quarter. Learned something new. If I need a **** outside of Minecraft ....

    A hiking trail marker without pedestrian access? Wow, rare! And without jokes ..... it's next to a street, but there is a god damn sidewalk.

    Third rejection reason is "other rejection criteria" ..... it's only enumerated under one of the main criteria. But those are totally neglectable. Right?

  • Rodensteiner-PGORodensteiner-PGO Posts: 1,705 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Rather pointless to submit atm. Theres too much bots or people out there that have the objective to collect reject - points.

  • Hitchhiker79-PGOHitchhiker79-PGO Posts: 63 ✭✭✭

    So if it's bots again, the center seems to be somewhere else this time. At the moment my suggestions go through without any problems. So far I haven't had a rejection with any funny reason. My location was or is north of Munich.

  • Raachermannl-INGRaachermannl-ING Posts: 1,070 ✭✭✭✭✭

    the trail markers for nordic skiing are insane ..... that something like that is rejected with only reason "person" (because of the stickmans?) It's again a clear hint, that bots are involved. Impossible to find a bunch of DAUs, that all select this single absurd reason ....

    @NianticGiffard

  • Rodensteiner-PGORodensteiner-PGO Posts: 1,705 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited July 2022

    as a very active wayfarer this is just a slap in the face, having continously rejections from surely the same persons.

    it is just a way of saying "i can reject this, and it will be rejected".

  • CarlangasI978-INGCarlangasI978-ING Posts: 58 ✭✭

    I do not think they are bots, but bad reviewers, although I see that some nominees are well qualified because they are not visually unique, the reason why I say it is that I consider myself a good qualifier since 2018 and in the last month my rating went down to poor


  • patsufredo-PGOpatsufredo-PGO Posts: 4,214 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Things are extremely different in Germany. And some surrounding countries.

    Yet Niantic are unable to resolve this for months, while able to took action against reviewers who 'correctly' rejected nominations from a single submitter...

  • Niieniie-PGONiieniie-PGO Posts: 1 ✭✭

    Same here, so many are getting rejected lately. We had a few playgrounds rejected for not being historically significant, and today I had an inaccurate location, for the first time ever? And a lot of trail markers are getting rejected again, this is getting sooo tiring 😭😭

  • WayfarerMSE-PGOWayfarerMSE-PGO Posts: 1,623 ✭✭✭✭✭

    I hope this thread gets a little more attention. Something is really not right there. Either there are a lot of incompetent raters hanging around in the cell or there's someone working with bots again. I've had some rejections that are totally unjustified and the justifications are ****.

  • Raachermannl-INGRaachermannl-ING Posts: 1,070 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Resubmission again rejected with **** reasons ....

    (again a wikipedia link in the supporting text)

  • Tijaykun-PGOTijaykun-PGO Posts: 19 ✭✭

    2 playgrounds clearly visible on google maps, were denied for inaccurate location reasons within 3 days - yay!

    First one:


    The tower with the slide is already visible on google maps, the location was set a bit right to the tower. It was proposed as a complete playground (and not one of the specific toys) so it shouldn't matter where on the playground it is (entry is better then).


    Second one:

    The playground (red circle) is and the picknick table (**** blue circle) is clearly visible on google maps and they are separated from another existing playground (yellow circle) on the right (with a fence and by the ways between the playgrounds). Also the right playground begins with a sign as shown on the environment photo (it's shadow is in the thin blue circle).


    Do you want me to propose each and every installation on those playgrounds (at least the chances would be higher than that maybe one will be accepted...)

  • Raachermannl-INGRaachermannl-ING Posts: 1,070 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Friend of mine got also a pure subcategory rejection:

    Problem here most likely also wrong duplicate votes:

    https://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=50.984139,11.678138&z=17&pll=50.984139,11.678138

    Like mentioned in the supporting statement there are 3 such stones. The two missing are south of the existing one.

  • Raachermannl-INGRaachermannl-ING Posts: 1,070 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Re-submission of one of the rejections of the inital post got again rejected.

