Wayfarer is like lunatics running the asylum

After a long break from Ingress I have returned to find that portal submissions are ridiculous now. I have seen fast food restaurants approved as portals in heavily "portaled" areas. What about Bojangles chicken and biscuits meets the criteria?

I see NUMEROUS cases of signs. Yes, plain signs. It is so bad that I believe people now think that a proper submission must be, (or at least include a photo of), a sign. I also see several cases of new portals that are just duplicates of signs announcing the location of an already approved portal location. For instance, there's been an approval for a sign by the road that declares the "Health and Science Center" at Randolph Community College, and it's 50 yards or less from the actual Health and Sciences Building portal.

And there are FAR too many SIGNS approved. They have no historic, artistic or local interest value.

But my next issue is what brings me here. And I think it's a sign ( no pun intended ) of a growing problem in this game community.

I have tried to submit portals only to have them denied. Here's my latest example. Recently I submitted a location on an extremely wide trail that can be seen on Google maps, IITC, etc. It's marked, and maintained. The location has historical significance because it marks the location of a wooden trestle bridge constructed a century ago. This bridge was the only way for it would come into all of the historical meals along the river. The old real line there has been turned into what I like to call the "super high way of walking trails" But my submission was denied because they claim there's no pedestrian access! You can see the trail on your map. You can see the trail itself clearly marked on Google maps. They have included emergency marker numbers, along the whole trail in case someone has a medical emergency. They can even drive an ambulance to you in many sections!

There's absolutely no reason anyone who even tries to approve portals cannot see this information with a bit of common sense and a quick glance at Google maps or even the map window in wayfarer. (I'll include a link for you to see for yourself.).

Deep River Rail Trail Trailhead

Rising Sun Way, Franklinville, NC 27248

https://maps.app.goo.gl/E31Ti4PhJFPnwpj59

This was not a problem before. In fact there are trails all over the area that have every single trail marker, or SIGN approved. While the amazing old structures are denied, the ugly trail marker 20 feet away is approved.

http://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=35.947345,-79.717751&z=18&pll=35.947345,-79.717751

http://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=35.636581,-79.762042&z=15&pll=35.636581,-79.762042

http://intel.ingress.com/intel?ll=35.993914,-79.438711&z=16&pll=35.993914,-79.438711

So after seeing these examples, why now after 2 years would my trail submission be denied for "not having pedestrian access" Niantic seems to have let the lunatics run the asylum, and the lunatics are lazy. They don't want anyone to have a portal that they can't get to easily from their car seats, and they don't want any new portals that aren't in their area. This truly has become the CARgress that we talked about in 2018.

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Comments

  • Feir33-INGFeir33-ING Posts: 1 ✭✭

    Exactly.. Pokemon players think. oh here is..something.. it should be a pokestop.. which is fine for PoGo.. It is NOT fine for Ingress. Niantic really needs to do more to review submissions. Just look at the portal submission forum where peoples houses have couch portals. I saw a McAllisters deli as a portal.. No, no mural, no statue, it was simply McAllisters and it was approved.

    The Ingress community warned Niantic that these exact situations would happen and here we are. PoGo players **** down legit submissions because its not something they can drive to while cluttering the map with portals that have absolutely no right based upon Niantics own rules of being a portal.

    And no, dont say, well report it. We have.. And anyone that has reported a portal knows what a **** **** that is. And lets be honest, if it got through the submission review initially, what are the chances that now, the magic number of people needed to remove it will show up?

  • MarioSGodoy87-PGOMarioSGodoy87-PGO Posts: 169 ✭✭✭

    I am playing from INGRESSE and Pokemon and when I am approving any type of request I follow the guidelines, I understand that not all evaluators keep up to date or really follow the approval guidelines, this is the problem and not the community of a specific game.

  • WearyExile-INGWearyExile-ING Posts: 10 ✭✭
    edited December 2020

    I see everyone's come here quick to defend Pokemon players, but not one person wants to address the issue. Why do we have this problem now? You can roll a wheelchair down to this submission, and that isn't even a requirement. You can drive a truck down this trail, and in fact a truck does drive down this trail occasionially, as part of maintenance. It's insulting to receive multiple emails telling me that there's no pedestrian access when anyone can see that's not true.

