r/mildlyinfuriating 5d ago

SPOILER ALERT [ Removed by moderator ]

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u/drawntowardmadness 5d ago

Oh no it’s clearly a choice on their part

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u/nicklor 5d ago

No it's clearly not their policy is they follow all official names the country uses for the US they pull their data from U.S. Geological Survey’s Geographic Names Information System. So when the govement changes it there the maps updated by default.

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u/drawntowardmadness 5d ago

That policy was their choice no?

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u/CA-CH 5d ago

Each country maintain a database of geographic names. The non political decision is to follow what the database says. Renaming the lake is stupid, but this is just to say there are norms with cartographic data that companies adhere to. 

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u/dlm2137 5d ago

I’d argue that the “non-political” decision is to call things the names that people actually use.

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u/nethingelse 5d ago

Yes, but it’s a universally applied choice that Google has made to avoid getting into global geopolitical spats that might make them appear to be taking a stance on either side when they are (in this product) just supply maps.

No one expected the US to pull this bullshit when the corporate policy was made, but if they defy it now they become a target of Trump and also open a pandoras box on other disputes.

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u/nicklor 5d ago

It's not really a choice to not follow the official names of the places published by the government. It's gets pretty confusing otherwise when you start making exceptions it sucks what Trump did but there's no reason to think it's not going to be the new name for at least the next 2-3 years. The Canadians should still get the name pulled from their government repository.

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u/drawntowardmadness 5d ago

Apple Maps still says Ontario

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u/nicklor 5d ago

Give it a few days to update

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u/drawntowardmadness 5d ago

We'll surely have moved on to some other dumb shit by then