"Giving your Pokéstop Nominations the best chance to be approved. With OPR insights + good and bad examples."

#PokemonGO: Introduction and Goals (Long post warning)Hi. I'm an OPR reviewer, which is the only way to review pokéstops currently, you only get it by reaching lvl 12 on Ingress and being approved in a test.By no means I'm a good reviewer, been doing for ~2 months and only for Brazil, which is a pretty limited scope, but I feel like there's common mistakes that could be avoided with simple advices. Listing and explaining then will be my goal here, with advices on what you should write/choose/picture or not.I'm assuming you have access to 2nd photo and additional texts, that it's available only in places where Pokéstop submission beta system is available or where it's been rollout in Ingress Prime(currently Brazil, Australia, New Zealand and South Korea).There’s a similar to this other thread about tips, check it out too.Also, my goal isn't to go by the mentality of “the more pokéstops better no matter what”, nor trick reviewers to think it's better than it is. I just want overall more quality submissions, which can be achieved by photo, description, location marker, etc. I think most submissions currently are good.I also made a compilation of the most basic questions about pokéstop submissions. Check it out if you're new to this topic first. There I mentioned how to make “a valid submission” that won't be automatically denied.First of all, if you are submitting, Please read the official guidelines they answer most questions with good examples of what's valid and not. Also, read what you should be writing on each step. I’ll assume you are submitting something valid.Second. Don't submit bad or fake nominations. It seems obvious, but you might be tempted to submit low quality candidates just because you have submissions available, don't do it. It will clog up the system and waste time trying to navigate by the location system, specially over areas that don't have many reviewers, like mine.Third. Don't blame reviewers if you get a reject. It could be the reason, but most of the time it's something that you could have done better. This is a bad habit/mentality that will make your submissions worse overall. Also, every reviewer does it differently, this is just my point of view. Every reject I got I can think of a point a (usually a photosphere would help). Reviewers can only suggest a change the location marker, but not for any text or photo.Point of interest or POI is the thing in the real world(statue, park, church, art, etc) that you are submitting to become a portal/pokéstop/gym. I'll refer to it a lot.Okay. Now let's go to the main topics:OPR Criterias:This could be a more complex topic. But I'll go just for the basics. Your submission will be reviewed by 6 ratings, for each the reviewer will assign 1 to 5 stars.1 is definitely not. 3 is unsure or “good enough”, 5 is definitely approved in accord to guidelines. 2 and 4 don't have a specific meaning behind them.The ratings: Should this be a portal? Is the title accurate? Does it have historical or cultural value? Is it visually unique? Is the location accurate? Can it be safely accessed?Choosing to 1-star on the main question(Should this be a portal) will allow the reviewer to skip other ratings, but it will need to say why.They can also suggest a new location, but not change text or photo.Reviewers won't live in your location(most likely), so they will judge by Street view, Google Maps’ Satellite view, and the coherence between them and your submitted data. Assume the submitter doesn’t know anything about it.Worth pointing out that every reviewer does it differently. Know your local community preferences, this comes with experience.We don't know the requirements for approval. But the more stars you get, the better.Title:Pretty straight forward.Use a descriptive and unique title. Use the official name whenever possible.A title that can be seen in photos is better.Emoji on it allows an instant 1* reject.Double check for typos. Reviewers can't edit it.Don’t title the POI over something that’s a reject. Most common I see is natural things(like a lake, important trees, river or boulders), to submit those, you need a sign(and name accordingly).Try not to use generic names only. Add some flavor to it. Like name the bigger place is included in, the main Street is near to. Bad: “Car art”, “Water tower”, “playground”, “Church”. Good: “Opala art on Car Workshop”, “Water Tower of 1st avenue”, “Sand Playground of X Park”, “São Benedito's Church”.Primary Photo:This will be the photodisk image(borders will be cut later). It has restriction rules that automatically reject you submissions. Read them on the guidelines.Makes sure that the POI it's shown, centered and highlighted in like 75% of the picture. . Bad: This could use a bit more of zoom, ⅓ of the photo is sky, and ⅓ is floor, your 2nd photo helps you identify these. This is meant to show the water tower, but it’s can barely find it. Also it shows animals, which means instant 1* reject.Take a photo at daylight whenever possible. It will contrast more important details. It will also give a better safety impression. No street view is taken a night. Bad: Night photos tend to be very bad, this one allows you to identify the things, but someone could 1* reject as a bad quality photo. Good: It’s possible that your POI is more visually unique during night.Don't take a blurred photo, from screens, inside a car, tilted, or blocked by your fat finger. Those are specific 1* reject criterias. You are shown a preview of it. Bad: Take 10 seconds to get out of the car to take the photo, you have a valid POI. Don’t take a photo with a tree that literally covers your POI unnecessarily, the 2nd photo could be the 1st. This is slightly