Wayfarer Ambassador Program 2023

News & Announcements
1

Hello Explorers,

The application for the Wayfarer Ambassador Program 2023 has shipped! I’m super excited to launch the second year of our Ambassador Program Application alongside our current Ambassadors who have provided tons of insight and feedback that’ll shape this new year of the program for the better. Do you want to be a part of the ongoing growth of our community? Do you want to be an advocate for your community locally and globally? If so, the Ambassador program might be for you!

What is it?

The Community Ambassadors program is for a group of Wayfarer Explorers who believe in Niantic Wayfarer and are active participants in the official Wayfarer Community. They’re passionate about exploration, excited to engage with other Explorers, and share Explorer best practices (nominations, reviewing, edits, etc). The Community Ambassadors support the Wayfarer Community’s Mission and Vision by collaborating with the Community Manager and representing the voice of the community. All Wayfarer Ambassadors embody the following in their participation:

  • Driven by Wayfarer’s Mission
  • Lead by Example
  • Respectful Towards Community Members
  • Knowledgeable about Wayfarer
  • Curiosity to Explore

Who is eligible to be a Wayfarer Ambassador?

Any Explorer (18 years or older) that has demonstrated a strong commitment to Wayfarer, the Wayfarer Community, or the Niantic Mission and has a strong understanding of our product. Lastly, applicants must have a Wayfarer rating of at least Good.

What’s the time commitment?

Being a Wayfarer Ambassador is completely voluntary. While there are no set time commitments, actively participating and engaging with other Ambassadors to provide feedback to the Wayfarer team is how you can make a real impact on the Community’s Wayfarer experience. Participation can look differently from week to week. Active participation can look like joining group meetings, providing insights from the community, helping to clarify community concerns, etc.

Term Length

If selected to be an Ambassador, your term will extend for the calendar year for which you were selected with the potential for an invitation on an advisory role to the new cohort after yours. Regardless of when you start, there will be a new cohort of Ambassadors at the beginning of the new calendar year. This is meant to maintain a healthy amount of diversity and creativity.

Selection Criteria

The Ambassadors are chosen for their diverse representation of the Explorer Community. Explorer levels within Niantic products have limited impact on the selection process. Selection criteria does not require Explorers to be considered community leaders, although we recognize that some may be viewed as such already.

Explorers will be selected to become Ambassadors primarily based on their geographic location, knowledge of Wayfarer (both experts and novices), historical Wayfarer Community engagement, Niantic’s Mission, and their responses to the application questions. The ability to read, write, and communicate verbally in English is a requirement as the key updates and feedback requests will be in English.

Why would I want to become a Wayfarer Ambassador?

Becoming a Wayfarer Ambassador comes with its perks! You’ll have the opportunity to

  • Pilot some of our upcoming features and Niantic Products before anyone else
  • Provide feedback on features, updates, and events to ensure they’re loved by Explorers
  • Aid in making our community safe, welcoming, and FUN
  • Community Voice - share your ideas and that of the community with the Wayfarer Team
  • And of course, SWAG!

Ambassadors Relationship with Niantic

To participate in the Ambassador program, Explorers will have to agree to and sign a Non-Disclosure Agreement (NDA). Violating the NDA may result in immediate removal from the program, legal action against the person, and the termination of the person’s Wayfarer and all other Niantic game accounts.

What are the limitations of an Ambassador?

Ambassadors are Explorer community members who volunteer to represent and advocate for other Explorers for the purpose of enhancing the overall Explorer experience. They are not Niantic employees and do not represent Niantic. They do not have access to Niantic systems, including personally identifiable information. They are not authorized to make any decisions related to Niantic or its games, including but not limited to help center tickets, nominations, appeals, or account bans.

Where and When can I apply?

Applications are open NOW and will remain open until the end of the day (11:59pm PST) on 02/12/2023. Application can be found HERE.

(originally posted February 2023)

6 Likes
2

Hello Explorers,

As you know, we closed the Ambassador Application earlier this week. We will now begin reviewing all applications and hope to notify those who’ve been selected by mid next week.

(originally posted February 2023)

2 Likes
3

Hello Explorers,

We have finished reviewing every single application submitted and have selected out finalists! Please check the emails you applied to the program with starting today at 5:00pm PST. You’ll only have a couple days to accept to please make sure you check your spam folder.

