Eric Schmidt: Ha ha, NO Google maps app for iPhone 5 Google has not made a maps app for the iPhone 5, its chairman Eric Schmidt said this morning - and his company is not working on one. The search engine supremo's snub will come as a blow to fanbois who "upgraded" to the latest Apple smartphone, or installed the new iOS 6 operating system on their fruity gadgets, and found …
You can have an Apple app permanently in development, watch and laugh as iTards slow give up on Apple, because the maps are a deal breaker (which they are) and they gradually work out they aren't the tech leader than some of the press seem to make out they are, and in say 2-3 years when they start approaching 50% of what Google Maps are, they can release it.
Apple would then be in a lose/lose situation, they would have lost 2+ years of users, and if they reject the app, they will lose even more, if they accept it, it's major and very public eating of humble pie.
Google could even launch a Google Maps on iOS6 that each time you launched it, it shows a 3 second advert splashscreen of the latest Android handsets from the OHA. How funny would that be....
Google's probably not doing that. But if they wanted to, it's a simple matter of an HTML5 app that detects the Safari mobile browser, and acts accordingly.
Maps alone aren't the problem. Apple dumped Google Maps largely because they got maps, but not Google Navigation, the SatNav app. Every Android device gets that, and it's very high quality in most places. And thanks to Nokia, Microsoft Phone users are getting NAVTEC SatNav. So this is now a mandatory smartphone function, and Apple's in trouble without it. Sure, they take heat for awhile, and they will probably never be as good as Google. But close enough, someday, and with the required features to seem competitive.
"You can have an Apple app permanently in development, watch and laugh as iTards slow give up on Apple, because the maps are a deal breaker (which they are) and they gradually work out they aren't the tech leader than some of the press seem to make out they are, and in say 2-3 years when they start approaching 50% of what Google Maps are, they can release it."
They'll just hire the the entire Google Maps team and get them to rewrite it for the iPhone. Whoops, too late, they're already doing that.
Given that google knew this was coming, they should have pulled *all* there apps from ios6 and run a huge advertising campaign. Or got Samsung to run one for them.
You want to compete against your suppliers? Fine, do all your own work.
You want to access youtube from ios6? Here, have a flash copy of the video... ;)
"the maps are a deal breaker (which they are)"
No they aren't.
And even if they are a deal-breaker for you, that has no bearing on the millions of customers that never even use them.
Not every customer is like you. Which is why some customers like different products to what you do.
Apple went with Tom Tom, for whatever reason. Maybe they saw Navteq's maps as part of the competition because Navteq is part of Nokia and they make a competing product?
Who knows; except that there's more to mapping than the basic data, however it sounds like the stuff from Tom Tom isn't up to snuff.
TomTom Hate? No, more like TomTom disgust. I don't have an iPhone and have no inclination to get one, but I am the unfortunate owner of a TomTom. I have found their maps to be so inaccurate, and their update service so pathetic, that a few months ago I walked into a store and bought a competing product. When talking to the sales girl, I told her that my first and foremost requirement would be that it not be a TomTom, because I am tired of driving down U.S. Highways that have been around for years and have it yelling at me to get out of the cornfield.
Apple is too fucking greedy for their own good. They could've took over Nokia for 10 billion and change (not advocating it, just a smart business move). This would've given them a map system that rivals Google's and thousands of patents with only a few that deal with corners. Think of all the havoc they could've caused with that? Windows phone wouldn't just be dead on arrival, it just wouldn't happen. Virtually every manufacturer would be paying rent to Apple. At the very least, they could've licensed Nokia maps for a few hundred mil and combined them with their own in-house features, providing their cult followers an experience that rivaled Google's.
What they did instead was to quickly hack together a product that works worse than Google Maps in 2005. And the reason they did so is because they expect the iFans to swallow it and ask for more. Apple is getting too greedy and cocky and that will be their downfall soon enough.
Aside from the much slated Apple maps app, what I would imagine riles Eric Schmidt is Apple's general dominance of revenue generation from Apps.
