I honestly don't want to be mad. Really, I don't, and I'm not mad. Just frustrated. I kind of like my Apple products a whole lot. So does my wife. So do my parents. Etc. What frustrates me is that I like my Apple stuff, and I like how they normally do pay a lot of attention to detail and on this they knew the trade-off, they knew their data was gonna suck, and instead of giving us a shim they just cut us off at the knees and gave us a crutch.
I don't use maps that often, and most of the time when I do I'm probably sitting down and just getting a general idea of where I'm going. I can count on one hand the number of times I've used the Maps app to actually direct me exactly where to go.
Curiously enough this weekend is going to be the first time I could really give Maps a chance. I'm going from Indianapolis to just outside Chicago (Medinah) to downtown Chicago to Benton Harbor, MI and back down to Indianapolis. So lots of time to see how it performs here in the Midwest.
GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
You're right, it's not how it should be...but I think it's a decent gesture given the facts. Remember, there are plenty of Apple users who wouldn't even know those app existed if it wasn't pointed out to them. They just assume Maps it it. That statement wasn't really meant for folks like us that already know the alternatives.
The transit directions for Google Maps was good enough, but after looking at Embark which lets me see the routes I'm taking and also shows each stop between my current location and my destination there is a lot less chance of me getting lost. Giving me extra knowledge of the route lets me make better decisions when something happens that the app can't help me with. I have gotten off of a train too early, at times because I wasn't sure about the route Google Maps was giving me.
I'll admit that third party apps do provide better transit directions. I'm using an app called Transit now and it's great, but I like how Google Maps also incorporates walking to/from stops when giving a route. So if I plan a trip somewhere, and my destination is 20 minutes from the nearest bus stop, which can happen at the edges of the city, it'll include that 20 minutes as well as the 5 minute walk from my house to the subway into the trip. So if the actual time on transit is 30 minutes, Google gives me a total time of 55 minutes. Transit would give me 30 minutes, as far as I'm aware. Which is a pretty big difference. If it's somewhere I've been and I know how far my destination is from the bus stop that's no big deal, but if it's somewhere new and I'm not expecting that, I'd be pretty upset.
Embark includes walking directions and shows you a map of your route.
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SarksusATTACK AND DETHRONE GODRegistered Userregular
The situation isn't even very well understood. There is a ton of speculation that has occurred since Maps became available and the situation keeps changing as more information and speculation is added.
The data set, for example, is from Tom Tom. Is Tom Tom known for their GPS units being shit? My understanding is that it's not the data set, it's how Apple is using the data set. I think that it's a lot easier for millions of people to pour over the app and find errors in it than it is for Apple to QA test it. Unforeseen issues in a software launch is completely normal.
Apple did fuck up, and the Maps app has problems, but I can't believe the amount of cynicism people are inserting into their apology letter. Apple apologized and even directed their customers to temporary alternatives so that their user experience didn't suffer while they fixed their app. If I went to a store and they didn't have what I needed and they directed me to a competitor in order to satisfy me I would feel taken care of, not told to go fuck off somewhere.
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GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
I have actually had that happen to me at a retail store, twice in fact. Once when I bought my Honda (the dealership didn't have the one I wanted, so they sent me to a competing dealership, still Honda, but a competitor), and once Best Buy sent me to a local audio/video store that had the exact TV I wanted.
Both times I wrote letters to the managers to say thank you, that I felt appreciated and taken care of and that I would give them business in the future.
The transit directions for Google Maps was good enough, but after looking at Embark which lets me see the routes I'm taking and also shows each stop between my current location and my destination there is a lot less chance of me getting lost. Giving me extra knowledge of the route lets me make better decisions when something happens that the app can't help me with. I have gotten off of a train too early, at times because I wasn't sure about the route Google Maps was giving me.
I'll admit that third party apps do provide better transit directions. I'm using an app called Transit now and it's great, but I like how Google Maps also incorporates walking to/from stops when giving a route. So if I plan a trip somewhere, and my destination is 20 minutes from the nearest bus stop, which can happen at the edges of the city, it'll include that 20 minutes as well as the 5 minute walk from my house to the subway into the trip. So if the actual time on transit is 30 minutes, Google gives me a total time of 55 minutes. Transit would give me 30 minutes, as far as I'm aware. Which is a pretty big difference. If it's somewhere I've been and I know how far my destination is from the bus stop that's no big deal, but if it's somewhere new and I'm not expecting that, I'd be pretty upset.
