In order to improve the way GeoNames is organized and account for its increasing complexity we are introducing the role of GeoNames Ambassador.
GeoNames has made huge progress in the last months and is now one of the major geo data providers used by thousands of applications. GeoNames Ambassadors serve as local contact to their country. They speak the local languages and are familiar with the local geo data situation. The importance of GeoNames is increasingly being recognized by national mapping agencies and the formalization of a local contact person will make communication with them easier. You find the first Ambassadors appointments on the team page.
The naming ‘Ambassador’ has been inspired by the Tagzania Diplomatic Service where it was coined by Luistxo who also serves as GeoNames Ambassador to the Basque Country and Gipuzkoa. Thanks to Luistxo’s local contacts we have already been able to integrate an official data set from Gipuzkoa.
I would like to express my thanks to all Ambassadors who have accepted the role as local contact person to their country and are ready to help us improve our data set.
Marc Belzunces, Ambassador to the Catalan Linguistic Area, has more information in his blog (in Catalan).
GeoNames Blog 
Great idea! I’ve done quite a bit of work using the GeoNames data and web services, and would be more than happy to act as the ambassador to Finland
[…] has created recently the role of Geonames Ambassador, who is going to be a local contact to his country or region. They have to speak the local […]