blurred, that makes you believe it’s taken inside the window of a vehicle, it’s bad but acceptable(could be worse).Make sure it shows some name identification if there's any available. This will be the main argument to give a 5* for the title. Depending on the visual uniqueness of the POI, you can use the 2nd photo for the identifier. A generic looking house can be a public worship place, but I can't know that just by you saying it is. Bad: [Here the 2nd photo is not useful(https://ift.tt/2YK1XnQ), I can already see the architecture(rectangular shape, roof thing, stairs) and identify them on satellite(street view was showing a construction, no problem), but name is barely visible below the roof, any of the photos could show a sign or a close to that. This shows a possible church, but with identification, and with a regular house looking, 1* reject. This square can’t get it’s title confirmed, 2nd photo could show a sign. Good: This simple photo shows a good square with proper signage and title.Proper signage will help a lot, specially if it's unique, on a totem, with historic text, showing inauguration date, made of resistant materials, etc. Bad: Generic sports field are suggested to be rejected. Good: This church shows a sign with proper identification, it shows the sign on 2nd photo, and I can identify the place to the right of street view. This sign shows the inauguration date, with a good combination of 1st, 2nd and street view angle and illumination, you can easily identify the very small sign.Show an object it’s tied to, there needs to be one. Bad: Submitting a park/square with a photo showing only grass and trees.Secondary photo:This is meant to help your primary photo be identified on it's bigger context, to show it's safe, has public access, etc.Visually show the POI on the photo. This is very important. If you just turn 90 degrees and take another photo, I can't tell if that’s the POI area or another one. This is a common “technique” that bad fake submitters use. Bad: This is a fake submission, it’s a cropped photo that conveniently hides any way of identification, 1* reject. This urban art might be on the alley, but 2nd photo doesn’t show the POI, so it could be a 2* for location. Good: This art on a barber shop is made of spray paint, on a public space, so eligible, submitter shows another angle, of the POI, the shop can be found at street view(despite on an older form) and it has an updated photosphere(not shown in the photo, but was there), this is the best case scenario(photosphere wasn’t even necessary IMO).Show another angle that will allow the submitter to find it in Street View. While you might think “but you can know it's safe by Street view”, another angle will help the reviewer identify neighbour’s house patterns, trees, long distance references, etc on street view/satellite to know it's actually there. Here in Brazil(specially in my rural area) most street view aren't updated(2011 or 2012), but there's visual references that are still there 8 years later. Alongside with the preview(check location marker), it can help get a better review even without a photosphere. Bad:This 2nd photo doesn’t help, but it shows that the field doesn’t have a safe place for someone playing on a phone to be, a better one should be the region over the street view(looks like a deck), on the top to bottom angle showing the white bars. This church can’t be found, and 2nd photo shows basically the same of the 1st.Unlike the main photo, this secondary doesn't have restrictions since it won't be published, you could show unnecessary people, but try not to. Bad: This 2nd image is covered by the submitter’s finger, but it not being on the 1st photo makes it okay to pass.Location Marker:This is an important one. Outside the rule of “it needs to be a few meters from the POI” there's no restriction rule of each side you put it on bigger POIs.Where to put the location marker? Center? Front? Side? Near to street? It depends, some say it’s what it’s over the picture, there needs to be a object that ties to the Portal, you can put it over it(like a sign), but I personally use the entrance(which is probably the photo anyway). If the POI is on a wrong location, it will likely be moved to one of those. If you want other location because of the s17 rule, or OSM tags, do with good sense considering these and other points.For sports fields, courts, pools, fountains and other similar POIs that don't want you to walk on the middle of it to spin it, anywhere on its surroundings/boundaries is preferable, not the center. For PoGo there’s no difference as long as you can are in the 40 meters radius, but on Ingress it’s ideal to have the area around all accessible(because of resonators/mods placements), specially the center. Make sure it's safely accessed by pedestrians. Bad: This court needs correction, it can’t be safely accessed if it needs to be Ultra-Striked(Ingress precision weapon), same for this other court. Good: This is on the surroundings of the field, so it can be safely accessed without interfering a game, same for this other.Choose the marker considering street view window. This is because the page will start by automatically choosing a street view/photosphere(the closest?). If you chose a location that will instantly highlight your POI, that will make your reviewers very very happy, most time lost in a submission is trying to find the POI. You can check this by opening Google Maps and holding down to put a marker or click once, it will show a small preview, either on a phone or computer. Bad: On my first submission I put a marker inside the place, but so that showed it's back on other street instead of entrance(that was the photo). Probably it received bad location reviews and it's been reviewing for at least 5 months, I reviewed