--- title: Google determines the names for bodies of water in... description: Google Earth labels disputed bodies of water using a policy called Primary Local Usage, showing the primary, common name used by each bordering sovereign... canonical: https://daily.dev/posts/google-determines-the-names-for-bodies-of-water-in-google-earth-2008--qmuispcle twitter:card: summary_large_image twitter:site: @dailydotdev og:type: website og:site_name: daily.dev og:title: Google determines the names for bodies of water in Google Earth (2008) | daily.dev og:description: Google Earth labels disputed bodies of water using a policy called Primary Local Usage, showing the primary, common name used by each bordering sovereign... og:url: https://daily.dev/posts/google-determines-the-names-for-bodies-of-water-in-google-earth-2008--qmuispcle og:image: https://api.daily.dev/og/posts/QMuISPcle.png og:image:alt: Google determines the names for bodies of water in Google Earth (2008) og:image:width: 1200 og:image:height: 630 og:locale: en --- > ## Documentation Index > Fetch the complete documentation index at: https://daily.dev/llms.txt > Use this file to discover all available pages before exploring further. # Google determines the names for bodies of water in Google Earth (2008) **[Hacker News](https://daily.dev/sources/hn)** · 8 min read · 0 upvotes · 0 comments ## Summary Google Earth labels disputed bodies of water using a policy called Primary Local Usage, showing the primary, common name used by each bordering sovereign nation. When countries agree on a name, only that name appears, as with the 'Caribbean Sea'. When they disagree, both names are shown, placed closer to the country that uses each one, and a clickable text box gives more detail, as with the 'Yellow Sea' versus 'West Sea' example. Non-English clients show only the local preferred name, like 'Sea of Japan' in Japanese and 'East Sea' in Korean, but still list both names in the annotation. Google says it rejected deferring to the UN Cartographic Section, the IHO, national geographic societies, or academic surveys because it considered each option and found problems with them, such as limited coverage, scope and membership gaps, politicization, and bias. ## Full article daily.dev links to this article rather than hosting it. Read it at the original source: ## Questions this post answers ### How does Google Earth decide which name to show for a body of water that different countries call by different names? Google Earth uses a policy called Primary Local Usage, displaying the primary, common, local name given by each sovereign nation bordering the body of water. If all bordering countries agree, a single name is shown, like 'Caribbean Sea'. If they disagree, both names appear, each placed closer to the country that uses it, with a clickable text box explaining the dispute in more detail. _Developers building mapping or localization features can see how naming disputes get resolved on daily.dev._ ### Why didn't Google Earth just use the United Nations names for disputed bodies of water? The UN Cartographic Section's publications did not provide the level of coverage and detail Google wanted, and the United Nations as an institution does not take official positions on geographical names in disputes, since doing so would require siding with one member state over another. The UN Conference on the Standardization of Geographical Names similarly avoids taking positions on geopolitical disputes. _Anyone weighing authoritative data sources for a geo product can track decisions like this on daily.dev._ ## Community take How the wider developer community reacted, aggregated from 2 discussions and 188 comments across hackernews (as of 2026-10-29). **TL;DR:** Most of the discussion focuses on accusing the company of abandoning its own 2008 'Primary Local Usage' policy by renaming the Gulf of Mexico and Lake Ontario to appease a US political figure, with heavy skepticism about the stated rationale and a lot of tangential political argument. **Sentiment:** 5% positive · 20% mixed · 75% skeptical **The case for** - A few argue the original 2008 policy is actually sound and more principled than letting any single government dictate names unilaterally. - Some note the policy sensibly shows multiple names depending on locale/language, which is a fair way to handle genuine international disputes. **The pushback** - Many argue the company violated its own stated 'common usage' standard by adopting 'Gulf of America' and 'Lake America' based on a political directive rather than organic common usage. - Several claim the company misrepresented its sourcing, saying it pulled the name from USGS data when that database hadn't actually been updated yet. - Commenters see the change as capitulation to a