Troubles with iD

Since some weeks I am observing and helping new users with their very first edits. Very often the newbies are removing huge polygons or destroy relations. Besides I am experiencing that many users do not read proposals at the Wiki. Which results in using only presets.

Some years ago mappers were regularly using the fixme or note taggings, which are now not used very often.

I have the impression that the newbies are not that integrated into the project. This project where everybody should read the proposals of somebody else. And does not put all the properties into the name-Tag.

My guess is that this is because it is too easy to edit the map. The presets are destroying the map: The newbies register, start to edit and find some nice presets. After a few clicks they finished thier first edit: They click on the save button which gives the impression to keep their edits until they login next time. So they can use this button to save their edits and come back later (but often never). In fact they are creating a changeset or uploading data to the database. But they’ll never find out, because with this poor editor they are not able to look inside the OSM. They get the impression of editing mapnik-tiles.

Another thing is: They are not able to browse the map, because in this editor they always just see the presets. This results in many duplicates.

My solution to the Problem would be: You really have to go on the nerves of the newbies with references to the wiki. Before they are able to upload something they should be bothered with tons of questions and not with mislabeled and easy to use buttons to save their first try. Maybe they should have to browse a tutorial.

But they should also get links to the pages and mailing-lists of their home region directly on their welcome screen - to ask questions etc.

The most important: Do not push such an incomplete editor onto osm.org. OWL (which has fewer bugs than iD) would be an helpful tool, but not iD. So please release OWL and move iD to any subpage where nobody is able to use it and push it later!

I confirm this.