Embark includes walking directions and shows you a map of your route.
Things like this make me think that it's more a very immature data-set than it is Apple not being able to figure out how to use the data they've gotten from Tom-Tom. A major part of that is probably me thinking there's no way that Apple would not have the know-how to pull data out of the map-data, though it's true that I'm not sure what the data from Tom-Tom looks like, and how Apple's able to query/use it.
TL;DR version: dude writes app to test Maps with the names of 2028 cities/towns in Ontario (Canada's largest province). Maps fails miserably. 20% of results were correct, 19% were close, 27% were incorrect and 34% came back as not even being on the map. (Gruber [dun dun dunnnnnnnn] said he'd like to see how this app ran on iOS 5 w/ Google's data, and I would too)
I really enjoyed this quote:
389 were close but not good enough (for example turn-by-turn might send you off a bridge but you'll get rescued close to where you want to be)
Again, my being cynical about Cook's letter is mostly based in feeling that Apple knew that their data was going to suck, and they decided to go forward using it anyway. I like Apple, and the stuff it makes. I think Cook seems like a genuinely nice guy, and Jobs put him in charge so I'm pretty confident in saying that the dude knows what he's doing. Maybe they just entirely had no clue how bad it was going to be, but I just don't want to believe that Apple's QA/testers are that bad at this. I wish they'd taken the option of giving it another year. Hell, it's Apple. Do something crazy. Make all Apple employees with a company-supplied iPhone run a custom iOS build for a year that has the new maps on it or something. Make your people dog-food it, not us.
[ed] So wait, we are going with "Apple didn't know the data they switched to was gonna suck this bad?" I dunno... for a company that wants me to think they're all about the details I find that tough to believe.
Apple is all about the details.
Of User Experience. The new Maps looks very nice and seems polished from a UX standpoint. It's tremendous stumbling block is data. Apple has never been a data company, while Google lives and breathes Big Data, so they're falling on their face getting accurate datapoints to shove into their Map app.
This week's Hypercritical had a pretty good angle on it (if you don't mind listening to a guy who sounds like Squidward.)
I always get UI and UX confused. UI seems like what Apple's good at: interfaces, what the user interacts with to get what they want. In this case, it seems like it's the user experience that's sucky because it includes the interface and the (poopy) data.
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SarksusATTACK AND DETHRONE GODRegistered Userregular
Things like this make me think that it's more a very immature data-set than it is Apple not being able to figure out how to use the data they've gotten from Tom-Tom. A major part of that is probably me thinking there's no way that Apple would not have the know-how to pull data out of the map-data, though it's true that I'm not sure what the data from Tom-Tom looks like, and how Apple's able to query/use it.
TL;DR version: dude writes app to test Maps with the names of 2028 cities/towns in Ontario (Canada's largest province). Maps fails miserably. 20% of results were correct, 19% were close, 27% were incorrect and 34% came back as not even being on the map. (Gruber [dun dun dunnnnnnnn] said he'd like to see how this app ran on iOS 5 w/ Google's data, and I would too)
I really enjoyed this quote:
389 were close but not good enough (for example turn-by-turn might send you off a bridge but you'll get rescued close to where you want to be)
Again, my being cynical about Cook's letter is mostly based in feeling that Apple knew that their data was going to suck, and they decided to go forward using it anyway. I like Apple, and the stuff it makes. I think Cook seems like a genuinely nice guy, and Jobs put him in charge so I'm pretty confident in saying that the dude knows what he's doing. Maybe they just entirely had no clue how bad it was going to be, but I just don't want to believe that Apple's QA/testers are that bad at this. I wish they'd taken the option of giving it another year. Hell, it's Apple. Do something crazy. Make all Apple employees with a company-supplied iPhone run a custom iOS build for a year that has the new maps on it or something. Make your people dog-food it, not us.
The problem is, it doesn't matter if they took another year, or five years, to test the app. They're still not going to find every problem that millions of people can find just by concurrently using it. How do you know if every address is accurate without using it to travel to every available address? Another year might have helped, but it wouldn't solve everything. Getting people to use it and report errors is better.