Leave aside commercial apps for a minute and consider Apps created by countless dev companies globally - from my experience, developing for Apple iOS first seems to be the order of the day. In fact, usually, it's the only consideration when developing a mobile application.
It's also arguably stated that developers prefer to create iOS apps because it's easier to generate revenue.
To coin a horrible marketing phrase, it's easier to "monetize" iOS apps.
I don't know offhand what the sums are - but I'm fairly sure iOS lead by a long way in terms of revenue generated from app sales, regardless of how many Android devices there are 'in the wild'
Here's just one source:
http://www.forbes.com/sites/darcytravlos/2012/08/22/five-reasons-why-google-android-versus-apple-ios-market-share-numbers-dont-matter/
There's plenty more.
It's clear that regardless of market share in devices, Apple is taking the Lions share of the bucks when it comes to Apps.
Just bear that in mind when deriding Apples Maps application.
I read the Reuters interview with Eric Schmidt to which Anna kindly provided a link above and didn't find anything there to indicate that Mr Schmidt was in any way «rile[d]». Perhaps, «Matt 89» you are privy to some other evidence and could be prevailed upon to post a link here ? Otherwise, there's a risk that some unkind souls may perhaps be led to think that it was not Mr Schmidt, but you yourself who was perturbed at the attention paid to this failure on Apple's part....
Henri
Schmidt doesn't give a damn about app revenue. What he cares about is (a) putting Google technology into as many devices as possible and (b) the ad impressions he can sell on the back of that.
Google make most of their money from advertising, and having a successful (and soon to be dominant) mobile OS puts them in a position to carry on making money from advertising as desktop browsing continues to wane.
Apple make most of their money from hardware and are supposed to provide an "it just works" user experience to justify the hefty price premium paid for that hardware. Without decent mapping - actually it isn't the maps themselves that provide the value, its the ability to search for, say, Wagamama and then get walking directions to the one you choose - Apple are going to find it much harder to switch Android users - which in the high-value economies of the West is their target market these days.
"developing for Apple iOS first seems to be the order of the day"
The problem with your argument is that Apple seems to be catered for first even for applications that aren't sold for money. Indeed if anything, this is more common among applications given away for free, consider the website wrappers "apps", and the applications give to access a company's service.
So it's nothing to do with monetizing (which seems a poor argument anyway, FUD similar to "But Linux users don't pay for software" nonsense). Nor is it to do with market share.
"http://www.forbes.com/sites/darcytravlos/2012/08/22/five-reasons-why-google-android-versus-apple-ios-market-share-numbers-dont-matter/"
The URL tells me all I need to know - if they only pick two platforms, it's a flawed article.
"Just bear that in mind when deriding Apples Maps application."
Why? Are Google Maps and Apple Maps paid applications?
And at least he didn't hide behind the banner of AC.
Well no, but "Bob" "Vista" "Kin" shows pretty much where our Bob lies on the "let's consider the various qualities of these competing products and make a rational judgement on those qualities alone" scale. He registers a 44 on the trollometer.
Not that my "name" is on my passport either, although at least mine is personally descriptive and not chosen to troll anyone, except those who'd prefer that people give up easily or who like cats.
"Not that my "name" is on my passport either, although at least mine is personally descriptive and not chosen to troll anyone, except those who'd prefer that people give up easily or who like cats."
Erm... I take it you're not British then? A dog owner is not exactly what came to my mind in looking at your handle.
I use maps on my WP7 device (Lumia 710) and they've worked excellently for navigation whilst driving. The voice is always pretty prompt and clear about what turnings are coming up and it's very quick to locate where I am and calculate or update a route. If Apple don't like Google, then they could possibly have licenced maps from MS as these work well. They might not want to work with MS, either. But at least MS would probably agree to sell them the full technology. Apple were basically forced into this by Google which refused to allow them to use the same features that Google themselves were allowed to on Android devices. Basically, Google wanted Apple to pay for a more limited version of what Google has. The Apple maps is a big fuss right now, but two years from now they might have something feature equivalent to Google's maps, but if they didn't do this, then two years from now, they would still be hamstrung by Google deciding what they could and couldn't have on their own phones.
