I receive many nominations for consideration from a large shopping center with a large floor area. Many of the nominations are clearly listed at significant distances from the actual location. However, I am in another city and do not have the opportunity to come and take a photo inside the building with a geotag. Furthermore, there are no suitable photospheres for evidence in the building. The only confirmation I can provide is the 2GIS navigation application. This app shows the location of all the boutiques and establishments (sometimes even sculptures) inside similar buildings. By combining the data from the photos of the nominations and the data from this app, I could prove the exact geolocation of the nomination. However, the data from the app apparently isn’t convincing enough for the support team. Are there any other ways to prove this remotely?
In my experience, you can not and should not fix misplaced wayspots at a shopping center unless you are physically there. Indoor shopping centers change fairly regularly. Even what you think is the best online investigation about where things are located can be completely wrong once you hit the spot. Unless you can physically go to this place, I would put it out of your mind.
Then such nominations should be accepted as non-permanent or something?
I don’t entirely like this answer. Lots of things in shopping centres don’t move around, but if they do, they shouldn’t be wayspots.
Also, when reviewing, if I come across an area that obviously has false or illegitimate wayspots, it bothers me. Several times, I have reported this (as have others). Finding a shopping centre with lots of wayspots that you find are abuse, because they have been mislocated, maybe deliberately, and things are appearing in Pokemon Go that shouldn’t, is frustrating even if you don’t physically go to that area.
It sounds wrong to be told to ignore abuse because it doesn’t affect your own gameplay.
Why are photospheres acceptable evidence then? In my country, Google Street View haven’t been updated since 2022, so how can they be considered relevant evidence? Especially considering that the official application for creating photospheres for Google Maps has been closed for several years now.
I am telling you from personal experience that shopping malls are often redesigned. The kids play area used to be at the north end is now at the south end. It’s still eligible at either place. The video arcade “store" moved to the second floor because a bigger space became available. Still eligible. The giant sculpture is now at the west entrance instead of the east.
Online maps sometimes exist but you have no way to know if they are current. Photos online might show the old locations of these things. You do not know unless you are physically there. There is a reason Wayfarer asks for geotagged photos for this kind of intense clean up. They want solid proof from the exact location.
Photospheres are fairly hard to fake. Obviously, they can be located incorrectly, but there is normally enough information in the photosphere to be able to tell whether it belongs where it is.
Although the official application can no longer upload photospheres to google maps, the API for uploading them is still live, so they can still be uploaded. They are a wonderful piece of technology, even if the quality of the images my phone produces are substandard (the defunct app has trouble focussing properly!)
Just go on what is presented, does it seem to be valid, do you think its likely to be accurate? If so, you can accept. If something seems off, or you’re not comfortable, you can choose to say you dont know that location is accurate, or you can reject if you believe its inaccurate.
You have 20 mins to do a review, there’s no way you’re supposed to do detailled investigations or visit the location in that time
I agree that online maps are not necessarily proof. I am not sure that if things move around (and change), that the wayspot can always move with them, as this feels close to repurposing. It might not be though!
Of course, my experiences is with UK shopping centres, which clearly don’t get redesigned as often as US shopping malls 
I’m talking about situations where photos are taken directly from the nominations themselves. For example, a nomination shows three boutiques in a row. The app also shows these three boutiques in a row. I doubt that the 3 boutiques in a row have all moved together to another part of the shopping center.
Malls in the US are desperate to stay open.
You used the word doubt. When you are talking about cleaning up existing wayspots, there should be NO doubt.
Off-topic, but I was in Amherst, MA, decades ago (1980s) and there were a couple of malls near each other. All the shops had closed down in the older mall and it was full of thrift stalls. Nothing wrong with the mall except the other one had opened up just down the road. Just one of the many things that malls have always had to contend with.
I imagine now they have the same problem as shopping centres and high streets in the UK. The irony is that the shopping centres were killing off the high streets and now the internet is killing off both.
Let me sign each line of sarcasm with a sign from The Big Bang Theory.
There is not a single statement in the world that is 100% true. It is appropriate to use the word “doubt” in any possible statement.
Can you be 100% sure that, for example, the sculpture you nominated today won’t be torn down tomorrow? There is such a probability, but it is infinitely small. So the probability that all 3 boutiques will be moved together to another location is also infinitely small.
I can give an example of such a nomination, but it’s currently being voted on. If I publish it, it might lead to some kind of shaming.
I’m not talking about the possibility of faking them, I’m talking about the fact that they are not always relevant in terms of time. Much of what is currently on Google Street View in our country has long been demolished, moved, or something else.
When you drop pegman onto a photosphere, it shows the month in which it was uploaded. Obviously, it would be possible to upload a photosphere 10 years after it was taken.
That’s not exactly what I’m talking about. For example, the photosphere was installed six months ago, but the nominated object was only appeared yesterday. I can’t claim that the object isn’t there now based on the photosphere from six months ago.
That does mean that it is hard for you to know that the object isn’t where the wayspot is and equally hard to prove this to someone else.
That’s why I use photos from the nomination itself as evidence. They clearly indicate the nomination’s location at the time of application, but only if combined with data on the location of objects in the background inside the mall.