Reducing subdivision amounts (UK, Thailand, etc.)

Hello,

I was thinking that I should edit the subdivision (state) list of some countries to reduce the amount of subdivisions in the search by state functions. E.g. United Kingdom has 231 subdivision units, which makes the search by subdivision rather useless. Here are some of the countries that might have some issues with the large amount of subdivisions:

United Kingdom (231 subdivisions)
Macedonia, FYRO (84 subdivisions, no players atm)
Thailand (77 subdivisions)
Malta (68 subdivisions, no players atm)

There are probably others too. I'll list on a following post the amount of subdivisions of each country, so that everyone can tell their opinion on other countries with high amount of subdivisions.

Here are few alternatives that could be used for each country in question:

United Kingdom

Option 1
Regions of England (9)
Northern Ireland (1)
Scotland (1)
Wales (1)
= 12

Option 2
Counties of England (48)
Counties of Northern Ireland (6)
Regions of Scotland (12)
Counties of Wales (8)
= 74

Option 3
Metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties of England (83)
Districts of Northern Ireland (26)
Council Areas of Scotland (32)
Unitary Authorities of Wales (22)
= 163

Option 4 (Current ISO 3166-2:GB)
England (151)
Northern Ireland (26)
Scotland (32)
Wales (22)
= 231

ISO 3166-2:GB

Regions of England
Counties of England
Metropolitan and non-metropolitan counties of England

Counties of Northern Ireland
Local government in Northern Ireland

Subdivisions of Scotland
Regions and islands areas

Preserved counties of Wales
Local government in Wales

Macedonia
Current: 84 municipalities (out of which 10 constitute Greater Skopje)
Option: 8 Statistical Regions of Macedonia

Municipalities of the Republic of Macedonia
Statistical Regions of Macedonia

Thailand
Current: 75 provinces and 2 special administrative regions
Option: 6 regions and Bangkok (total 7)

Provinces of Thailand

Malta
Current: 68 local councils
Option: 6 districts

Local councils of Malta
Districts of Malta

231 - United Kingdom
84 - Macedonia, the former Yugoslav Republic of
83 - Russian Federation
81 - Turkey
77 - Thailand
76 - Azerbaijan
68 - Malta
64 - Viet Nam
64 - Bangladesh
57 - United States
48 - Algeria
47 - Japan
43 - Hungary
42 - Romania
37 - Nigeria
37 - Moldova, Republic of
35 - India
35 - France
34 - Afghanistan
34 - China, People's Republic of
33 - Latvia
33 - Indonesia
33 - Colombia
32 - Dominican Republic
32 - Bahamas
32 - Mexico
30 - Serbia
30 - Iran, Islamic Republic of
29 - Egypt
28 - Bulgaria
27 - Brazil
27 - Ukraine
26 - Switzerland
26 - Tanzania, United Republic of
26 - Peru
25 - Seychelles
25 - Venezuela, Bolivarian Republic of
25 - Sudan
24 - Tunisia
24 - Argentina
24 - Ecuador
24 - Cambodia
23 - China, Republic of (Taiwan)
22 - Guatemala
22 - Mongolia
22 - Libyan Arab Jamahiriya
22 - Chad
21 - Croatia
21 - Sweden
21 - Norway
21 - Yemen
21 - Montenegro
20 - Maldives
20 - Italy
20 - Portugal
20 - Papua New Guinea
20 - Bhutan
19 - Côte d'Ivoire
19 - Spain
19 - Uruguay
18 - Angola
18 - Paraguay
18 - Iraq
18 - Somalia
18 - Honduras
17 - Central African Republic
17 - Burundi
17 - Philippines
17 - New Zealand
17 - Mauritius
17 - Nicaragua
16 - Germany
16 - Morocco
16 - Malaysia
16 - Kazakhstan
16 - Palau
16 - Trinidad and Tobago
16 - Lao People's Democratic Republic
16 - Korea, Republic of
16 - Poland
15 - Chile
15 - Estonia
15 - Cuba
15 - Liberia
14 - Senegal
14 - Uzbekistan
14 - Myanmar
14 - Nauru
14 - Jamaica
14 - Czech Republic
14 - El Salvador
14 - Syrian Arab Republic
13 - Canada
13 - Namibia
13 - Greece
13 - Mauritania
13 - Saudi Arabia
13 - Timor-Leste
13 - Burkina Faso
12 - Panama
12 - Benin
12 - Albania
12 - Slovenia
12 - Georgia
12 - Netherlands
12 - Jordan
11 - Ethiopia
11 - Korea, Democratic People's Republic of
11 - Congo, Democratic Republic of the (Kinshasa)
11 - Saint Lucia
11 - Congo, Republic of the (Brazzaville)
11 - Samoa
11 - Armenia
11 - Barbados
11 - Mozambique
11 - Liechtenstein
11 - Belgium
10 - Solomon Islands
10 - Lesotho
10 - Haiti
10 - Dominica
10 - Cameroon
10 - Lithuania
10 - Suriname
10 - Ghana
10 - Guyana
10 - Zimbabwe
9 - Qatar
9 - Iceland
9 - Guinea-Bissau
9 - South Africa
9 - United States Minor Outlying Islands
9 - San Marino
9 - Bolivia, Plurinational State of
9 - Oman
9 - Zambia
9 - Sri Lanka
9 - Gabon
9 - Botswana
9 - Mali
9 - Austria
8 - Kenya
8 - Australia
8 - Niger
8 - Antigua and Barbuda
8 - Guinea
8 - Lebanon
8 - Tuvalu
8 - Pakistan
8 - Kyrgyzstan
8 - Slovakia
7 - Equatorial Guinea
7 - Belarus
7 - Andorra
7 - Grenada
7 - United Arab Emirates
7 - Costa Rica
6 - Saint Vincent and the Grenadines
6 - Cyprus
6 - Turkmenistan
6 - Finland
6 - Madagascar
6 - Kuwait
6 - Belize
6 - Israel
6 - Djibouti
6 - Eritrea
6 - Vanuatu
6 - Gambia
5 - Nepal
5 - Togo
5 - Denmark
5 - Singapore
5 - Bahrain
5 - Fiji
5 - Rwanda
5 - Tonga
4 - Micronesia, Federated States of
4 - Swaziland
4 - Uganda
4 - Brunei Darussalam
4 - Sierra Leone
4 - Greenland
4 - Ireland
3 - Tajikistan
3 - Luxembourg
3 - Comoros
3 - Saint Helena, Ascension and Tristan da Cunha
3 - Kiribati
3 - Malawi
3 - Bosnia and Herzegovina
2 - Cape Verde
2 - Marshall Islands
2 - São Tomé and Príncipe
2 - Saint Kitts and Nevis

This is what I found from the BBC site: BBC - Select your local site

The option 1 is based on the Nomenclature of Territorial Units for Statistics . Options 2 and 3 are what I scrounged on the Wikipedia site.

The main points in here would be to divide the country into meaningful sized regions, that would be preferably immediately recognizable to local population, and be verifiable by non-local population. Dividing to countries would probably serve the recognition purpose, but they would probably be geographically too large for locating events and stuff.