for the first time these days. This urban art/grafitti, second photo doesn’t show POI, which is bad, but I can identify the building under construction at the background, which helps. Good: This spongebob is somewhat small, but can be easily have it’s context identified because it has the same angle that the preview window automatically shows(green commerce at bg, orange roof), I can’t say it’s actually there, but it’s pretty possible. This fountain isn’t shown on street view, but it’s shows the building with construction signs, and there’s the window pattern behind it(easily found because of the angle), it’s probably there.Know how updated is your Street View. This might lead you to a bad location marker, or it being moved. Bad: This location marker puts the POI on the left side of the street, instead of the right(correct one), despite being on top of POI itself, that’s because the street view did a poor mapping, this isn’t the submitters fault, but it could be avoided. This church is on the other side of the street of the location marker, which could mean a reviewer missing the place, since none of the photos show the whole building(I had to turn to the right to see it).If you're submitting by Ingress, please make sure to recheck the location marker. The system will automatically choose where you opened the request, but it's not accurate.Description:Honestly, I don't read much to it. That's either because the submitter doesn’t care about writing useful info(like repeating the title), or that I can identify it’s already a 5 stars by other means. However, there's instances where is helpful. This has a limit of 250 characters.Do not write instructions for OPR reviewers. Same for Emoji usage. This might lead to instant 1* reject. Bad: This can be seen from google maps(if it wasn’t you shouldn’t even be submitting).Mention to any game(Ingress, pogo and others) or it’s mechanics will justify an instant 1* reject. Don’t mention “trainers”, “portal”, “pokéstop” or even “player”. This is on guidelines, but still people miss it. If you want to use this terms, use the supportive text. Bad: This a troll description that mentions PoGo teams.Use it to describe the POI. Tell about its history and culture aspects. Good: What material is made of, foundation/creation date, who made it, who it refers to, etc. Bad: This submission is pretty good, but could use more info that’s available on the sign, which shows it’s a 47 year old bridge.If you have nothing useful to describe(or you just don't know), right a small standard text about its location. This could be something like “Located at X district of city Y”, “inside/outside/part of X place”, “on the mural of X”, etc. This might help reviewers identify the POI easier. Leaving it blank gives a bad impression(like you don’t care, so why we should).Mentioning which criteria it fits is not ideal(use supportive text for that), but it's not a reason to reject.Additional text:Similar to description, but this won’t be published, only read by reviewers. It has a limit of 300 characters.Main Rule: Do not write about how it’s addition will be useful to players. Instead, write WHY it’s good candidate according to guidelines. This is the most common mistake in my review experience(probably because the text is poorly written). Pokéstops aren't created to satisfy your needs of playing on more convenient places, but create a network of interesting real life stuff that might cause that. Good: “Place that encourage exercise, with benches to take a rest”, “Public place of worship”, “public accessible in X park and with 24h security vigilance”, “statue from a notable member of our country's history”.Your(or your community's) desire to have more pokéstops is irrelevant for the review, and likely writing that will probably give a worse impression, it shows ignorance about the system, just don't write it. It's common sense that you want it to be approved. The amount of pokéstops near you is also irrelevant(unless you're submitting memorial benches, fire department or highway rest areas). The system as far as I know already prioritizes low density regions’ submissions. Bad: “Neighbourhood is in need of pokéstops”, “It’s really important that my pokéstop is approved”(Yeah I saw that, fake and in his house, very likely), “Place valid to become a pokéstop”.Choose the words that resembles the intentions on guidelines. It shows that you read and understood them. Bad: “It's a pretty popular place alongside trainers”, “It's a place where a lot of people pass daily”, “it’s a well known place and very visited”. Good: “It’s a place that gathers our community”, “Connect and unite people”, “Public space that encourage walk and exercise”.Don’t repeat what you wrote on title or description. It’s a waste of time.Photospheres.Most of the problems listed could be avoided by submitting a photosphere(including my own rejects). This is a 360º image that can show all the region of the POI, you don’t need to wait Street View to be updated, any user can do it. Here’s a video explaining it. It’s the best feature you have to ensure your submission, more than any other tip. Honestly, this isn’t used here. Maybe like 1 out of 500 submissions has one(usually badly cropped, but good enough).Final considerations.All submissions I review aren't on English, so if you would like to include examples of any point, I'll edit them in!We are open to discussions! If you disagree, would like to discuss or include a point, or correct me, I'll try to keep it updated.For feedback about your specific submissions, post at r/IngressOPR. Please include title, description, photos, location marker and supportive text(if you're doing by PoGo) for the most useful feedback. Can't review properly just by showing a photo. via /r/TheSilphRoad https://ift.tt/2YM9Xor