I believe Lumia uses Nokia's own mapping system, which from what I understand is second only to Google.
I wonder if AAA (American Auto Assoc. for you Brits) has sold their maps to someone. Pre internet days they were the best and only game in town as far maps in the US and traveling went. Or did they just miss the boat completely?
I've used Google Maps (On my Galaxy-S), and I've used Navteq/Nokia maps (I'm using Navigon on my HTC HD7 at the moment).
Navteq are actually BETTER than google maps in the UK. Same maps as used by Garmin, and many car manufacturers. Google maps kept trying to get me to go up roads that are closed off (and have been for years), and sometimes routed me the LOOONG way round where I live.
Google I'm told is very good in large cities with large populations, however we don't all live in London/New York/LA.
"Apple were basically forced into this by Google which refused to allow them to use the same features that Google themselves were allowed to on Android devices. Basically, Google wanted Apple to pay for a more limited version of what Google has."
Heaven forbid that Google not want to give away their product for free to the competition!
Next time I see someone saying they like the software that comes with OS X, I'll tell them it's Apples fault for not making it available for free for MS to ship with Windows...
"by Google deciding what they could and couldn't have on their own phones."
Um no, it's entirely up to Apple. But other companies aren't obliged to write software for Apple. Or perhaps you can point me to the version of Apple maps that is (a) available for Android, WP, Symbian and Blackberry, and (b) may be distributed by phone manufacturers free of charge? (Not that anyone would want it...)
None of them provide OS integration for other apps that use maps..
Basically any app on your iPhone that uses maps in anyway is lumbered with the shitty Apple maps.
I'm waiting tor the class-action lawsuit from disgruntled owners of older devices, and news of mass returns of iPhone5 (which is already only 50% of forcast sales).
They are obsessed because it get page views. Apple releases are big news (they probably shoudn't be quite so big but they are). Journalists report on what is popular. And hordes of Apple fans is a big market.
Now I'm not saying they are not going over the top in their reporting - but with such a big reader base, why wouldn't they? Blame the Apple buyers and readers as well, not just the reporters. But it does have a ring of feedback to it, sadly. Still maybe this latest launch will go some way to putting a brake on it.
"hordes of Apple fans", "more views"
just curious. If there's more Android phones than Apple phones how come it's Apple which has "hordes of fans" and generates more page views? Could these views be in fact generated by hordes of Androids fans hording over each and every one Apple article?
"There's a lot more Fords, Hyundais and so on than BMWs or Porsches out there, but guess which gets the most attention in the lad's mags motoring comics?"
Well, you have just confirmed my suspicion, that page views of iPhone articles are in fact generated by Android, Windows Phone and Blackberry owners, not Apple fans.
And watch out, because you have just compared Android to Hyundai. You may not be safe now.
I drive one, and it drives nicely, works well and is easy to maintain.
Remember that only a few years ago people mocked Samsung for being the electronics equivalent of Hyundai - and now it's the market leader in TVs, and has phones and tablets so good that Apple is peeing themselves a little.
While you weren't looking Hyundai did the same.
" "While you weren't looking Hyundai did the same."
Errrr...no they didn't."
Errrr, yes they did, they've spent the last 10/15 years poaching some of the best engineers from the likes of Toyota, Yamaha, Nissan etc. and some of the brightest automotive design graduates from the UK and US. They're rapidly catching up with European makers, if they haven't already done so that is.
I'll still be sticking with my european saloon but don't knock 'em, they're making some interesting cars at the moment.
To stick with the car metaphor, while Apple are more like McLaren, Android is like VAG (VW Audi Group). With Android you get everything from a VW Polo to a Bugatti Veryon, where as Apple only make 1 model, that competes in the high end, so there's no £50 phone to devalue the exclusivity and "I'm better than you" factor of their brand.