political figure to protect business interests rather than a neutral cartographic decision. - Some point out the renaming is inconsistently applied depending on country/IP, undermining the claimed policy of showing both names everywhere. - Critics argue Lake Ontario and the Gulf of Mexico cases aren't comparable to legitimate local-usage disputes like Denali, since the new names aren't in genuine widespread use. **By community** - hackernews (heated): The thread splits into fierce, often political debate about whether the company abandoned its own naming policy to appease a political leader, with extensive tangents into company culture and politics. **Hottest debate:** Whether adopting 'Gulf of America'/'Lake America' is a legitimate application of the 'primary common usage' policy or a political capitulation that breaks it. **Open questions** - Why does the renamed label appear differently depending on country/IP (e.g., shown alone in the US but bracketed elsewhere)? - Why did the company claim the name came from USGS data when that database had not yet been updated? - What exactly counts as 'common usage' and who gets to adjudicate it when government mandates conflict with everyday speech? **Highlights** > It seems their actual policy is "the policy of Primary Local Usage": "Under this policy, the English Google Earth client displays the primary, common, local name(s) given to a body of water by the sovereign nations that border it. If all bordering countries agree on the name, then the common single name is displayed (e.g. "Caribbean Sea" in English, "Mar Caribe" in Spanish, etc.). But if different countries dispute the proper name for a body of water, our policy is to display both names, with each label placed closer to the country or countries that use it." Which basically means "multiple names until all bordering countries agree on the same name", if I'm not mistaken > — [rickdeckard on hackernews · 1 comments](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50288802) > It's a very lawyerly distinction you're making here that's willfully blind to what's really going on. The common-sense reading "primary, common, local name" is that it should be called the Gulf of Mexico, as that is what it is called in the USA. If the nutso president of Turkmenistan decided one day that the Caspian Sea's real name was the Turkmen Sea, there's absolutely no way that Google Maps would rename it on their maps. The reason they renamed it in this case is not because "well, the government said so, so we have no choice!". It's (obviously!) done to not piss of Trump, and pissing off Trump would be bad for their business. They can hide behind lawyerly arguing all they want, but that is the real reason. > — [OskarS on hackernews · 1 comments](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50289197) > I'm not so sure on the Turkmen Sea example. Google is (trying to) sidestep this issue as much as possible by making the name on the map depend on your physical location, language and localization settings, or both. They could easily make the Caspian Sea say Turkmen Sea only in Turkmenistan, and probably would if they wanted to keep doing business in Turkmenistan. This is already how it works for Lake Ontario: if I access from the US, it says "Lake America", but if I VPN to somewhere in Europe, it says "Lake Ontario (Lake America)". In terms of lawyerly distinctions, I would actually argue that there is still no legal basis to the rename. The president has directed the federal executive branch to refer to Lake Ontario as Lake America, but...that's it. It literally doesn't and can't apply to Google. No law has been passed, and even if there had been it's pretty clear that it's a 1st Amendment issue to compel private entities to refer to things in particular ways -- it would be a slam dunk even on this Supreme Court. Their decision to do it is a voluntary act meant to curry favor with this administration, or at least to avoid pissing it off. This isn't like the Indian laws that make it illegal to publish a map that shows Kashmir as part of Pakistan, it's just a memo to the federal bureaucracy. Yes, this doesn't really matter because there are punishments that are within the power of the president (like cancelling contracts, or cooking up bogus DoJ investigations, or failing to resist antitrust enforcement, etc.) that they want to avoid. This just goes to illustrate that the rule of law in the United States is mostly a fantasy. > — [ElevenLathe on hackernews · 1 comments](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50290375) > Google claimed that they pull from USGS and they had no control of the name. But the USGS database (GNIS) did not update when Google (and Apple) changed the name. Google's claim that they pulled from GNIS