Gulf of America
Google said today that it plans to update Google Maps to reflect President Trump’s January 20th executive order to change the names of the Gulf of Mexico and Denali to the Gulf of America and Mount McKinley, respectively.
The order declared that, within 30 days, the Secretary of the Interior should take all appropriate actions to change the names of the prominent body of water and mountain. To do this, the database of name and location information published by the US Geological Survey, the Geographic Names Information System, should be updated accordingly. These files are revised on a bi-monthly basis.
“When that happens, we will update Google Maps in the US quickly to show Mount McKinley and Gulf of America,” the company said Monday.
Apple has remained silent about the issue, but a change has been made, even if it is a small one. If users navigate to the Gulf of Mexico, it still shows the 400-year-old name plain as day.
However, if a user searches “Gulf of America,” the text over the Gulf changes to reflect the search result, but the information sheet shows data and photos about the Gulf of Mexico.
[…]
Google will change the name for United States users to Gulf of America. Users outside of the United States will see both names with one in parentheses, while people in Mexico will see only Gulf of Mexico.
However, it is pretty rich to think of Google as particularly concerned about the accuracy of names on its maps. It routinely invents names of neighbourhoods.
Re-renaming Denali back to Mount McKinley seems like a no-brainer for the maps to comply with. A country names its own mountains. If Obama could rename it, Trump can re-rename it.
The Gulf of Mexico, though, is an international body of water, and its name wasn’t even debated until Trump started talking about it a few weeks ago. Google (and perhaps Apple) having a policy where they simply follow the naming conventions of the GNIS seems not merely sensible but utterly uncontroversial ... until now.
In GIS, there are Places (POIs) and there are names but there are also historical names and local names. A lot of whatever streets in tiny towns around the world have dozens of alt names. As long as some news paper or town or historian called it that at some point in history, mapping companies capture it and store it under the place ID.
[…]
Until the next administration rescinds the Executive Order, it’s not unusual for an American company to comply with a place name change but that name may only display in certain geographies and the old name will still work.
These are mapping and metadata nerds approaching the dilemma in the very nerdiest of ways. I found it rather soothing, and also quite informative — particularly the posts from Minh Nguyễn, who seems to be an OpenStreetMap super user.
Previously:
- TikTok Takedown
- Apple Changes Crimea Map When Viewed From Russia
- Taiwan Flag Removed from iOS Emoji Keyboard in Hong Kong
- macOS 10.14.4 Restricts Taiwan Flag Emoji in China
- Apple Fixed Bug That Crashed Devices When Typing ”Taiwan”
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I'm fine with this. Most countries have localized names for entire countries, so why not a body of water?
Sure, it's a petty imperialistic world view that drives the renaming, but that's true for most of the US already.
