June 2020

Welcome to our 9th edition :)

In light of the constantly evolving situation with COVID-19, we hope everyone is safe and healthy. Thank you for helping each other navigate to safety by editing in the WME and being active community members. Read on to find out what our communities have been up to recently.

Waze Communities Team.

Our dedicated Navigation team has made some awesome changes to the ETA!

Current restrictions created by the COVID-19 situation are different from one country to the other, but in some places we already see traffic is building up to the same levels it was before the outbreak.

As we monitor the ETA in real-time and look at what is happening in countries that are lifting restrictions, we are making sure that changes in traffic are identified as new traffic patterns very quickly, sometimes in just 2-3 days.

Our best guess is that for the next few months, traffic patterns will not behave normally, or even change at a predictable rate, as policies will change daily and people adapt to new routines.

Our new strategy is to train day-to-day models, where Wednesday's data is learned from Monday and Tuesday, and not from the history of previous Wednesdays.

In the long-term we do expect traffic to settle down to a new, hopefully recognizable, "commute" mode.

We are going to leverage this challenging period to develop the best-in-class traffic prediction models, more accurate and agile than ever!

Hi everyone!

My name is Hila and I manage Waze's Global Communities Group.

Supporting the world's STRONGEST online community requires a STRONG team, so we recently made some changes to our group's structure. Check out our new structure and see the faces behind the keyboard in this slide.

Also, I'd like to take this opportunity to thank you for your contributions and dedication throughout COVID-19. We're touched to see how much you care about the community, the map and helping others navigate to safety.

We're holding many online events to stay close during this time - add this calendar to your Google calendar or check out this list of online events to make sure you don't miss an Online Meetup or a webinar about an exciting new feature!

Can't wait to see you in one of our online events,

Hila, Waze Communities - Global Group Manager.

Lucas, a Coordinator, Global Champ, Beta Leader and more, has been editing the map since 2013. He found some mistakes along his route, and absolutely loved being able to correct those.

7 years later, he has paved, edited and corrected many routes along with Wiki pages and Carpool features.

Lucas would like to tell new editors that every contribution to the map, even the smallest, is a fundamental part for the community and its users. "Nobody knows everything!", Lucas writes, "Here, we all know something and together we will know more!". This wonderful slogan was also printed on a hoodie prepared by the local community.

Lucas kindly invites community members to reach out to him and consult about community management, editing practices and support for new communities.

Thank you Lucas for all that you do for our local and global communities!