Sarksus on
+1
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Blake TDo you have enemies then?Good. That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life.Registered Userregular
I gotta say. I used the new maps app the whole time I was on vacation this past week, and I didnt have ANY problems with it. I actually really liked how they implemented the turn by turn stuff in it (even though I didnt have Siri for vocal at the time, Ill try that eventually now that my 5 has arrived).
That being said.
Any really good apps that are optimized for the 5 to download?
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syndalisGetting ClassyOn the WallRegistered User, Loves Apple Productsregular
I gotta say. I used the new maps app the whole time I was on vacation this past week, and I didnt have ANY problems with it. I actually really liked how they implemented the turn by turn stuff in it (even though I didnt have Siri for vocal at the time, Ill try that eventually now that my 5 has arrived).
That being said.
Any really good apps that are optimized for the 5 to download?
Jetpack Joyride is a very fun game if you havent played it yet, and it makes use of the 5's screen.
Minecraft has been updated as well; its not as feature-rich as the desktop version, and the world is inexplicably only 256x256x256 (I mean, the 5 has a gig of RAM, it can handle a bigger world), but it is a hell of a lot of fun to be had on a phone.
SW-4158-3990-6116
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
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GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
Things like this make me think that it's more a very immature data-set than it is Apple not being able to figure out how to use the data they've gotten from Tom-Tom. A major part of that is probably me thinking there's no way that Apple would not have the know-how to pull data out of the map-data, though it's true that I'm not sure what the data from Tom-Tom looks like, and how Apple's able to query/use it.
TL;DR version: dude writes app to test Maps with the names of 2028 cities/towns in Ontario (Canada's largest province). Maps fails miserably. 20% of results were correct, 19% were close, 27% were incorrect and 34% came back as not even being on the map. (Gruber [dun dun dunnnnnnnn] said he'd like to see how this app ran on iOS 5 w/ Google's data, and I would too)
I really enjoyed this quote:
389 were close but not good enough (for example turn-by-turn might send you off a bridge but you'll get rescued close to where you want to be)
Again, my being cynical about Cook's letter is mostly based in feeling that Apple knew that their data was going to suck, and they decided to go forward using it anyway. I like Apple, and the stuff it makes. I think Cook seems like a genuinely nice guy, and Jobs put him in charge so I'm pretty confident in saying that the dude knows what he's doing. Maybe they just entirely had no clue how bad it was going to be, but I just don't want to believe that Apple's QA/testers are that bad at this. I wish they'd taken the option of giving it another year. Hell, it's Apple. Do something crazy. Make all Apple employees with a company-supplied iPhone run a custom iOS build for a year that has the new maps on it or something. Make your people dog-food it, not us.
The problem is, it doesn't matter if they took another year, or five years, to test the app. They're still not going to find every problem that millions of people can find just by concurrently using it. How do you know if every address is accurate without using it to travel to every available address? Another year might have helped, but it wouldn't solve everything. Getting people to use it and report errors is better.
Eh, knowing how they designed the new maps (with multiple data sources), and knowing they had a year left on their Google deal, they could have done this:
Release maps initially using the Yelp, Waze, TomTom and Google sources. Just use all of them. Use automated data tracking to figure out when the Maps app is hitting the Google data source, instead of the others, and use that as an automated way to track defecincies. After six months, release a Maps update where users can manually toggle off using Google as a data source. Tell users, through some sort of service update or an open letter, that you recommend they start getting used to the Google data source not being there, but that you've been using ths intervening time to make sure the new data sources are solid.
When the contract is near ending, you release a final forced Maps update that shuts off the Google stream forever. The new data streams may not still be perfect, but they'd be better than they are now, and users would have been given the time to adjust. They would have gotten their millions of users pounding on the system, with inline verification against Google as an authoritative source, and saved themselves this entire debacle. They just pulled the rug out instead.
syndalisGetting ClassyOn the WallRegistered User, Loves Apple Productsregular
Do you really think that if Apple could have made use of the Google data source in their turn by turn, voice activated app with fancy graphics, that they would have dropped google?
This is the crux of the whole issue. This is why they did it. the solution you are proposing is not something Apple and Google were able to come to terms with.
