How do you explain what you’re doing when questioned while surveying?

On the occasions that I have been asked what I'm doing I simply state that I am collecting data for OpenStreetMap which is a map equivalent to Wikipedia. People in my area definitely know about Wikipedia so that is usually enough. (Not really true that OSM is the equivalent to Wikipedia but close enough for that type of query.)

However one time the people in an area did not ask me but simply called the police to report a suspicious person. The officer who talked to me had no problems or issues with what I was doing. That episode made me decide I'd rather be inconspicuous when mapping. So I dropped the walking papers style mapping and now use OSMtracker (for gpx tracks and collecting information about speed limits, etc.) and OsmPad to collect house numbers. I can simply walk by looking like everyone else who's head is buried in their smart phone and nobody gives me a second glance.

Before using OsmPad, I used the sound record option with OSMTracker and a set of ear buds to collect addresses. Again, nobody pays attention to people talking mindlessly to themselves on a phone. But my post processing to get addresses into JOSM was much longer than the simple import of a OSM file from OsmPad.

Indeed there's a couple of leaflets. The English one is distributed by Andy Allan in the UK - he charges a little bit of money to cover shipping and handling. Here: http://shop.opencyclemap.org/products/openstreetmap-promotional-leaflets

If you're not in the UK then, due to the high cost of shipping, it might be cheaper to print some yourself. A couple SVG sources are here http://svn.openstreetmap.org/misc/pr_material/ but I assume that Andy would be willing to share his sources too if you ask him.

• In case you understand German, see the diary post Hausnummern mappen und "Internetverweigerer" (started 2013-05-28) and the many comments there.
• At the forum there is/was a discussion about the same topic which some tips: How do you identify as contributor? (started 2014-07-13).
• I've read that some people wear those: OSM Surveyors Jacket – quite the opposite, proactive attempt.
• And for flyers – see Flyers_and_posters#Flyers in our wiki. At least you should be able to find a good template there and design one yourself.

I don't have a pamphlet but do often get into conversations with local business owners and start talking to them about OSM. Once I've finished uploading all the details I usually send them a link to the relevant section of the map. More details here in a diary entry I posted a few months ago https://www.openstreetmap.org/user/NZGraham/diary/23335

Regulary happens to me, residential neighborhoods on a Sunday afternoon nearly always cause issues.

It is one of the things on my longer TODO list to produce a leaflet with a concise version of what the mapper is doing and why we are the good guys. This is not the same as what the currently available collateral does (which tries to sell the project to a potential contributor), and should address privacy and safety concerns and point out that OSM has the potential to increase personal privacy at least a bit.

Not really an answer, I know.

If I sense suspicion I then say " hello, in case you are wondering what I'm doing is I am trying to update a free internet map, It's very useful I say, especially for new addresses and new shops as otherwise they are hard to find, would you mind telling me the post code?" leaflets are a good idea to hand out. But maybe the people i meet feel less threatened as I'm a pensioner.

If I'm a robber and read this Q&A page, I would present myself as an OpenStreetMap contributor when someone is asking what I'm doing in a street, looking for unoccupied houses :-)