    The problem is, some reviewers who are either blind, ignorant, stupid, or just simply opposed to any portal that they can't reach from the booster seat in the back of mommy's minivan deny.

  • holdthebeer-INGholdthebeer-ING Posts: 199 ✭✭✭✭

    It's not pokemon vs ingress players, or lazy reviewers. Many people play both games, or have friends who play, or are, well, aware of other game mechanics. Many reviewers know what is good submission, and what is not good.

    Part of the problem is the gym spawn rules - players see four pokestops in a cell, and they "need" one more in the same cell to spawn a gym. Then, they need to find a crappy sign and keep submitting it until it goes through. It can be rejected 10 times, but eventually there will be "right" group of reviewers. If the "sign" is 5% good - will be resubmitted 20 times, and accepted. Then, no portal can be removed for being crappy sign.

  • holdthebeer-INGholdthebeer-ING Posts: 199 ✭✭✭✭
    edited December 2020

    Niantic has examples of what is very good submission, or what is not acceptable. They say "trail markers are good", agree, lots of trails, lots of good trail markers, but when I see a piece of metal on a road shoulder submitted as "trail marker" - now what?

    I would really like Niantic to create a fresh "official" wayfarer team account for public reviews (maybe ask vanguards to help with translation or country-specific nominations). Like, youtube channel. Every day, pick a country or region, do 20 reviews in a row. Don't skip. Follow guidelines. Explain the actions. Show reviewers - what to do with real submissions: signs, swings, fastfood, you name it.

    (See it falling into poor in 2 weeks).

    Post edited by holdthebeer-ING on
  • Misch60-PGOMisch60-PGO Posts: 225 ✭✭✭

    Also, should this even be in Nomination Improvement? This is not really about improving your nomination, but more complaining about the entire nomination system.

  • Jtronmoore-PGOJtronmoore-PGO Posts: 1,581 ✭✭✭✭✭

    The main issue is niantic doesnt force anyone to read the nomination criteria prior to submitting. Thats pretty much the issue plain and simple. There will always be someone that submits garbage to try and get a home poi thats a given. If the nomination only has 5% chance of passing well there are still wayfaire reviewers who can see that it met some kind of criteria or otherwise it would get rejected

  • Damastaglen-PGODamastaglen-PGO Posts: 124 ✭✭✭

    Blaming just PoGo players is wrong and it stinks of snobbery by Ingress players. The fact is, anyone can make a bad submission.

    I, for one, play PoGo mainly and very rarely Ingress though PoGo was first. I take great pride in my nomination and always help the other members in my local community in their submissions. I do this because I want my game to be better, in this case PoGo. Is it potentially clogging up Ingress with tons of local portals - sure, but I can guarantee that the ones from our group at least are the kind of cool stuff Niantic wants in thier POI database.

    If you move to an area where there’s not much ‘cool’ stuff, you may chance a borderline nomination so you can get portals to link in the same way a PoGo player wants a gym.

    I will admit that there has been some awful submissions come through since PoGo had the submission cap dropped to level 38 but I don’t think they are to blame - unless they are also reviewers, and I can guarantee a lot aren’t because I have had to educate some in my community how, the communication as to what is or is not acceptable leaves a lot to be desired.

    Another thing to think about as well is there are a lot more PoGo players than Ingress players so they will be seem to be more bad coming from PoGo.

    As for your last point, only Niantic remove POIs

  • Hey folks,

    Closing down this thread as it's become heavily negatively focused on Pokémon GO submitter criticism, which isn't productive.

    The OP @WearyExile-ING's point has been lost in this discussion. To their original point:

    • Signs for a building and a building itself should be a single Wayspot, unless the sign has unique utility (i.e. a notification board).
    • Trail markers should be considered to be eligible and the illogical rejection reason seem to be the result of reviewers working too quickly and without sufficient care taken in reviewing the criteria.

    As I've mentioned previously, high on our priority list for addressing in the new year is the reviewer experience and re-reviewing the requirements for being a submitter to improve the quality of the submissions and better details in future rejections.

    Thanks for your feedback.

This discussion has been closed.