Not sure if this is the right forum to discuss this, but at least a UK group will understand UK geography :)
Facebook is in a right mess as far as it's list of places that people can select to use as location markers. http://www.jasonfriend.me/facebookplaces/w/editing:incorrectlyspelledcities:... will give you some idea of the extent of the problem, and that is by no means complete. You will notice that Wikipedia links are used to provide background information and basically prove to US edtors that we know what we are talking about, but the wikipedia page names are ow causing problems as they are being taken 'literally'.
Example https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Harlington identifies three UK locations, but uses 'London' rather than 'Hillingdon' to identify that page. As soon as one is on the page the Hillingdon connection is listed, but Facebook are making a meal out of things which is creating even more of a mess.
While it is not a wikipedia problem, one tidy up that would make things a little more consistent across several directories would be to replace many of the ,London disambiguation with the correct borough and then the crude Facebook processing would at least pick up the right cross link without having to mess up the hierarchy in Facebook. Personally I'd prefer it if Facebook used a better method of listing places, but many of these problems go back several years and we have not been able to get any movement, so fixing the other end first may finally prompt some action :)
( And I do not have any problem undertaking the work. I've got most of the problem links already documented as part of the 'fix Facebook' campaign )
Hi Lester,
As with most issues on Wikipedia, the best solution will always involve mobilising support for it. Have you had a look at WikiProject London?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_London
I'd recommend copying the gist of your email to the talk page there and seeing if you get any support or opposition. If you get support, then involve them in the cleanup. If you get opposition, then at least you know what obstacles will be in the way. If nobody seems bothered, it's a green light to go ahead yourself.
Let us know if you run into problems.
On 19/07/15 22:51, rexx wrote:
As with most issues on Wikipedia, the best solution will always involve mobilising support for it. Have you had a look at WikiProject London?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_London
I'd recommend copying the gist of your email to the talk page there and seeing if you get any support or opposition. If you get support, then involve them in the cleanup. If you get opposition, then at least you know what obstacles will be in the way. If nobody seems bothered, it's a green light to go ahead yourself.
For reference ... https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_London#Administrati...
I've put that page on my watchlist. Hopefully other members of this list may keep an eye on it as well.
Facebook will one day switch to Wikidata info instead of wikipedia data
This will give multilingual labels, more places, better hierarchy of Admin divisions
Joe
On Mon, 20 Jul 2015 00:40 rexx rexx@blueyonder.co.uk wrote:
I've put that page on my watchlist. Hopefully other members of this list may keep an eye on it as well.
-- Rexx
On 19 July 2015 at 23:09, Lester Caine lester@lsces.co.uk wrote:
On 19/07/15 22:51, rexx wrote:
As with most issues on Wikipedia, the best solution will always involve mobilising support for it. Have you had a look at WikiProject London?
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia:WikiProject_London
I'd recommend copying the gist of your email to the talk page there and seeing if you get any support or opposition. If you get support, then involve them in the cleanup. If you get opposition, then at least you know what obstacles will be in the way. If nobody seems bothered, it's a green light to go ahead yourself.
For reference ...
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_talk:WikiProject_London#Administrati...
-- Lester Caine - G8HFL
Contact - http://lsces.co.uk/wiki/?page=contact L.S.Caine Electronic Services - http://lsces.co.uk EnquirySolve - http://enquirysolve.com/ Model Engineers Digital Workshop - http://medw.co.uk Rainbow Digital Media - http://rainbowdigitalmedia.co.uk
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
Wikimedia UK mailing list wikimediauk-l@wikimedia.org https://lists.wikimedia.org/mailman/listinfo/wikimediauk-l WMUK: https://wikimedia.org.uk
On 20/07/15 13:35, Joe Filceolaire wrote:
Facebook will one day switch to Wikidata info instead of wikipedia data
This will give multilingual labels, more places, better hierarchy of Admin divisions
Having been trying to get the existing mess sorted for the past 5+ years some how I doubt THAT is going to happen any time soon :) But we are finally getting some movement on the long list of mistakes so one lives in hope. One day I may be able to actually add my home town to my profile :)
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