>To stick with the car metaphor, while Apple are more like McLaren
Apple are not McLaren - that's practically libel. There isn't a smartphone which parallels them at all, even the cream of the crop are just transient, mass produced and semi-disposable gadgets. The level of human craftmanship involved @ McLaren despite the uber-tech factory has to be seen to be believed.
...and car analogies are kind of lame when Android OEMs - Samsung, Hyundai, Huawei etc also manufacture hundreds of millions of cars every year.
I suspect, though, now that Apple's Maps has seen the light of day, they might choose to avoid censoring an app that resolves the issues for free. At least, that is, until they get their own house in order.
You think users are upset now? Imagine if the story was "Schmidt says they submitted Google Maps for iOS5 but Apple rejected it as duplicating functionality in the OS".
" they might choose to avoid censoring an app that resolves the issues for free. At least, that is, until they get their own house in order."
The chances of this happening might be vanishingly small, but the possibility of it must have some marginal effect on app development. There is always a non-zero risk of spending resources developing an app only for Apple to say no.
This is not a problem penguins have.
The thing with a market cap is it's about what shareholders think it's worth, there may be no substantive link to the real world. Apple's a valuable company, that's a given, but is it necessarily worth that cap? Especially long-term?
I don't know the answer, and my suspicion is neither do you. For short-term profit (not necessarily a bad thing) you'd probably be best with Apple, but for a long-term investment I can't help think you'd be better off with a company that's selling greater volumes. Of course, it's swings & roundabouts as Google aren't actually selling Android, so it is a little hard to compare.
I am by no means an Apple fanboi, in fact I do not own any apple products though I do recommend them to people who ask me because usually they are not clued in enough to use any other type of device. I seem to have contradicted myself with the "not a popularity contest remark" because of course retail is a popularity contest. What I should have said is that its the margins you make that matter to business.
With that in mind, Apple under Jobs (both periods) made desirable products and charged a premium and it had been a highly effective marketing ploy. How effective? What year was Apple incorporated? 1977? Okay they dodged a bullet when MS bailed them out. Now they are in a position where they have products that are just like everyone else's (some better some worse) but they charge 2 or 3 times more and make a healthy profit. So they have shown their effectiveness in the long term, the short term gains (5million 5s in a weekend), the repeat customers (see ebay for sell ons). Much as Android have stacked them high to sell them with thin margins, Apple have stacked them high and sold them with a fat gain.
They do the hardware, software sales and support. Google do software and sell ads. And some hardware.
I guess it depends how you look at it though. Apple have far fewer users spending far more. What this means is that every single user that ebbs away, detracts from their future profit by a greater percentage. Sometimes it's far better to have a huge number of customers not spending much, than it is to have just a few spending loads.
Not that Apple's going to disappear any time soon, of course, but the point is it would take fewer users slipping away for them to have to fall back on their cash reserves (or discontinue the iPhone) than it would for Google's Android.
It's about whether you're looking for short or long-term profit. Sadly, too many businesses (read shareholders) concentrate on the now with no regard for the future.
Apple IT products are rarely bought for technical reasons. But for the popularity of the nontechnical reasons, would Apple make so much profit?
This whole phenomenon fascinates me, because they've managed to tap into the male desire to establish reproductive fitness by displays of conspicuous consumption. iPhones are basically the stag's antlers. Economics just doesn't seem to take into account, with its theories of rational markets, that there are a lot of people out there who want to be seen to be able to spend more money than the next person, even if they're giving it in handfuls to a faceless corporation. It's the poor person's equivalent of the plumber's jet ski or the barrister's Tuscan castle for August.
Apple are one of the few companies to have cracked the cross-gender thing. MacBooks of all kinds appeal to boyz and grrlz equally.
That's very clever design. I'm not sure how deliberate it was, but it's not an easy thing to do.
But all the fangrrlz I know are seriously unhappy with Apple's bullying and lack of new shiny, and they're either not upgrading their iPhones at all or they're switching to Sammys. (In fact it seems that for many former fangrrrlz 'Samsung' is the new word for 'Android.')
