Oh ok, I kept clicking on a the AMA post in there and it had a link that kept taking me back here. I was scrolling down a little fast and missing the instructions. Thanks.
@NianticTintino might be a good idea to turn voting on just now, I'm seeing alooooooooot of the same questions coming up, probably because the earlier questions are getting pushed back and people arwnt looking far enough back. If the voting was turned on now the questions wouldn't be re asked as the could just vote (or add to) the discussion
Why do some nominations get marked as duplicate (we have a small park in our town that isn’t a pokéstop but every time I nominate it someone reject it and makes it as duplicate) but there is no pokéstop there. Is there anything I can do to fix this issue? I don’t want to resubmit it again and again if it’s always going to be rejected. I just think some reviews don’t actually check properly. I’ve reviewed quite a few and have only rejected 12 total for duplicate entries.
When you nominate something, if it gets accepted, it gets added to Niantic's Lightship database and becomes a wayspot within that database. Then, once a day, each of Niantic's games will synchronise new wayspots from the Lightship database and they'll appear in those games. However, each game has a hidden rule that effectively limits the proximity of wayspots within that game. In Ingress, a wayspot will only get added to the game from the database if it's at least 20 metres away from any existing Portals. In Pokémon Go, a wayspot will only become a Pokéstop or Gym if it is in an empty level 17 S2 cell.
So the chances are that what you're nominating does already exist in the database, but there's something else nearby in Pokémon Go that is preventing you from seeing that it exists. This is why it can be useful to also have an Ingress account, as this can help you see some additional wayspots that are in the database but not in Pokémon Go, and can give you access to IITC which you can use to see level 17 cells.
The other thing you can do is when you are next at this park, if you press the button to make a submission, the map that allows you to place the location pin will show you all wayspots within ~100 metres of where you're stood (this is why you need to actually be at the park). Any that are already in Pokémon Go will show as a blue Pokéstop icon, and any that are in the database but not in Pokémon Go will show as an orange Wayfarer icon. You can tap on these icons to see what the wayspots are.
And not a single criteria clarification question was answered. And once you include the September and December AMAs, only one criteria clarification question has made it to the "Top 15". Either Niantic needs to do a separate AMA for criteria clarification questions or ignore the "top 15" and pick criteria clarification questions. And the answer they gave about why they haven't been involved in answering criteria clarification questions on the forums is entirely unsatisfactory. How are reviewers going to know if they are applying any parts of the rejection criteria correctly if they are not given ANY guidance? And I am specifically calling out extremely vague rejection criteria such as "The object is mass-produced, generic, or not visually unique or interesting" and "A generic business, chain, or franchise that is not locally unique". No matter how reviewers apply those criteria, they will always be decried as abusive rejections.
If, as before, you have any suggestions or questions that were not selected for the Top 15 but are interesting for the team, please let me know in addition.
To add to that, rhe question on why they don't get Involved in the clarifications page seemed more like a brushing it off and make excuses rather than comit to getting involved more. In fact it almost seemed like they want to not clarify anything and instead just let us work it out for ourselves.
So my first question, the edits in contribution page, was kinda hoping for something like "in the backlog, but aiming for end of summer" or something liek thay, but at least it seems a higher priority
The 20m rule, he says to go look at the ingress answer, but that answer was wishy washy and wasn't even really an answer as it was more "well we had it for a reason before prime so .....". While I get that its bit entirely wayfarer related, rhe fact it Kate it to the top 15 questions should show people wanted a better engagement from it, maybe eveb getting wayfarer and ingress to talk about it with each other
Am i the only one who is severely disappointed with the answers? Most answers didn’t even answer anything really... also 20k appeals done by this time is a big joke..
I have become disengaged with the AMA as after raised expectations the actual output is poor and does little to help the wayfarer community.
Quite what the roles that Niantic staff have has become very unclear, and I am having doubts as to how the ambassadors are actually going to fit in. I’m sure other work pressures play a large role, but we have to remember the bottom line is Niantic- and we should all know what their deep down drivers
I think we just get on with using the majority of the space here to self support each other, and where we can reach a consensus.
I’m more disappointed in the questions that were asked. Nothing really useful, just some insight questions to which Niantic so many times gave a “political” answer.
This. People asked a lot **** questions that affect very little. And somehow they were the top 15 - burying the real questions, like the many ways Niantic has gone back on their own word, and the hundreds of nominations waiting months and years with no action.
I agree that much of the lack of interesting answers comes from what we as a community chose to be the top 15. Many of the top 15 "questions" are features people want phrased in the form of questions, so of course most of the answers will be "It's on our to-do list".