SW-4158-3990-6116
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
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GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
They couldn't use Google's turn by turn engine, which is built in to Android. They could have used Google's data for a custom turn by turn engine, like many other systems do (Motion X Drive for one).
Do you think Yelp is a turn by turn engine? No, it's a data source. As is Waze. I would imagine they licensed TomTom's turn by turn engine and just feed it data from Yelp and Waze.
They couldn't use Google's turn by turn engine, which is built in to Android. They could have used Google's data for a custom turn by turn engine, like many other systems do (Motion X Drive for one).
Do you think Yelp is a turn by turn engine? No, it's a data source. As is Waze. I would imagine they licensed TomTom's turn by turn engine and just feed it data from Yelp and Waze.
Google has sole discretion on how people make use of their data and API for high volume applications.
I am guessing that Motion X pays google for the right.
SW-4158-3990-6116
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
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GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
As did Apple. This is not magic sauce, Apple could have done this. If all else failed, they could have excluded Google data from turn by turn, but allowed it to still be used for poi searching.
They had options that weren't thermonuclear destruction. I wish people would stop trying to cover this up with Apple apologies.
SarksusATTACK AND DETHRONE GODRegistered Userregular
These types of arguments seem to always require the assumption of irrational stupidity on the part of the enormously successful business run by smart people. Maybe it is as you say, and you have better judgement than them, or maybe there are factors none of us are aware of.
Either way it's kind of a pointless argument.
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GnomeTankWhat the what?Portland, OregonRegistered Userregular
edited September 2012
No more pointless than the "you must think you're smarter than XYZ" argument, which is based on some fundamentally flawed idea that companies always make decisions in the best interest of their users, smart or otherwise. Very smart companies do very dumb things all the time, to suggest otherwise with some sort of intelligincia argument is kind of weak.
No more pointless than the "you must think your smarter than XYZ" argument, which is based on some fundamentally flawed idea that companies make decisions in the best interest of their users, smart or otherwise. Very smart companies do very dumb things all the time, to suggest otherwise with some sort of intelligincia argument is kind of weak.
I am saying the entire argument, even my part of it, is pointless. My point is there's no way to make a satisfactory conclusion. This argument is the tech equivalent of celebrity gossip.
+1
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Blake TDo you have enemies then?Good. That means you’ve stood up for something, sometime in your life.Registered Userregular
As did Apple. This is not magic sauce, Apple could have done this. If all else failed, they could have excluded Google data from turn by turn, but allowed it to still be used for poi searching.
They had options that weren't thermonuclear destruction. I wish people would stop trying to cover this up with Apple apologies.
They flat out said, google wouldn't give them turn by turn.
I used the new maps yesterday and had no problems. I like the new directions pseudo turn by turn(3GS).
Nintendo ID: Incindium
PSN: IncindiumX
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syndalisGetting ClassyOn the WallRegistered User, Loves Apple Productsregular
Aside from one trip to a wal mart that didn't exist (which is shit that used to happen to me ALL THE DAMN TIME on google maps), I haven't had any issues either.
SW-4158-3990-6116
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
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minor incidentexpert in a dying fieldnjRegistered Userregular
For what it's worth, I had a full day of deliveries and errands yesterday and Maps was spot on with turn-by-turn the whole way, probably 9 or 10 destinations across North Jersey and Manhattan.
It even handled a couple of automatic, instant reroutes due to detours perfectly smoothly, which was a relief.
The data set definitely has issues with POI locations, but that's pretty much 100% eliminated when you're using street addresses.
Ah, it stinks, it sucks, it's anthropologically unjust
kaliyamaLeft to find less-moderated foraRegistered Userregular
edited October 2012
To me this has been an eye opening experience - previous google map integration was an outlier and the third party app treatment going forward will be a lot more like how chrome is treated in ios. That suggests what Apple's desired end-game will be for its walled garden content model: shutting out competitors when they don't want to pay licensing fees, even the competitor offers a superior experience for the user. It's more cost-efficient in the long run for Apple to develop their own stuff than license it, and that approach is problematic when they simultaneously refuse to be allow third party apps to out-compete them in core functions - e.g. the way competitor browsers are limited. I could see the EU competition people coming down on this when they figure out what it all means in a couple of years, as it will strike them as analogous to how microsoft integrated IE into desktops in the 90s.