was untrue https://arstechnica.com/gadgets/2026/08/google-maps-renames-... > — [jordanb on hackernews · 1 comments](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50293259) > This is the one I find most hilarious, as Ontario was named after the lake, not the other way around. So the temper tantrum reaction in trying to spite Canada wholly misses the mark. > — [croon on hackernews · 1 comments](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50290781) **Source threads** - [hackernews](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=50287448) · 200 points · 168 comments - [hackernews](https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=42859580) · 52 points · 20 comments ## Similar posts on daily.dev - [World geography gotchas](https://daily.dev/posts/world-geography-gotchas-4tly7cdnx) · A Java geek · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [South Korea opens the door to let Google Maps operate fully](https://daily.dev/posts/south-korea-opens-the-door-to-let-google-maps-operate-fully-v1pffifof) · TechCrunch · 0 upvotes · 0 comments - [On Google declaring war on the Web](https://daily.dev/posts/on-google-declaring-war-on-the-web-pcynbvyeh) · Hacker News · 1 upvotes · 0 comments - [R-bloggers](https://daily.dev/posts/r-bloggers-xoqr3aqpz) · R-bloggers · 0 upvotes · 0 comments --- [View this post on daily.dev](https://daily.dev/posts/google-determines-the-names-for-bodies-of-water-in-google-earth-2008--qmuispcle) ```json {"@context":"https://schema.org","@graph":[{"@type":"Organization","@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180},"sameAs":["https://twitter.com/dailydotdev","https://github.com/dailydotdev","https://www.linkedin.com/company/daily-dev-ltd"]},{"@type":"WebSite","@id":"https://daily.dev/#website","url":"https://daily.dev","name":"daily.dev","publisher":{"@id":"https://daily.dev/#organization"},"potentialAction":{"@type":"SearchAction","target":{"@type":"EntryPoint","urlTemplate":"https://daily.dev/search?q={search_term_string}"},"query-input":"required name=search_term_string"}}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"TechArticle","headline":"Google determines the names for bodies of water in Google Earth (2008)","url":"https://daily.dev/posts/google-determines-the-names-for-bodies-of-water-in-google-earth-2008--qmuispcle","mainEntityOfPage":{"@type":"WebPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/google-determines-the-names-for-bodies-of-water-in-google-earth-2008--qmuispcle"},"datePublished":"2026-10-29T15:21:24.495Z","dateModified":"2026-10-29T19:39:38.739Z","description":"Google Earth labels disputed bodies of water using a policy called Primary Local Usage, showing the primary, common name used by each bordering sovereign...","image":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--P4t4XyoV--/f_auto/v1722860399/public/Placeholder%2001","thumbnailUrl":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/s--P4t4XyoV--/f_auto/v1722860399/public/Placeholder%2001","isAccessibleForFree":true,"articleSection":"Hacker News","inLanguage":"en","publisher":{"@type":"Organization","name":"daily.dev","url":"https://daily.dev","logo":{"@type":"ImageObject","url":"https://daily.dev/apple-touch-icon.png","width":180,"height":180}},"author":{"@type":"Organization","name":"Hacker News","logo":"https://media.daily.dev/image/upload/t_logo,f_auto/v1/logos/hn","url":"https://daily.dev/sources/hn"},"commentCount":0,"discussionUrl":"https://daily.dev/posts/google-determines-the-names-for-bodies-of-water-in-google-earth-2008--qmuispcle","interactionStatistic":[{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"LikeAction"},"userInteractionCount":0},{"@type":"InteractionCounter","interactionType":{"@type":"CommentAction"},"userInteractionCount":0}],"keywords":"","timeRequired":"PT8M"} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"BreadcrumbList","itemListElement":[{"@type":"ListItem","position":1,"name":"Home","item":"https://daily.dev"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":2,"name":"Hacker News","item":"https://daily.dev/sources/hn"},{"@type":"ListItem","position":3,"name":"Google determines the names for bodies of water in Google Earth (2008)"}]} {"@context":"https://schema.org","@type":"FAQPage","@id":"https://daily.dev/posts/google-determines-the-names-for-bodies-of-water-in-google-earth-2008--qmuispcle#faq","mainEntity":[{"@type":"Question","name":"How does Google Earth decide which name to show for a body of water that different countries call by different names?","acceptedAnswer":{"@type":"Answer","text":"Google Earth uses a policy called Primary Local Usage, displaying the primary, common, local name given by each sovereign nation bordering the body of water. 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