Right, I think that I already stated this one or two AMAs ago, instead of Questions aimed at learning something new, people use the AMAs as a list of feature requests, so the answers are gonna be political correct "thanks for bringing this up, it's in our backlog" as those are features that people have been requesting for a long time.
So we can't fully blame Niantic for not providing answers when we haven't asked and voted the proper questions.
I think one of the most interesting answers is the one given to Q7, which confirms pretty much what a lot of people have supected - that the Niantic Wayfarer Team have very little in-house influence with regards to all of the complaints and queries and suggestions made about Gameplay in the various games that pop up on the forums, and also very litte or no ability to censure players actual gameplay accounts. As they have said, there is the Ingress Team, the PoGo Team, and the Wayfarer Team, which are pretty much separate entities, with the Wayfarer Team really only being in place to deal with the "onboarding / assimilation" of new Waypoints into the Lightship Database - they have very little influence over any game specific issues. That's disappointing (though not surprising), but fairly typical of a lot of games companies who really pay very little attention to what their customer base really see as the priorities.
A good example is the reply to the top "most votes" question posed in the April AMA - Better consequences for abusers
We completely agree with you that it is only fair to ban Explorers for abuse on both the in-game submission features and the Wayfarer website. It’s reasonable to think that abusive reviews will also mean abusive nomination behavior. We are actively looking into the trends here and need to complete that analysis before we decide how to implement the solution.
While the OP only asked about sanctions on the Wayfarer side of things, it is clear from the posts attached to this question that the majority or people replying want "proper" sanctions applied to people posting fake nominations or influencing Waypoint nominations by multi-accounting etc. Banning Wayfarer accounts is pointless if gameplay accounts are not impacted in terms of gameplay. Looking at the AMA replies, it seems fairly clear that the Wayfarer team have little say in removing gameplay accounts, which appear to be left to the various "game teams". This needs a rethink from Niantic.
This was a waste of an AMA. No answers to anything that I can use to clarify criteria. I hope next AMA will have questions filtered by the ambassadors.
This AMA was a waste of time. I am not going to lose my time engaging in the next one. Look's like Niantic doesn't really care to get in touch with the community
Comments
Oh ok, I kept clicking on a the AMA post in there and it had a link that kept taking me back here. I was scrolling down a little fast and missing the instructions. Thanks.
@NianticTintino might be a good idea to turn voting on just now, I'm seeing alooooooooot of the same questions coming up, probably because the earlier questions are getting pushed back and people arwnt looking far enough back. If the voting was turned on now the questions wouldn't be re asked as the could just vote (or add to) the discussion
Hello, is it still possible to ask a question?
I had not seen that an AMA was going to be carried out.
On occasion, I see submissions for sites that are located on cemetery property.
Are those allowed or no?
Why do some nominations get marked as duplicate (we have a small park in our town that isn’t a pokéstop but every time I nominate it someone reject it and makes it as duplicate) but there is no pokéstop there. Is there anything I can do to fix this issue? I don’t want to resubmit it again and again if it’s always going to be rejected. I just think some reviews don’t actually check properly. I’ve reviewed quite a few and have only rejected 12 total for duplicate entries.
When you nominate something, if it gets accepted, it gets added to Niantic's Lightship database and becomes a wayspot within that database. Then, once a day, each of Niantic's games will synchronise new wayspots from the Lightship database and they'll appear in those games. However, each game has a hidden rule that effectively limits the proximity of wayspots within that game. In Ingress, a wayspot will only get added to the game from the database if it's at least 20 metres away from any existing Portals. In Pokémon Go, a wayspot will only become a Pokéstop or Gym if it is in an empty level 17 S2 cell.
So the chances are that what you're nominating does already exist in the database, but there's something else nearby in Pokémon Go that is preventing you from seeing that it exists. This is why it can be useful to also have an Ingress account, as this can help you see some additional wayspots that are in the database but not in Pokémon Go, and can give you access to IITC which you can use to see level 17 cells.
The other thing you can do is when you are next at this park, if you press the button to make a submission, the map that allows you to place the location pin will show you all wayspots within ~100 metres of where you're stood (this is why you need to actually be at the park). Any that are already in Pokémon Go will show as a blue Pokéstop icon, and any that are in the database but not in Pokémon Go will show as an orange Wayfarer icon. You can tap on these icons to see what the wayspots are.
And you can use the Ingress Intel Map on a browser too which I find simpler intel.ingress.com/intel
Unfortunately with the release of Lightship, the intel map does not always include all accepted pois.
I did not know that, so thank you for filling me in 👍
Hello Explorers!