I hope Cook realises how badly he has fucked up. This was his to lose, he didn't have to do much to keep Apple on top of the game.
But instead, he's rolled out epic fail. And Apple's position is a lot more fragile than he thinks it is - precisely because the strength of the brand isn't from one feature or technology or product, but the user perception of buying something special and magical.
If the products stop being seen as special etc, Apple has lost all of its USP.
"Apple are one of the few companies to have cracked the cross-gender thing. MacBooks of all kinds appeal to boyz and grrlz equally."
I think that's true of technology products in general. I mean, a laptop is a laptop, whether it's a Dell, Samsung, Apple or whatever else. Thankfully unlike many products, we don't have "men's laptops" and "women's laptops".
(Though I sometimes wonder that things would be like that - Apple included - if laptops were around since one hundred years ago.)
"This was his to lose, he didn't have to do much to keep Apple on top of the game."
Note that Apple were never on top in the phone market, either by company (it was Nokia now Samsung) or platform (it was Symbian now Android). Android was way ahead of Apple before this new guy took over. I agree things do seem to be getting worse though, in the last year.
" Economics just doesn't seem to take into account" -- economics absolutely does take this into account, the Austrian variety especially. It is rational to consume conspicuously if you think this will make you more sexually attractive.
The danger, if you are Apple, is that such things are subject to the whimsy of fashion.
Bought by morons that are brainwashed by the media.
Next time you watch a TV show or movie, watch out for the darkened room with the macbook with the gleaming Apple logo, and the unnecessary camera angle that shows it off.
Don't believe for a minute Apple didn't pay money for the product placement. It's so rife, it's not even funny anymore. Watch any American TV show or Hollywood movie, and you play the count the product placements. Apple will almost certainly come out on top.
http://www.businessweek.com/articles/2012-05-10/apple-the-other-cult-in-hollywood
I feel slightly sorry for the cretins that fall for it.
"watch out for the darkened room with the macbook with the gleaming Apple log"
I wonder if that logo is illuminated by the display's backlight or if it's a separate umm backlight? Curious if it's just sat there draining battery for Apple's benefit (it's clearly nothing more than an advert - as a user, they should never see it lit up - unless they are a way way over the top fanboi.)
with regards to product placement, I find it depends on the movie studio.
Columbia - Sony - all computers are VAIOs and all smart/cell phones are Sony.
Take a look at the recent james bond films.
Warner (used to be time/aol) it is usually Dell and a mixture of 'droid/blackberry and winMo phones - check out Smallville etc.
It's not a hard and fast 'rule' but it's always fun to look!
Glad it's not just me that noticed this. It really is astonishing when you start noticing it - pretty much every American TV show that shows computers or phones will have Apple logos in it. Some shows seem to have a logo present in every other scene.
I know it's just product placement, but this kind of advertising seems like it would be more effective on a subconscious level than direct advertising.
And it is quite jarring and off putting to have to watch this in so many shows.
This is because the types that are involved in 'creative' trades - you know - the ones that got a single GCSE in Art and then went on to do 'Media Studies' - are too stupid to use a real computer, and so Macs are endemic in these areas. Same with journalists...
Mnd you, with the new 'even stupid people can cope' interface in Windows 8 maybe Microsoft will now take back these area by storm....
Pure speculation warning.
My guess, is Apple and Google are disagreeing over some aspect of Google Maps as a separate app. Like Apple want a feature add/removed from it. Whilst Google probably want something add/removed or possibly an option for the user to select Google Maps as the default. (which Apple would not like)
This is an interesting play. IIRC Eric Schmidt was a non-exec on the board of Apple while they were developing the iPhone. His position was there because Apple and Google didn't directly compete. By complete coincidence Google purchased and developed a phone OS while Apple were developing the iPhone. It is inconceivable that a board member at Apple wouldn't know about the development of the iPhone. I'm no fan of either company, but this is pretty shitty behavior on behalf of Google and I'm only surprised that it took Apple so long to dump all their services from their products.
