GeoNames Forum

I note that Geonames population data is supposed to be obtained from official sources, such as a government census.

However, while working to update a list of Malaysian populated places, I have noticed that there are numerous new Populated Places which are created and given a population that do not corroborate with official government census or wikipedia records of such places. May I clarify if this is supposed to be allowed under geonames guidelines?

To clarify what we are trying to look at, we have enough to suspect that someone has been updating the Geonames database by manually calculating Area * Region Population Density, with the help of applications such as Nimby Rails. We are clarifying if this is valid, and if not, can the administrator help us to do a mass removal of the wrong populations.

As we are using the database for our own project purposes, we are asking if the administrators can clarify on this as soon as possible. Thanks.

Hi

For populated places it is usually easier to find population numbers than area size, so I think it would be difficult to do the calculation you suspect.
As you say this kind of calculation does not seem to be useful, or it would be so complicated that it would be easier to use real numbers.

Which populated places do you think are wrong? So we can contact the contributor, undo the changes and block the user.

Best Regards

Marc