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When A Waymark Changes


La de Boheme

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A year ago, I posted this waymarkq-waymark.gif of a mural. The mural has since been painted over and replaced with a new image. Should I edit the existing waymark with new info and new pictures, basically leaving the old info intact, but explaining that it has been refurbished and changed recently (i.e. leaving a 'historic' record of what was there) or should I just relegate it to being a legacy or 86 it altogether and submit an entirely new waymark?

 

I appreciate any advice, since I am in a quandary on how to approach this.

 

xs-shrug.gif

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A year ago, I posted this waymarkq-waymark.gif of a mural. The mural has since been painted over and replaced with a new image. Should I edit the existing waymark with new info and new pictures, basically leaving the old info intact, but explaining that it has been refurbished and changed recently (i.e. leaving a 'historic' record of what was there) or should I just relegate it to being a legacy or 86 it altogether and submit an entirely new waymark?

 

I appreciate any advice, since I am in a quandary on how to approach this.

 

xs-shrug.gif

 

I know what you mean about not being sure what to do. But when I read your post, I had no doubt at all about what I would do: mark the old mural as legacy, and create a NEW waymark for the new mural. In my opinion, it's better to have a clear, separate record of the old mural.

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A year ago, I posted this waymarkq-waymark.gif of a mural. The mural has since been painted over and replaced with a new image. Should I edit the existing waymark with new info and new pictures, basically leaving the old info intact, but explaining that it has been refurbished and changed recently (i.e. leaving a 'historic' record of what was there) or should I just relegate it to being a legacy or 86 it altogether and submit an entirely new waymark?

 

I appreciate any advice, since I am in a quandary on how to approach this.

 

 

Here's the approach I've developed from thoughts here in the forum. I'll try to illustrate with some examples from my postings. It shouldn't matter whether there is more that one waymarker involved. It might depend on how the waymark changed or moved. It makes good sense to collect similar visit photos under unique waymarks that could be linked/related to each other. I like the usage of LEGACY or CLOSED in the title, as opposed to deleting (archiving) the history.

 

I encountered the same thing recently with a similar category - painted utility boxes. A box was repainted with a different design. I felt the old painted design should remain as a historical interest note (in case anyone still had unposted visit pictures! ;) ) and so I created a new waymark with the same coordinates to collect pictures of the new box. Since I could edit both waymarks, they are hyperlinked together for reference and the old one has updated notes. See older painting and newer painting. An interesting note is that the Google Street view still shows the original box painting.

 

How about some other cases of a waymark changing?

 

If a business relocates to a new location, then again I think two waymarks are the best way to track this historically, even if different waymarkers are involved. An example of this is a bicycle shop that moved from there to here.

 

A similar change also happened recently when Apple closed one of its original stores and relocated a few blocks away in a new building in Palo Alto. When I submitted a waymark for the new store, the category managers there were faced with a situation happening for the first time in that category and I don't think they recognized how to deal with this case. There was already an existing waymark for the first store, when I waymarked the new location, so my submission had a link to the former store location in my new waymark. The approver took my submission as an "update" to the original waymark, pasted my text and coordinates into the someone else's waymark and deleted all the photos to "start anew", thereby loosing all history of that location and visits to the original waymark. It also created a self-referential link of the waymark to itself, based on my text which has a link back to it!

 

Eventually, through discussion with the category managers, they accepted my waymark, but they had to archive the first one, because it had been so altered. The link back from the current waymark to the archived one still shows the obliteration of the original waymark. I decided to post one last visit picture to the former store with an appropriate picture. (Did this count as a visit for me?) I even asked to get the original waymark restored from a Groundspeak backup, but nothing happened.

 

I think another the more obvious case for two waymarks is when a business location closes and another business opens in the same building. Often the two businesses will be in two different Waymarking categories with (virtually) the same coordinates. My movie rental store has already closed and marked as LEGACY. I'm waiting to see if something new and waymarkable moves in here. Even if a new business in the same category opened at this location, it should still be a new waymark.

 

Now, what if a building is picked up and moved to a distant (a few block, at least) location? If it had already been waymarked at the original location, then those photos and visits serve as a nice collection of the building at that location. In addition to Relocated Structures, a new waymark for the building at its new coordinates should be created for visit pictures to the building at that location. You can't take any pictures of the building at the old location anymore!

 

In summary, think in terms of a waymark's photo gallery, keeping location-related pictures grouped together in unique waymarks and linking waymarks to each other where useful and possible.

Edited by DougK
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My approach is similar to DougK's. If a place closes I add "{LEGACY}" in front of the title and update the short and long description with a clearly labeled edit note.

 

I am not perfectly happy with this workaround, but even more I hate to see this historic information gone that maybe is not recorded anywhere else. It may be only "minor" history but even a former fast food joint can have a great value in someone's memories. And you never know, this could be the place where the president of 2038 met his future wife the first time :-)

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Now that Waymarking.com is a few years old, these types of situations come up more frequently. This is more common, I think, in the commercial categories, which might be a good reason not to have them. But, there are many ways that a waymark can become obsolete, or substantially altered. Sometimes an existing waymark just needs to be updated.

 

I'm strongly against just archiving a waymark without some compelling reason. I think one of the values our hobby offers is historical documentation, however insignificant that may seem. I'm not sure "legacy" really communicates anything, so I prefer to use more descriptive terms such as "Moved," "Gone," "Removed," or "Demolished." I put this in caps at the beginning of the waymark name, then again in the quick description, and the detailed description. I then add a note of explanation with whatever information I have.

 

In cases where another qualifying waymark, in the same or different category, appears at the same coordinates, then it needs another new waymark. Adding explanations, and hyperlinks, to both waymarks is the best way to go. If an object, building, or business has actually moved or been relocated, then I think a new waymark is also the best alternative--again with explanations and links. There have been some sculptures, for instance, that have been relocated several times to different cities. Each one should be a separate waymark since each is a unique location.

 

I think it is not appropriate for an officer in a category to make large changes in someone's waymarks at all. If there is an issue, work with the person who created and submitted the waymarks. That's how we collaborate to achieve the best results.

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I'm not sure "legacy" really communicates anything, so I prefer to use more descriptive terms such as "Moved," "Gone," "Removed," or "Demolished." I put this in caps at the beginning of the waymark name, then again in the quick description, and the detailed description. I then add a note of explanation with whatever information I have.

This makes perfect sense. To me, LEGACY basically says the waymark no longer exists in any form when in fact, it still may whether in an altered form or it has become inaccessible to the public or it's been moved.

 

So I took this advice to heart and edited five LEGACY WMs I have to a more descriptive term. They are all one-of-a-kind items and down the road, who knows? They may be one of the few records left.

 

:)

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mark the old mural as legacy, and create a NEW waymark for the new mural.

 

I dislike the word Legacy, and since brand new waymarks are approved with the word Legacy in the title, I agree that it would be better to use other words (as Silverquill suggested).

You are right. The word itself is not the best choice when it comes to a given location; there there will always be a better, more meaningful one.

 

But when you think of a whole bunch of waymarks that have gone in all different kinds that are possible, then you need a standard label to filter for it. Seeing it this way I did not find anything more inclusive. As I said before I use the word LEGACY in all capital letters with curly brackets around in front of the title; and I give an explanation in a clearly labeled edit not in the short and in the long description. This gives me the possibility to filter for all my gone waymarks with one single search term. In my opinion this outweights the vagueness on a given waymark by far. I would prefer a checkbox to tell this location is not valid any longer in its former state but still searchable if wished; we will probably never get this so I found my approach the least bad workaround.

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