Civil Geeks: Meet the Hawaii Team Behind Waze

My latest “Civil Geeks” column for Civil Beat introduces the everyday people behind one of the most popular navigation apps in the world. Waze, acquired by Google in 2013, incorporates traffic and incident reports from its more than 50 million users, giving it unmatched real-time information on everything from accidents to fresh potholes. But it also relies on a volunteer army of map editors — including many based in Hawaii — to help carve order out of the chaos that comes with large-scale crowdsourcing.

Waze is available for iOS and Android smartphones, as well as on the web. People new to Waze in the islands can check out the Waze Hawaii page on Facebook or the Hawaii community in the Waze forums. People interested in becoming a map editor are encouraged to visit the Hawaii state page on the Waze wiki before jumping into the Waze Map Editor.

Read the full column here: Civil Geeks: A People-Powered Navigation App