2022
Since few months ago, I found few photos that I uploaded onto Google Maps relocated to "unknown place" or some strange places. There seems no way for users to correct it except delete those relocated photos. Here are 2 examples, one was relocated to "Unknown place", one strange place "Taipei, Keelung City". I feedbacked the problem by "Send feedback" for months, but I have not heard any from Google, nor seen any improvement.
Similarly, some irrelevant photos (or very far-fetched) used as sort of "cover image" of the places, and I feedbacked to Google as well. Months after, those are still there. Here is one example, the photo of Yufeng Bridge has been the "cover" of Yulau Lookout for months, the distance in between is 9.9km according to Google Maps.
Some users contributed a series of photos irrelevant to the places, then after reporting few of them to Google, Google would start to give you hard time reporting such misplaced photos. Even I spent time doing those tasks Google Maps gave, those photos remain there months after I reported.
Why would Google replace proper photos with irrelevant ones? Does anyone know how to tackle such problems? How to correct the photos that were relocated? How to relocate or suggest relocate certain photos?
Frank
Thank you very much for replying @Pea!
1. relocation of photo
@FrankS wrote:How to correct the photos that were relocated? How to relocate or suggest relocate certain photos?
Your photos weren't relocated so you can't re-relocate them. The term 'Unknown place' usually appears when the listing the photo was associated with is removed. Photos must be tied to a specific POI (eg something like a store) not just an area
1.1. location: unknown place
A photo must tie to one specific POI, (I am not sure what POI is, point of interests, I supposed) not an area. However, some points of interests are area, such parks, pools, lakes ..etc.; some are linear, such like a canyon, beach, historical trail or street...etc. Therefore, it's not unusual to see same place or point of interests marked at different points on the map. I myself suggested remove duplicated marks (of same place) many many times on MapMaker. I believe some duplicated marks were removed, and consequently some photos users uploaded onto those POI mark became associated with "unknown place". However, the photos uploaded to those later removed POI are "innocent".
Allow me to use the same example I gave in first post again here.
The upper one was uploaded to "Qingshui Duanyai", which is still a POI on Google Maps. Can I link that photo to it? I noticed few points marked as "Qingshui Duanyai" when I was about to upload the photos, this POI is "linear". I, therefore, chose the one with most comments and photos, but it looked like Google decided to keep the one with least photos and comments later on.
1.2 location: non-existing place
The 2nd photo in my example, it's a photo uploaded to a swimming pool which is a POI on Google Maps now. Besides I want to link that photo to the existing POI, I have been wondering why it would be "relocated" to such a strange place, "Taipei, Keelung City". Taipei and Keelung are different cities, though both are located in the northern part of Taiwan. Taipei is generally referred to Taipei City, though there is New Taipei City, which was Taipei county till few years ago. There was/is not any district in Keelung City named "Taipei". It's not like "Paris, Texas" in the US, a real place exists in the real world. "Taipei, Keelung City" never existed in the past, and does not exist in the real world but Google Maps.
"The Google Maps Team" sent me email regarding the photos uploaded regularly, it always goes,
| Keep up the good work |
| Contribute to places you've visited recently in Your Contributions. |
 |
| Keep exploring, The Google Maps team |
The Google Maps team always encourage people to upload more photos. Perhaps, the quality of the photos and after-uploading appear rather irrelevant, or not as interested. Likely, the solution would be leaving those irrelevant photos, and photos at unknown places and non-existing places alone and upload more.