So you're saying you want my freedom to take photographs from a public road to be curtailed?
Interesting how all you people blabbering on about freedoms change your tune the moment anyone else uses their freedoms to do something you aren't 100% happy with. It's almost like you haven't thought your position through.
why would him being on the board of Apple have any bearing on Google bringing out a phone OS?
Were they supposed to cancel plans for it because Apple made a phone? Do you really think that he saw they were making a phone and then said "why don't we do that too"?
If so you really need to stock up on your tin foil
He was on the board then because Apple and Google were best friends back then, with Google not interfering in anything Apple did. Apple launched a phone, then shortly afterwards Google bought a phone OS in development, secretly developed a phone and launched it. At this point, Google and Apple stopped being friends, and became frenemies.
Now, even the veneer of friendship that is the frenemy has gone, they flat out don't like each other now, no hiding it.
You mean they should do an app for iOS5? Or have you hijacked a thread about Google Maps on iOS5 to go on about some historical wrong that you think is relevant here?
While you're surprised it took apple this long to dump all google services from their product, I'm surprised apple are stupid enough to kick google maps off their OS when the replacement is not ready. I guess delivering payback to someone who wronged you is more important that delivering a usable product to your loyal fanbase. We'll see what the market thinks of that logic....
Unfortunately the market will forgive them, due the dumb users, in the same way that the iPhone 4 fiasco over that stupid antenna design meant that many people could not make calls outside of high signal areas. In that case the iSheep and the iPress just carried on with their fawning of Jobs and co regardless. Put another way, this is worse than religion, it's a completely illogical belief system built around a bit of electronic kit! Mankind, well many if us, are still stupid and primitive.
Some boxers are said to have a heart (apple) and public loves them despite all their illogical behaviour, while others (microsoft, google) are just soulless boxing machines. So yes, people will definitely forgive this Inferior Maps App, which will be polished and improved BTW
What responsibility do Google have to Apple? Google is a profit based business. It's duty is only to it's shareholders and customers.
Companies that let themselves get left behind because they're worried about hurting the feelings of people on the board of another company get eaten up and pooped out. They're unsuccessful companies.
The whole idea of a free market economy is competition which drives innovation and lowers price to customers and I want the latest tech at the lowest prices.
In any case, imitation is the most sincere form of flattery:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=CW0DUg63lqU
Releasing a free Maps app on their competitor's phone is not going to get them revenue. Deliberately not releasing one so Apple get lots of bad publicity for crap maps could drive people away from Apple.
This could actually be good for MS/Nokia too - people upset with Apple just as WP8 comes out, and Nokia already give their free maps and GPS/satnav away on their handsets (which seems pretty decent from my tests). So Google/Android could get a lot of good press by hurting Apple, while also giving WP8 some more users and opening things up in the market more.
Maybe.
Google make money from advertising services. When somebody looks at Maps, business like restaurants want to be seen. They pay Google to be there and be highly ranked when somebody searches for a restaurant in that area. Google Maps is just a modern version of Yellow Pages in that respect.
Of course, if nobody reads it any more, nobody will want to advertise in it...as Yell has found out.
Losing the iPhone users reduces the audience for those adverts and potentially the revenues from it. Of course, this is the revenue that Apple wants to tap into with its own maps product.
Now advertisers have to choose whether to pay to be in Google Maps, Apple Maps or both. Potentially Bing too. Android's market share has clearly grown to the point where Google aren't too concerned about losing that income in the short term. If 4 people want to go out to dinner and one of them has Android and therefore Google Maps, which one is going to be searching for the restaurant? Google still get the hit and the revenue from the search results.
Selling the phone and the OS is one thing, but people using it is what makes the money. If iPhone users revert to Google Maps on the web, then Google still get the income and don't have the expense of supporting the Apple device.
Speak for yourself, plenty of people are finding Windows Phone to be a better experience. WP bashers are becoming an endangered species. Trawl the net and you'll see tons of pro-WP articles and comments. You're already starting to look a bit pointless with this kind of baseless drivel.