I'm sure apple's UX will be fine in a few months, either because google releases its map app or apple fixes its own, but from a long-term perspective I don't see why my dollars should support Apple's anti-competitive behavior - it will reduce competition in the long run and therefore my UX will suffer regardless of whose phone I am using a decade from now.
To me this has been an eye opening experience - previous google map integration was an outlier and the third party app treatment going forward will be a lot more like how chrome is treated in ios. That suggests what Apple's desired end-game will be for its walled garden content model: shutting out competitors when they don't want to pay licensing fees, even the competitor offers a superior experience for the user. It's more cost-efficient in the long run for Apple to develop their own stuff than license it, and that approach is problematic when they simultaneously refuse to be allow third party apps to out-compete them in core functions - e.g. the way competitor browsers are limited. I could see the EU competition people coming down on this when they figure out what it all means in a couple of years, as it will strike them as analogous to how microsoft integrated IE into desktops in the 90s.
I'm sure apple's UX will be fine in a few months, either because google releases its map app or apple fixes its own, but from a long-term perspective I don't see why my dollars should support Apple's anti-competitive behavior - it will reduce competition in the long run and therefore my UX will suffer regardless of whose phone I am using a decade from now.
Google tried to strong-arm apple into giving them their user data in exchange for the features they were able to lord over iOS on Android, like turn based navigation and vector maps.
Apple made their own product instead of giving that information to a direct competitor. A competitor who has actually used exploits against their web browser (safari) to further mine these users for browsing data and habits. Furthermore, Apple is promoting OTHER map apps and telling people to use them if they need to in this interim period. If google had a google maps app ready, you can bet that apple would put it on the store right now.
The truth is... I know nearly ten people with either the 4s or 5, and we haven't been complaining about maps at all. I got one bad POI, but otherwise it has been aces, even finding hole in the wall speakeasy bars in manhattan or fondue restaurants in raleigh, NC. It is significantly better than google maps was at the launch of their service, and after this initial hiccup (one Apple readily admits was not up to their standard), it will be fine.
I plan to submit an error report for every little thing I find. As do others.
SW-4158-3990-6116
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
i'm bored so i'm going to make apple maps a better experience by reporting every single address i click on in brooklyn ny and replacing the new york, ny in the address with brooklyn, ny because it's pissing me off and gives me the wrong borough half the time when i look for shit
still aint upgraded my phone tho
poo
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syndalisGetting ClassyOn the WallRegistered User, Loves Apple Productsregular
i'm bored so i'm going to make apple maps a better experience by reporting every single address i click on in brooklyn ny and replacing the new york, ny in the address with brooklyn, ny because it's pissing me off and gives me the wrong borough half the time when i look for shit
still aint upgraded my phone tho
that's a good idea. I'll do the same when I am out there.
SW-4158-3990-6116
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
So, I listen to music on my iPhone with headphones for a bit, then at some point double tap the home key and pause it. Later, the next day or whatever, I go back to listen, and it starts me off at the first song I started with last time.
Different question! What's your favorite note-taking (ie for a class) app for the iPad. Things that I'd consider sort of important: usability and flexibility, both typing and handwriting/drawing, being able to take notes directly on a PPT would be cool, and price. But curious what other people use even if it doesn't match those or whatnot
Are people still pissed off about maps? Also my iPhone5 is pretty great but I've found one glaring problem. With the extra row I now have way to many app folders and I need to pair down the amount of apps I have installed on my phone.
Mostly successful weekend-trip to the Ryder Cup for Apple Maps. Only screwed up twice:
- tried to take us down a one-way street the wrong way in downtown Chicago on the way to dinner. Just went past the street and it re-routed correctly.
- took me down a road that's been gone/halfway-torn-out-lengthwise for 6yrs (according to the golf course) while I was trying to make my tee-time on Sunday. :P
So, not too bad. Reported both as problems, so they should get fixed up.
I didn't really think about it prior to going, but damn did turn-by-turn kill my battery. When we left Indianapolis my iPad's battery was at 52% and it got down to 1% as we made our last turn into the public parking for the Cup. I get why it does that (has to keep the GPS radio on pretty much constantly to make sure you're still where you were last time it looked, so it can give you an ETA, total mileage left, mileage to next turn/exit/etc, and so it knows when X Y or Z is coming up), but I was a little surprised initially at just how much battery it used up.