Safe Exploring!

(originally posted February 2023)

3 Likes
4

Hello Explorers,

We are extremely excited to announce that all of the applicants we extended invites to have accepted to become a part of the new cohort of Ambassadors! For 2023, we invited and are welcoming 12 new Ambassadors into the program for a total of 23 Ambassadors spread around the globe. Please join me in congratulating them as you read more about why they chose to become an Ambassador and what they are looking forward to the most about being a Wayfarer Ambassador.

SeaprincessHNB

  • I wanted to become a Wayfarer Ambassador because I believe Wayfarer is the foundation for all Niantic games. I enjoy providing interaction points for the community and want to help others understand this process. Expanding the play field is a tangible way to improve the experience for others in my local community. By educating others, I can help them have the same impact on their local communities. I’m looking forward to helping the community have a better understanding of Niantic’s goals and expectations for Wayfarer while also communicating to Niantic how they can help the community achieve our goals within Wayfarer. The Ambassador program can be an amazing resource to Niantic if we all work together.

Roli

  • Hola, me dicen Roli, I’m Mexican, born and raised in Los Angeles. I enjoy ramen, boba (not popping pearls) and many other foods. I chose to apply to become an Ambassador because Wayfarer is already a big part of my daily life directly and indirectly that it only seems natural to extend that to a bigger role. As Ambassador, I look forward to working with my fellow ambos, current and past to bring up our own, along with the communities, ideas, concerns and questions. A lot of you know to find me in the WDD Discord server.

Kawin240

  • Hello, Hallo, ¡Hola!, Salut, Bog and Здравствуйте! I’m Kawin240 from Germany. Over time I played Ingress and Pokémon GO, but Wayfarer quickly became my main thing from Niantic once I got access to it! Nowadays one exploration follows another when I get to it. The communities I’m in struggled a bit with how some things are currently being done in Wayfarer. I want to not only provide that as Feedback more directly to Niantic, but also the topics from other communities I heard of, and help people out. My language skills can be put to great use here! I’m looking forward to use my language skills to connect to all the Wayfarer Friends, Freunde, Amigos, Amis, Prijatelji and Друзья ! It’s an exciting role and I look forward to making many new connections over this programme, that will help Niantic but also are great for the community.

AisforAndis

  • Hello! I’m AisforAndis, and I am a longtime Wayfarer from Florida, USA. I fell in love with Wayfarer because it encouraged me to pay more attention to my surroundings, and over the years it has given me a greater appreciation for the many interesting places I’ve explored. I chose to become a Wayfarer Ambassador so that I can help make Wayfarer a more fun, fulfilling, and straightforward experience for everyone. I am looking forward to helping grow and educate the Wayfarer community, providing feedback on new features and products, and interacting with even more community members from around the world.

PkmnTrainerJ

  • I am PkmnTrainerJ in most places online, I’ve played Pokémon GO since the start, and Ingress since 2017 (just missed out on the Sage badge). I’ve also played the various other Niantic titles too, and play various video games. I’m probably known in the community for long titles on Wayspots and Futurama GIFs. I chose to become a Wayfarer Ambassador because I’ve learnt quite a lot from the community since the days of OPR, and was invited to admin the UK Cross Platform Wayfarer discussion group on Telegram last year, so hope to share the guidance that others have shared with me, and see how Wayfarer grows. The current Ambassadors have really tried to help the community with getting Niantic to do challenges, updating criteria and the like. So I would like to continue that (oh, and being able to personally ask Tintino to add the Criteria Challenge update to the main site (after reviewing it) would be a bonus)

iFrankmans

  • I am Frank a player of most Niantic games (Ingress, Pokemon GO, Pikmin Bloom) from the Netherlands. Wayfarer (or historically OPR) has been a part of the games that has always interested me a lot. Wherever I go I always keep my eyes open for interesting objects in the environment that could benefit the Wayfarer network. The reason I applied as a Wayfarer Ambassador is to help the Wayfarer mission by inspiring others to go out more to explore new areas and help new players find their way with Wayfarer. I am most looking forward to keep doing Wayfarer as I have been doing all along and provide more direct feedback from the community to the Wayfarer team.