"plenty of people are finding Windows Phone to be a better experience"
Actually I have to agree with you. I don't own a Windows phone myself, and I was a bit sceptical about them, but our company recently bought ten Lumia 800s for the engineers. All the new company phones come to me first to have their emails set up. I must admit I was quite impressed.
Personally I wouldn't touch either Apple or a Windows Phone with a bargepole. I'm an ex-Nokian now on Android and that's because it's the least locked down of all the platforms. If it hasn't got file management, expandable storage and requires some proprietary app to transfer data from a pc that's a huge no-no from me. To me a smartphone is a pc and I wouldn't tolerate that on a pc, let alone something so personal as a phone which I carry everywhere.
Er, releasing a free Maps app WILL give them revenue. That revenue is in the form of usage data - which is what they were getting until Apple replaced them as supplier. This kind of usage data is invaluable.
No one is going to move away from Apple just because there isn't a Google Maps app on iPhone.
Firstly, does Google make ads money from maps if you search for "restaurants" and then click on one? Do maps use adwords, etc - I thought it displayed everything relevant in the vicinity you were searching based on distance? I never thought about how they monetise maps before, I figured they did it for free to build the brand but am happy to be corrected how it works.
>>No one is going to move away from Apple just because there isn't a Google Maps app on iPhone
I don't think that's a safe assumption. To many people, maps are a must-have tool and for others, using your phone as a sat-nav is indispensable. So I could certainly see people due an upgrade thinking harder about whether they stick with Apple.
Also, there are always new customers looking for their first phone. If they can be headed away from getting into Apple in the first place, they quite likely will end up stuck in whichever ecosystem they go for.
Either way, Nokia have a wonderful opportunity here to sit on the edge and pick up the scraps.
"No one is going to move away from Apple just because there isn't a Google Maps app on iPhone."
But they are. Which is the point.
Maps is so irredeemably pants that come upgrade time a lot of punters will be looking at Android and even Nokia with renewed interest.
This is a fiasco for Apple because it ends the lock-in.
Previously upgrading was a no-brainer. Now, not so much.
And as punters drift away from the iPhone, they also start to drift away from Macs.
Storm in a teacup. You want Google Maps - go to maps.google.co.uk and put it on your home page (10 seconds).
You want Apple Maps - just use it. May not be perfect for everyone but I doubt Google is either. I know people who prefer Bing Maps and I have compared Apples satellite images to Googles and for my house, my parents house, my office and a few other locations Apple has the more up-to-date maps - by several years in some cases.
Google will lose out on this - iOS was worth a LOT of cash to them - now they have turned a nice 'revenue' into an extra cost - imagine all those thousands of servers that are no longer requires as they are not serving the data.
@AC: "I have compared Apples satellite images to Googles and for my house, my parents house, my office and a few other locations Apple has the more up-to-date maps - by several years in some cases."
Also true here. Building sites finished 3-4 years ago don't appear on Google maps, but are right up to date on Apple's. Also, most businesses shown on Google maps in our area are all in the wrong place - over a mile away in many cases - whereas they are right on Apple's.
I don't completely rely on any one map source. I have several and cross-check them whenever travelling somewhere new. It isn't at all uncommon to find that they disagree, but it's not a case of one being uniformly more up to date than the other.
Agreed, my house isn't even a building site on Google's satellite images, it's just an empty plot. Both Apple and Bing have more up to date images than that. I've lost count of the times a POI on Google Maps has been in the wrong place, duplicated or points to something not there any more. Apple's maps aren't perfect but I think the disparity between it and the alternatives is being rather overblown, especially when there's nothing stopping people using maps.google.co.uk.
This post has been deleted by its author
The point is developers have to use Apple's cr(m)ap, or waste a lot of time finding and working out how to use an alternative.
Apple's API uses Apple's 'maps.' As a dev I can use an alternative - maybe even Google's own API. But it takes extra work and possibly extra money.
In the meantime, all the existing apps that use the mapping APIs are broken and pretty much useless.