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minor incidentexpert in a dying fieldnjRegistered Userregular
I guess I never thought about how much battery it eats up, because anytime I'm using it in the car, it's plugged in and charging. But yeah, that's bound to absolutely devour battery life otherwise.
Ah, it stinks, it sucks, it's anthropologically unjust
Posts
I don't use maps that often, and most of the time when I do I'm probably sitting down and just getting a general idea of where I'm going. I can count on one hand the number of times I've used the Maps app to actually direct me exactly where to go.
Curiously enough this weekend is going to be the first time I could really give Maps a chance. I'm going from Indianapolis to just outside Chicago (Medinah) to downtown Chicago to Benton Harbor, MI and back down to Indianapolis. So lots of time to see how it performs here in the Midwest.
Its gotten to the point where Apple's trying to help us find better mapping applications, and that's not how it should goddamned be, Apple. They should have made sure their maps were ready for the prime-time, or they shouldn't have pushed it down the pipe yet.
Embark includes walking directions and shows you a map of your route.
The data set, for example, is from Tom Tom. Is Tom Tom known for their GPS units being shit? My understanding is that it's not the data set, it's how Apple is using the data set. I think that it's a lot easier for millions of people to pour over the app and find errors in it than it is for Apple to QA test it. Unforeseen issues in a software launch is completely normal.
Apple did fuck up, and the Maps app has problems, but I can't believe the amount of cynicism people are inserting into their apology letter. Apple apologized and even directed their customers to temporary alternatives so that their user experience didn't suffer while they fixed their app. If I went to a store and they didn't have what I needed and they directed me to a competitor in order to satisfy me I would feel taken care of, not told to go fuck off somewhere.
Both times I wrote letters to the managers to say thank you, that I felt appreciated and taken care of and that I would give them business in the future.
Unfortunately there's no Embark for Toronto.
XBL |Steam | PSN | last.fm
TL;DR version: dude writes app to test Maps with the names of 2028 cities/towns in Ontario (Canada's largest province). Maps fails miserably. 20% of results were correct, 19% were close, 27% were incorrect and 34% came back as not even being on the map. (Gruber [dun dun dunnnnnnnn] said he'd like to see how this app ran on iOS 5 w/ Google's data, and I would too)
I really enjoyed this quote:
Again, my being cynical about Cook's letter is mostly based in feeling that Apple knew that their data was going to suck, and they decided to go forward using it anyway. I like Apple, and the stuff it makes. I think Cook seems like a genuinely nice guy, and Jobs put him in charge so I'm pretty confident in saying that the dude knows what he's doing. Maybe they just entirely had no clue how bad it was going to be, but I just don't want to believe that Apple's QA/testers are that bad at this. I wish they'd taken the option of giving it another year. Hell, it's Apple. Do something crazy. Make all Apple employees with a company-supplied iPhone run a custom iOS build for a year that has the new maps on it or something. Make your people dog-food it, not us.
Apple is all about the details.
Of User Experience. The new Maps looks very nice and seems polished from a UX standpoint. It's tremendous stumbling block is data. Apple has never been a data company, while Google lives and breathes Big Data, so they're falling on their face getting accurate datapoints to shove into their Map app.
This week's Hypercritical had a pretty good angle on it (if you don't mind listening to a guy who sounds like Squidward.)
The problem is, it doesn't matter if they took another year, or five years, to test the app. They're still not going to find every problem that millions of people can find just by concurrently using it. How do you know if every address is accurate without using it to travel to every available address? Another year might have helped, but it wouldn't solve everything. Getting people to use it and report errors is better.
Pity I don't want to.
Satans..... hints.....
That being said.
Any really good apps that are optimized for the 5 to download?
Minecraft has been updated as well; its not as feature-rich as the desktop version, and the world is inexplicably only 256x256x256 (I mean, the 5 has a gig of RAM, it can handle a bigger world), but it is a hell of a lot of fun to be had on a phone.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
Eh, knowing how they designed the new maps (with multiple data sources), and knowing they had a year left on their Google deal, they could have done this:
Release maps initially using the Yelp, Waze, TomTom and Google sources. Just use all of them. Use automated data tracking to figure out when the Maps app is hitting the Google data source, instead of the others, and use that as an automated way to track defecincies. After six months, release a Maps update where users can manually toggle off using Google as a data source. Tell users, through some sort of service update or an open letter, that you recommend they start getting used to the Google data source not being there, but that you've been using ths intervening time to make sure the new data sources are solid.