    Again with the stupid "submitter identifiable". My guess is, that this might be a single stupid real person, that voted both attempts on this submission and chose this because of the shadow.

    .... and now we have additionally the "not historically or culturally significant", that obviously hints to the bot networks. An infoboard of an educational trail .... not historically or culturally significant .... that's such a hard joke for that I can't even construct any absurd reasoning. That "reviewer" can't be the vote of a real person, that plays your games.

    @NianticGiffard @NianticTintino-ING

  • xAaroniusx-PGOxAaroniusx-PGO Posts: 2

    My Stuff (Germany) keeps being rejected all the Time as well.

    Fully accesible public Restaurant? - Rejected for 'bad Photo' and 'private Property' ?!

    Its getting beyond ridicilous. My whole Town is filled with fake PokeStops from entirely different Cities/Towns and not being removed despited reported multiple Times but my actual suggestion of real existing Spots keep being rejected.

    Im literally not able to properly the Game in my Town like this. What am i supposed to do? No wonder so many people Cheat...


  • sogNinjaman-INGsogNinjaman-ING Posts: 3,313 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Just because a location is "fully acessible" does not automatically mean a nomination should be accepted. This looks like an "everyday" chinese restarant. What makes this worthy of being a Waypoint? How does it meet any Niantic criteria? Does it have any awards? Restarants are very difficult to get accepted anywhere, you need to tell reviewers why this is "better" thsn every other restarant in town.

    As for fake waypoints in town, report them via the app, if they get refused then you can appeal on here in the "Invalid Waypoint" section.

  • Raachermannl-INGRaachermannl-ING Posts: 1,070 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited July 2022

    This example is in a rural area. The statement from the guidelines is obviously for big cities and only a rule of thumb. The main question is, whether it is a place to be social (and then permanent enough and somehow family friendly).

    Big cities have dozens of cafes and restaurants next to each other. The question, whether a cafe or restaurant is considered to be a place to be social in Nia-terms, leads then to those, that are better than others and last longer ... necessary since the unsuccessful ones change owner and concept very often.

    Looking at rural area there aren't many restaurants. Over the last decades lots of restaurants, pubs and cafes in rural area vanished. So those that survive the "Kneipensterben" (dying of pubs) are okay. If you are in rural area you can't be selective on a level of awards or such criteria - in wayfarer as well as in real life, if you want to go with your family to a restaurant. The restaurants, that survived over the last decades are simply eligible, because bad ones were closed. This doesn't mean, that you have to accept every trash. In rural area there are also bunch of garage pubs for the heavy drinkers - those aren't worthy of course. But a Chinese restaurant in a 13k inhabitant town like Barßel is valid. If you ask for some special aspects of restaurants in rural area, than a Asia-food-focus is already special. In rural area you can't ask for awards or such ****. Looking at my own home village .... I don't even know where the next awarded restaurant/pub/cafe might be. I guess in the next 100k town ....

  • Rodensteiner-PGORodensteiner-PGO Posts: 1,705 ✭✭✭✭✭
    edited July 2022

    personally, id never trust anything that is submitted in Barßel. Sorry i have this issue, but there were too many fakes.

  • Raachermannl-INGRaachermannl-ING Posts: 1,070 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Next insane rejection ....

    No rejection criterion is a big joke .... it has even the Way of St.James on it .... Europes most famous trail(s) and others, that are also important enough to have wikipedia articles ....

    Location Sensitive? Srsly? Did an AI think this might be a cross on top of a Gravesite?

  • Raachermannl-INGRaachermannl-ING Posts: 1,070 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Next totally stupid rejection.

    An infoboard and the object it tells about ..... a few hundred years old mineshaft, 306m deep ....

  • Raachermannl-INGRaachermannl-ING Posts: 1,070 ✭✭✭✭✭

    Infoboard now rejected a 3rd time with stupid reasons:

    Low quality photo .... no discussion needed.

    Mismatched location .... good joke. There are 4 similar infoboards nearby and also two infoboards with schematic maps, that prove that location. Further the name of the eucational trai was given in the description. So again either bot votes, or at least totally useless reviewers, that need to get a "nice" mail ....

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