If you searched on Bing maps last week for Melbourne, you would have instead been re-directed to a spot in the North Pacific Ocean, off the East coast of Japan.
How did this happen? Bing was using inaccurate information from Wikipedia, namely, Wikipedia didn’t include the all-important South on the co-ordinates.
@ssharwood This issue has been fixed. Missing negative sign in Wikipedia data.
— Ricky Brundritt (@rbrundritt) August 22, 2016
Ricky Brunditt, is a Senior Program Manager for Bing Maps, explained the situation to The Register‘s Simon Sharwood.
@ssharwood Not too much. Mainly only for rich description on map website. The developer API’s don’t use this and didn’t have this error.
— Ricky Brundritt (@rbrundritt) August 23, 2016
But Brunditt assures there’s no need to be concerned that the mis-information directed someone into the sea instead the Victorian city.
@sabarinathg The Bing Maps Terms of use don’t allow turn by turn navigation apps to be created.
— Ricky Brundritt (@rbrundritt) August 25, 2016
This story originally appeared on Gizmodo
Comments
7 responses to “Microsoft Blames Wikipedia For Bing Maps Putting Melbourne In The Sea”
Working as intended. I tend to think Melbournians should get in the sea at every opportunity
My teachers at Uni would rip me a new one for using Wiki as a source. You’d think the boffins behind Bing would know better.
On second thought….
Because it’s lazy. Use Wikipedia, it includes citations and sources. So you can get your information from Wiki and then cite the source they cite
I like how Bing doesnt cross validate that information with any other data… its not like anyone can edit or change it
Also given their reliance on wikipedia information, did they make donation to keep them afloat?
That’s what the government wants you to think. Really Melbourne is actually a flight capable land mass that decided to go on a jaunt to the North for a while before coming back to Australia.
Why do I find that more believable than the actual explanation of Wikipedia?
Ooh the fabled Laputa! It all makes sense now.