April AMA answer have been posted! Check them out HERE!
And not a single criteria clarification question was answered. And once you include the September and December AMAs, only one criteria clarification question has made it to the "Top 15". Either Niantic needs to do a separate AMA for criteria clarification questions or ignore the "top 15" and pick criteria clarification questions. And the answer they gave about why they haven't been involved in answering criteria clarification questions on the forums is entirely unsatisfactory. How are reviewers going to know if they are applying any parts of the rejection criteria correctly if they are not given ANY guidance? And I am specifically calling out extremely vague rejection criteria such as "The object is mass-produced, generic, or not visually unique or interesting" and "A generic business, chain, or franchise that is not locally unique". No matter how reviewers apply those criteria, they will always be decried as abusive rejections.
Thanks for the answer.
If, as before, you have any suggestions or questions that were not selected for the Top 15 but are interesting for the team, please let me know in addition.
To add to that, rhe question on why they don't get Involved in the clarifications page seemed more like a brushing it off and make excuses rather than comit to getting involved more. In fact it almost seemed like they want to not clarify anything and instead just let us work it out for ourselves.
So my first question, the edits in contribution page, was kinda hoping for something like "in the backlog, but aiming for end of summer" or something liek thay, but at least it seems a higher priority
The 20m rule, he says to go look at the ingress answer, but that answer was wishy washy and wasn't even really an answer as it was more "well we had it for a reason before prime so .....". While I get that its bit entirely wayfarer related, rhe fact it Kate it to the top 15 questions should show people wanted a better engagement from it, maybe eveb getting wayfarer and ingress to talk about it with each other
As near as I can tell in regards to the 20m rule each team is directing the community to the other so they don't have to deal with it.
Am i the only one who is severely disappointed with the answers? Most answers didn’t even answer anything really... also 20k appeals done by this time is a big joke..
It dies seem like it, though ingress ama did suggest it is to do with them, but he seemed to just not give a reason why its still here
Congratulations @NianticTintino !
You dodged evry question xD
At this point maybe it'll be best to ask criteria clarification question directly to Danbocat via @NianticWayfarer in Twitter.
Really, I feel that most of the answers didn't answer the questions.
I have become disengaged with the AMA as after raised expectations the actual output is poor and does little to help the wayfarer community.
Quite what the roles that Niantic staff have has become very unclear, and I am having doubts as to how the ambassadors are actually going to fit in. I’m sure other work pressures play a large role, but we have to remember the bottom line is Niantic- and we should all know what their deep down drivers
I think we just get on with using the majority of the space here to self support each other, and where we can reach a consensus.
I’m more disappointed in the questions that were asked. Nothing really useful, just some insight questions to which Niantic so many times gave a “political” answer.
maybe Niantic should act a little more like people on Discord.
For those that want a TL:DR, here's the summary of the answers:
1, 2, 3, 4, 8, 13
a1) We agree with you and it's in our backlog
5
a2) We're working on it, but can't disclose
6
a3) We've processed 20k appeals. + (a1)
7, 9, 14
a4) We're working on it
10
a5) We planned 6-10 people, although we extended to 12 there were some issues with the 12th one and so we decided to move on
11
a6) This has been answered by the Ingress team, move along.
12
a7) yeah, it's hard you know. And now a long paragraph to make it look like and answer.
15
a8) It's not up to us how each game uses Wayspots. + (a1) about Wayfarer app.
Pretty bothered my this answer:
Why can’t we withdraw “in voting” nominations?
Again, we don’t disagree with you. This has always been in our backlog and it’s something we haven’t gotten around to.
How can it have always been in your backlog if it was always an active, working feature up until recently?
This. People asked a lot **** questions that affect very little. And somehow they were the top 15 - burying the real questions, like the many ways Niantic has gone back on their own word, and the hundreds of nominations waiting months and years with no action.
I agree that much of the lack of interesting answers comes from what we as a community chose to be the top 15. Many of the top 15 "questions" are features people want phrased in the form of questions, so of course most of the answers will be "It's on our to-do list".
Right, I think that I already stated this one or two AMAs ago, instead of Questions aimed at learning something new, people use the AMAs as a list of feature requests, so the answers are gonna be political correct "thanks for bringing this up, it's in our backlog" as those are features that people have been requesting for a long time.
So we can't fully blame Niantic for not providing answers when we haven't asked and voted the proper questions.
This was a waste of an AMA. No answers to anything that I can use to clarify criteria. I hope next AMA will have questions filtered by the ambassadors.
This AMA was a waste of time. I am not going to lose my time engaging in the next one. Look's like Niantic doesn't really care to get in touch with the community