I have been submitting all the Disc Golf Holes, Fitness Stations, Mile Markers, and more along the Lake Elsinore Levee Nature and Hiking Trail near Storm Stadium for the last few weeks now and out of nowhere one of the first Wayspots I got accepted, and which showed up in game and on the Wayfarer map for more than a week, has been removed.
Today I resubmitted the same Wayspot but have placed it on hold as it is a waste of both my time and the voter’s time to make us do this all over again when it was already accepted and was 100% eligible. The only reason I can think of that it was removed is that someone who doesn’t walk on the Levee looked at an outdated Satellite Map and could not see the hole and the obstacle and assumed it wasn’t there, as the Niantic Wayfarer map itself is outdated, which can be seen by attached screenshots. It is there and I can take as many photos of it as you need to prove so, and I do not think people should be reporting and getting stops removed from places they do not physically walk. It is incredibly frustrating to take the time to submit real legitimate POIs which are on trails for walking, only to get them removed by people who have never stepped foot in the area.
That doesn’t make any sense, individual fitness stations are eligible even if they are part of a larger fitness course, and every Disc Golf Hole is a different spot for exercising, throwing, with different obstacles. Do you mean to tell me that every single Disc Golf hole I got accepted along this trail is going to be removed now?
Why is only the second hole removed and not the rest of them?
I understand the frustration.
I don’t have access to any information about this case. Someone may have reported more, in which case yes it is likely they will be removed except perhaps for the first tee to anchor the whole field of play.
Who does have information and who makes these rules? Because I am looking up the reasons for why Disc Golf Holes aren’t eligible, and the reasoning is faulty. This course is along a hiking and biking trail, I placed the Wayspots behind or next to the Tee-Off spots, which are next to a trail that hundreds of people walk, bike, and run on every day. These Holes being Wayspots does not impede anyone or anything, least of all the Disc Golf Players. They should be eligible, they encourage exploration and exercise.
Individual disc golf holes are more like individual bases on a baseball field. Many people who actually play have told me it is dangerous to have non-players on the courses. Niantic staff have made this clarification.
The criteria clarification page I gave is from the Wayfarer Team.
They make the decisions about some specific clarifications. Sometimes these include consideration of things such as health and safety. A fast flying disc can cause harm. Being absorbed in a game rather than watching out for a disc is not a good combination.
There is also the consideration that the course is considered as a whole.
That’s the explanation.
If this particular one is next to a trail then the trail can be considered - presumably it has some markers to keep you on the trail.
I understand how annoying this will feel having put the effort into submitting. It is very unfortunate that they were accepted and raised your hopes.
Disc Golf players who also play Pokémon Go are the ones who encouraged me to submit them to begin with. If you look at what I submitted, and the Lake Elsinore Levee trail itself, there is zero chance that having POIs behind or next to the Tee Off rectangle will lead to their game being interrupted, there are people who fish on the shore, there are dog walkers and hikers and bikers constantly on the trail.
To remove these is to make any game which uses Niantic’s database worse, and I find this a bridge too far. If this is really the way things are going to be run, I’m done submitting and I’m done playing any Niantic games, I’ve been submitting for over five years now, have somewhere between 200-400 unique POIs accepted and at no point have I come across something as frustrating and seemingly malicious as this.
I’m looking through the other Disc Golf Hole related threads, and people are celebrating getting other people’s submissions removed, having fun wasting people’s time and making everyone else’s experience worse. Is that what these forums are about?
It is about getting Wayspots that have been clarified to not meet criteria off the game board so that people don’t submit them incorrectly. A friend of a friend served a 30day suspension for continuing to submit and resubmit them. I don’t want that to happen to anyone.
And yes, reviewers were accepting them incorrectly. You will see another topic posted here where we talk about education and reviewers needing feedback.
Bad rules should not be enforced, unjust decisions should not be celebrated. Niantic should change this ruling when it comes to Disc Golf Holes as it is clear that both submitters and reviewers and players want them to be in their games, and beyond that, they encourage exercise and exploration which if you listen to any interview with Niantic, any statement from them, they say that’s the vision, that’s the goal.
But what I’m being told here is that they don’t actually care about that, they just want sponsored Stops in Target and Starbucks, and would prefer that people aren’t encouraged to go out on trails in nature by there being more Stops there. The idea that a long Disc Golf Course which stretches miles, should not have multiple POIs along it which encourages people to keep walking, but should only have one anchor POI at the beginning near the parking lot is antithetical to the whole vision and goal of getting people out walking, exploring and exercising.
That is a large amount of time and effort you have put into finding things and making the gameboard better for a large number of players.
I understand why it might feel like the last straw, but my advice is to take a step back and time to think.
It is unfortunate you were unaware that there was an issue but these clarifications were made some time ago. This was a general ruling so no one is applying it maliciously against your specific submission.
I am thinking, I’m thinking I wasted my time and energy trying to make this stuff better for other people because I foolishly thought that it was a good thing to do which would encourage other people to exercise and explore, when in reality I’ve just been giving data to a company that doesn’t care about any of that and only wants to make money.
If I keep playing and submitting I’m just a sucker.
That is subjective. I personally think the rule makes perfect sense. You go to enjoy the course as a whole, so the course gets one wayspot to represent it, and you also don’t want people standing in the way of people using the course and/or getting hit by discs.
Fitness trails are a little different as each piece of equipment is a different exercise and they’re all spread out. You’re not doing the same thing 9 or 18 times in a row like you would with a golf course/disc golf course. They’re all individual things that can be done separately or together, whereas for a game of disc golf, all of the individual holes involve throwing a disc, and you play all the holes as one game. As stated above, submitting multiple holes on a golf course is analogous to submitting multiple bases on a baseball diamond, instead of submitting it as a whole.
At any rate, whether you like the rule or not, you agreed to play by the wayfarer rules when you did your onboarding, and this is a rule that currently exists. If anything, you should be grateful that this is something that we have clear guidelines on. There are many things which we don’t have clear guidance on but that we’d love to have clarified, such as neighborhood entrance signs.
I would personally take this as a learning experience. It might be disheartening, but you now know something you didn’t before. You shouldn’t let it put you off playing or finding other things that are eligible to submit.
Oh, because you’d get joy out of removing those ones that people have submitted as well?
I will not be finding other things to submit, just so they can be accepted and then you and your forum buddies can laugh while getting them removed from the other side of the world when you would never in a million years step foot on the Levee that you are getting my submissions removed from. I’m done with Wayfarer and I’m done with Pokémon Go, too many people like you ruins the entire experience
Here’s a photo of a turkey vulture flying away that I took on my walk at the Levee today:
I fully get your frustration, however please remain respectful to those here trying to answer your concerns.
None of us how have been happy to engage here, take any sense of joy or pleasure as you describe it, in removing things as we are all well aware of the implications. And we have had all had our own moments of frustration.
I think there is nothing more that can add to this conversation as the situation has been explained, and we are fellow wayfinders and not the ones that make the rules or guidelines.
As shown, official criteria states that only 1 wayspot should represent the course. Nobody who reports these are being malicious,they are following the wayfarer rules.
Criteria should not be followed for some and not others.
In regards to quitting, that is your choice. Personally I would suggest taking a bit of time out then make that decision.
So you’ll remove my parts of my response to a comment telling me that I should be “grateful” and take it as a “learning experience” because I’m the one being disrespectful and making “inappropriate comments”? Do all of you really not see the way you’re acting right now and in general with this stuff?
