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Comment by owl110 | Hacker News Reader

I think the problem is that the colors have different meaning. The values in the screenshot for Amsterdam using the NL scale translates to 'insufficient' and while the DE scale translates to 'good' for the same city at the same time.

At the very least, it means that a user cannot use these scales for inference without knowing/understanding the technology behind them. This is probably not the intention behind showing an air quality indicator in the iOS app.

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The colors are usually defined by the same bodies that define the scales.

The German LQI has associated colors, I know for sure the American does too, and I’ll bet the Dutch in the screenshots also comes directly from the definition of the scale.

And iOS defaulting to _local_ standards is a good thing! It means people get the same information they would from watching TV or reading newspaper, which is much more useful for most people than comparing their air quality to that of a neighboring country.

The point though is they can't actually compare it to their neighbors. There's no objective standard, just local baselines and hazard lines decided by political will and history.

And that’s the correct tradeoff.

For Apple, yes. For people who want more valid info for health reasons, no.

No, that is the correct tradeoff for the _vast_ majority of the users.

The built-in weather services in the OS should cater to the majority of the use cases, not a tiny and narrow minority.

And I hope we can agree that „people who distrust their own and neighboring countries pollution scales and need to compare them frequently” is not a wide-spread and mainstream position.

As I said, teres people with health conditions wo don't care what the relative scales are. They want to know the absolute value to determine their health choices.

Sure, they aren't traveling enough to be catered to by apple, but it's a valid criticism.

The colors having different meanings shouldn't come up in typical cases, because who's looking at their air quality map from two different countries? There's also a key to the upper left.

It's interesting and well designed IMO. I don't think this actually causes issues for any users.

The difficulty seems to be that depending on what country you are in, the colours you are used to will have different meanings.

Hopefully the german definition of good air quality isn't too overly optimistic, or someone with actual health issues might get a surprise if they are used to being ok on days with a certain "colour" when traveling.

Well, they said the AQ for NL was “insufficient” but the same value was “good” according to Germany. So it’s not just different colors, it’s different standards for AQ.

I guess you’re proposing that the AQ meter always use the scale of your home country. Doesn’t seem unreasonable but also seems like a quibble so tiny that it could be defeated if someone more knowledgeable offered a single reason against it.

Hm. That seemed unnecessarily contentious. We were largely in agreement. Yes, the german one is using more lax standards, as I was saying, hopefully not too lax, but yes, the colours indicate entirely different standards.

And yes, I think a simple solution would be to use the colour of your home country that you are used to. Presumably if you moved, you could just learn the standards of your new country. A consistent standard that you can rely on in your phone when on a trip to another country definitely seems more useful if you are actually relying on this iOS app. It could be a simple app pref, a little toggle switch..

> The colors having different meanings shouldn't come up in typical cases, because who's looking at their air quality map from two different countries?

Anyone who travels between countries?

> who's looking at their air quality map from two different countries?

I do it a few times per week while I commute from Belgium to France and when I'm doing my groceries in whichever country is best for what I need. I'm interested in the air quality in France when I'm leaving Belgium, and in the quality in Belgium when I'm leaving France.

I don't look at them from iOS though so I don't really have any problem. But crossing borders is a rather common thing around here.

> because who's looking at their air quality map from two different countries

People that travel. Are you serious?

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