Xeno

  • Hi, I’m Xeno, I currently live in Switzerland. I enjoy hiking, traveling and exploring through Niantic games and through Wayfarer. I would like to help Wayfarer develop further as a tool for highlighting awesome and non-obvious locations that are great for exploration, and meaningfully integrate with other Niantic games and platforms. I am looking forward to advocating for the user community and providing feedback to the development team.

Siinnie

  • Hello, I’m Siinnie and I’m from Portugal. I’ve been around since 2019 and I am very involved in nominating and reviewing since then. Wayfarer has made me look at the world with very different eyes and I love to travel and explore new places. I chose to become a Wayfarer Ambassador because we must continue the job that this first batch of Ambassadors started and keep improving the Wayfarer experience for everyone. I’m looking forward to address feedback from the community and make Wayfarer a better place and fun for everyone that wants to be involved with it.

Elijustrying

  • Hello, I’m a Elijustrying, exiled to England. I mainly play Pokemon Go where my IGN is Elijustwalkin. I took up Ingress in 2018 with the plan to get an exgym. Before I knew it I was hooked on wayfinding, (still only Ingress). I have learnt a lot from the community - time to give something back. As an active community forum user and contributor I feel I have skills, experience and perspectives that could complement other Ambassadors. It’s a bit scary (in a good way), as it’s a very diverse global community, that we will seek to represent, but I’m up for the challenge. I look forward to contributing towards a better wayfinder experience, drawing on what I absorb from the forum. It will be fun to get to know the people behind the IGN string of letters.

Topu

  • An explorer with a vision of utmost growth. Focused on community outreach and improvement in a wider range from local to global. GO-Explore-Grow, three fundamentals I have chosen to pursue in the long run along with Niantic’s adventure. I chose to become a Wayfarer Ambassador to play an active role in expanding Niantic and it’s adventurous aspects to a vast and wider entity, to help more eligible waypoints getting a recognition; so that a wider range of people, even from rural places can be an adherent part of Niantic’s global community. The most I am looking forward to, the recognition of a wider range of eligible waypoints globally leading to the growth of both urban and rural communities. Also, making stronger communication among the people from different communities along with more engagement.

Onecino

  • Hey I’m onecino. I’ve started playing Ingress in closed beta while living in London, UK. I’m currently residing in Gdańsk, Poland where I still play a little bit. I’ve started reviewing as soon as the Operation Portal Recon started. I chose to become a Wayfarer Ambassador to spread knowledge in order to help people bring high quality Wayspot nominations into the Wayfarer network that will allow other fellow players to discover interesting places around the world. I am most looking forward to learning more from fellow Ambassadors how we can make the most out of our Ambassador Program for the whole Wayfarer community.

LukeAllStars

  • Hi, I’m LukeAllStars. I live in Hamburg, Germany. I started doing Wayfarer stuff in mid-2019, right after it was released in Germany. I play Ingress, as well as Pokemon Go. I love traveling, discovering new places, and meeting new friends on my journey through the world. I chose to become Ambassador because I think this is a great way to support the Wayfarer community in communication, as well as bring new ideas to the process. I can also use my experience to make wayfarer more fun, and easy to use for everyone. Also, Wayfarer is a big aspect of the games I enjoy every day. I like to put as much energy into this often-forgotten topic for maximal game experience. I love communicating with others. Especially in Wayfarer, I’ve seen many different perspectives of Wayfarers, as well as the communities of the Niantic games. Since communication is a key aspect of Wayfarer, I can represent the community to improve the product of Wayfarer. I like to work with a great team of motivated Ambassadors to make the program as helpful as possible for the community. Also, I’m happy to give useful feedback on the product or upcoming features, so that they can be optimal to use for everyone.

Again, we’re extremely excited to welcome them to the Ambassador Program and looking forward to all of the great things that will come through our collective efforts. It’s an exciting 2023 for Wayfarer! Welcome to the Ambassador Program!

What’s next you might ask? Soon we will have our first meeting where we’ll be able to meet each other for the first time and start thinking about what aspects of Wayfarer we want to impact the most. But until them, I hope you take some time getting to know our new Ambassadors.

(originally posted March 2023)

3 Likes