When the contract is near ending, you release a final forced Maps update that shuts off the Google stream forever. The new data streams may not still be perfect, but they'd be better than they are now, and users would have been given the time to adjust. They would have gotten their millions of users pounding on the system, with inline verification against Google as an authoritative source, and saved themselves this entire debacle. They just pulled the rug out instead.
This is the crux of the whole issue. This is why they did it. the solution you are proposing is not something Apple and Google were able to come to terms with.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
Do you think Yelp is a turn by turn engine? No, it's a data source. As is Waze. I would imagine they licensed TomTom's turn by turn engine and just feed it data from Yelp and Waze.
Google has sole discretion on how people make use of their data and API for high volume applications.
I am guessing that Motion X pays google for the right.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
They had options that weren't thermonuclear destruction. I wish people would stop trying to cover this up with Apple apologies.
Either way it's kind of a pointless argument.
I am saying the entire argument, even my part of it, is pointless. My point is there's no way to make a satisfactory conclusion. This argument is the tech equivalent of celebrity gossip.
They flat out said, google wouldn't give them turn by turn.
Satans..... hints.....
Nintendo ID: Incindium
PSN: IncindiumX
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
It even handled a couple of automatic, instant reroutes due to detours perfectly smoothly, which was a relief.
The data set definitely has issues with POI locations, but that's pretty much 100% eliminated when you're using street addresses.
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[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
http://www.macobserver.com/tmo/article/major-outage-stops-purchases-on-apples-itunes-app-stores
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[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
I'm sure apple's UX will be fine in a few months, either because google releases its map app or apple fixes its own, but from a long-term perspective I don't see why my dollars should support Apple's anti-competitive behavior - it will reduce competition in the long run and therefore my UX will suffer regardless of whose phone I am using a decade from now.
I wonder if someone broke something with today being the last day for Ping
Looks like everything is working again. I am able to update my apps.
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[3DS] 3394-3901-4002 | [Xbox/Steam] Redfield85
Google tried to strong-arm apple into giving them their user data in exchange for the features they were able to lord over iOS on Android, like turn based navigation and vector maps.
Apple made their own product instead of giving that information to a direct competitor. A competitor who has actually used exploits against their web browser (safari) to further mine these users for browsing data and habits. Furthermore, Apple is promoting OTHER map apps and telling people to use them if they need to in this interim period. If google had a google maps app ready, you can bet that apple would put it on the store right now.
The truth is... I know nearly ten people with either the 4s or 5, and we haven't been complaining about maps at all. I got one bad POI, but otherwise it has been aces, even finding hole in the wall speakeasy bars in manhattan or fondue restaurants in raleigh, NC. It is significantly better than google maps was at the launch of their service, and after this initial hiccup (one Apple readily admits was not up to their standard), it will be fine.
I plan to submit an error report for every little thing I find. As do others.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
still aint upgraded my phone tho
that's a good idea. I'll do the same when I am out there.
Let's play Mario Kart or something...
Any idea why that is?
3DS Friend Code: 3110-5393-4113
Steam profile
3DS Friend Code: 3110-5393-4113
Steam profile
- tried to take us down a one-way street the wrong way in downtown Chicago on the way to dinner. Just went past the street and it re-routed correctly.
- took me down a road that's been gone/halfway-torn-out-lengthwise for 6yrs (according to the golf course) while I was trying to make my tee-time on Sunday. :P
So, not too bad. Reported both as problems, so they should get fixed up.
I didn't really think about it prior to going, but damn did turn-by-turn kill my battery. When we left Indianapolis my iPad's battery was at 52% and it got down to 1% as we made our last turn into the public parking for the Cup. I get why it does that (has to keep the GPS radio on pretty much constantly to make sure you're still where you were last time it looked, so it can give you an ETA, total mileage left, mileage to next turn/exit/etc, and so it knows when X Y or Z is coming up), but I was a little surprised initially at just how much battery it used up.