Local Guides, 2022 Star Photos

[AdamGT]

Hello @AT_Rome and welcome back to Connect 😉

Great to hear that you have updated, I strongly recommend that you do so each month and preferably on the same day of the month (e.g. 30th, 15th or whatever day fits in best with your lifestyle).  I always mention this because it provides for the best history of your data which is then used in the forecasting (e.g. charting).  With the new system, it now only takes a few minutes each month to update, and regular updates provide you with good returns on your time investment beyond just leaderboard rankings. 

Regarding the first issue you mention, I'm not a professional programmer or website developer so I do not fully understand why this happens but the best way I have found to avoid it is to always formally logout via the menu system.  I wrote about this in some detail in a comment reply here on Connect but cannot find it now. If you encounter this problem then I suggest that (1) while on the blank page you remove the cookie which will delete any encoded credentials stored on your local device, and (2) return to the index page and do a Ctrl+F5. Once again I mention that the best way to avoid this problem is to always formally logout via the menu system.

Regarding the second issue, you've unknowingly explained this yourself when you said that you are promising (and hoping) to be more present in this incredible Local Guides Community.  As his may be a littler cryptic, and because you have specifically asked How can I buy back the higher level? , you will find the detailed answer by hitting the system's online help information from the last item on your Profile page.  Because I have answered this a few times now I'm preferring to refer participants to the online help because I want to get participants in the habit of reading it and because it is more efficient of my time.

Thank you for your kind admiration.

[AT_Rome]

Thanks for the promptness and clarity of your answer, Adam, and for this I appreciate you and your work even more ...
I assure you that I have scheduled the updating of my statistics in the last days of each month, and I will take the appropriate time to read and deepen the posts published on "Local Guides Connect" and interact more.
And I tell you that reading the statistics and other incredible information present in the VIP Section is one more reason to do it!
Great job, really ...
A warm greeting from Rome, giving you two images of Rome that I took a few days ago while walking around the city: these are the famous "Trevi Fountain" and the "Imperial Forums", which despite being geographically close, represent two very distant eras over time (the 1700 Baroque of the fountain, and the ancient Rome of the first century BC of the Forums)

Trevi Fountain, completed in 1762 on an initial project by Gianlorenzo Bernini.

Imperial Forums, built between 46 BC and 113 AD by Julius Caesar, and the emperors Augustus, Vespasian, Nerva, Trajan

[AdamGT]

I'm here and always happy to help you @AT_Rome and I'm pleased to hear that of your plans to regularly update. The best is to add a reminder on your calendar. Interacting and engaging on Connect and the leaderboard posts. You have already seen that the Leaderboards are fast becoming much more than just leaderboards of rankings, with so much useful information to help you better learn, monitor and improve your Maps contributions.

Oh how I love just walking around Rome. There is just so much history there.  Thank you for sharing your beautiful photos. I also have some from my last visit there but I do like this one. Do you recognize it?

[AT_Rome]

Nice picture, Adam!
It is the "Fountain of the Four Rivers", by the sculptor Gianlorenzo Bernini (also author of the Trevi Fountain project), and in particular the big man in the foreground depicts the personification of the river Ganges, holding a long oar that indicates the complete navigability of the river at the time of the creation of the fountain.
The other three rivers (the most important for the continents then known), located at the corners of the fountain, are the Nile, the Danube and the Rio de la Plata.
There are numerous anecdotes, which you may already know, which characterize this beautiful fountain, and among them:
- it stands in the place where in the mid-1600s there was a watering hole for horses
- the human figures are in marble, while the central rock is in "travertine", a very common stone in Rome
- In addition to sculptures of trees and plants (such as palms, agaves, peonies, vines), there are 7 sculpted animals: lion, armadillo, horse, sea and land snake, dolphin, dragon
- the obelisk located on the top of the fountain is an Egyptian original from the 1st century AD, commissioned by the emperor Domitian in Aswan when Egypt was a province of the ancient Roman Empire
- the oval shape of the square follows that of the stadium of Domitian (built in the year 85 AD), where athletes competitions were held, and even then there were fountains that allowed to flood the square and carry out shows with real boats.
And this fountain is just one of the countless testimonies that past centuries have left in Rome: some of which are less exposed and therefore less visible, such as the enchanting "Moses" by the famous sculptor Michelangelo Buonarroti, located in the corner of a church not far from the Colosseum, of which you can find a photo I took some time ago, together with a gif of the Fountain of the Rivers, taken from the opposite side to your beautiful photo ...
Best wishes

Statue of Moses, Michelangelo Buonarroti , Rome (1515)

Fountain of the Four Rivers in Piazza Navona, Gian Lorenzo Bernini (1650)

[AdamGT]

Wow @AT_Rome you are a wealth of information on this. We should have made this a post of it's own LOL.

You have now more than convinced me that you would make an excellent tour guide on my next visit to Rome 😉

[JonBekkevoll]

TStar photo uploaded august 29 in 2022.Star photo taken of Macy’s at Cherry creek center in Denver Colorado. Date 16 of January 2018

[Cercis]

Hello @AdamGT 

I have trouble saving recent views of my star photo and the URL of the Connect article about the star photo.  I've entered information and submitted the page several times.  The response is "saved entry" or similar each time, but the correct data is not there.  I had no trouble with entering the pages' information. 

Cercis🙄 

[AdamGT]

Hi @Cercis 

Your star views was showing as 705842 but I have updated this for you. I'm not sure why you have this problem. Have you been able to update before with our new system or is this the first time you have tried? Have you been able to update your Maps data? What device and OS are you using? I ask because no one else is having this specific problem!  BTW this is your screenshot URL and you shouldn't be needing to change this (see 4 - Updating your star photo). 

[Cercis]

@AdamGT Thanks for the swift reply and for updating the star photo data.  I had the same problem last month, with star photo but chalked it up to general fuzziness.  I did not have any problems updating July or August's map data.

I use my Mac Laptop Pro osSierra to do data updatiing.  I definitely will read the bit about updating my photo.  

Cercis

[AdamGT]

@Cercis thanks for that information.  May I suggest that you try to update your star views now say decrease it by just 1 view and see if it saves then increase back up.  So that I will know what I'm searching for and to establish if this is isolated to your star photo, are you able to update your there Maps data?