"Storm in a teacup. You want Google Maps - go to maps.google.co.uk and put it on your home page (10 seconds)."
OOI, why don't people do this for every other web page? Instead it seems that every website and company is advertising an "app" just for Iphones, and I never understood why they (and only that platform) needed this.
I agree, you might as well use the webpage. In neither case will you get features like offline maps or free satnav, that Android and Nokia have had for months or years.
There's a difference between Google putting a free maps app in the store and picking up ad revenue and Apple paying Google to put a free maps app on their phones and additionally picking up ad revenue.
Apple should have waited a year to perfect it before release, it's not as if they needed to scrimp and save like Nokia do. The damage to Apple's reputation by not having a usable maps app on the phone is probably far more monetarily than what Apple were paying Google, especially when there was a usable maps app until recently.
This is the kind of thing which drives people away from a competitor's platform and onto yours. If Apple don't want to pay Google for the app, Google certainly aren't going to provide it for free out of the goodness of their hearts just to fix Apple's damaged reputation.
"True that you only hear from people complaining but it does seem to be a lot of people"
Operative word on "seem". They've sold millions of these phones already. It only takes a handful to make a storm on the Internet. For example, many of the posters on this thread alone are overtly Android phone owners and presumably haven't any direct personal experience of the Apple maps. And yet they confidently comment about their quality. For example, have you used the Apple maps, yet?
but when did he say they were not going to develop Google Maps for iOS? "We have not done anything yet," isn't the same thing.
If fact the Reuters article has him say that in response to :
But he said any decision on whether Google Maps would be accepted as an application in the Apple App Store would have to be made by Apple.
So, he has confirmed that they have not submitted the app yet. Nothing more, not much less.
I do love The Reg, and I appreciate that you need page hits - but please try and report the story.
Many of the apps show use the built in maps.
Heres an example: use Zillow or Trulia apps to find a house for sale... iOS5, you can see train stations on the map, which is useful when assessing the location of a house to purchase. But as soon as you upgrade to iOS6, that train statio. No longer shows up. Doesnt sound like much, but compound it with everything else that uses the built in maps... non-trivial downgrade.
It's great just to get the satnav functionality. Satnav gives pretty good directions and speaks out the proper road names so rather than saying "Turn left" it will say "Turn left onto George Street", "Or keep right and follow signs for the M4" or whatever. it's too bad it has to be online to get directions but it works. It also has traffic analysis for some places which is neat. Maps can be cached offline but directions require being online.
I also have offline maps & routes on a Lumia 800 which is a plan B if I have no internet. It seems more accurate online since offline some of the routes can be really bizarre. It's better than nothing though.
I haven't seen many reviews of the satnav functionality for iOS 6 but some reports suggest it is only in the iPhone 5. This seems utterly bizarre to me. I assume older iPhones have the prerequisite bits like GPS and compass to do satnav so it's a mystery why they might be unsupported except some artificial product differentiation.
Apple's approach to iMaps or CrapMaps whatever you call it reminds how Microsoft rolls out Windows ... put a barely decent product out there then let the users find the flaws and issues. Apple wants you to do their work for them as they are used to slave labor.
If Google does put a new map app out there then they should charge as much as they can for it. iDrones will gladly pay for a map app that actually works.
For those that say "Well this is the first cut and Google Maps sucked at first too" is full of BS because this is your great Apple who have had years to work on this and produce something “revolutionary but instead plopped a pile of poo and stuck a compass in it.
Once Apple improves their maps, Google will have to do it as well. And customers will have a choice. That`s actually good, a monopoly is never a good thing. I'd like to see the same happening with Google Search. Some alternative to consumers and advertisers would be welcome
I really don't give a rat's ass about the Google and Apple squabble. But I am pissed at Apple for having me upload ios6 to my iPhone 4s and then lose google maps. Also pissed at Google for punishing me because of the spat. This smacks alot of the posturing and fights between Microsoft and Apple 15-20 years ago. The consumer lost.
Not sure what my response to Apple is yet, but I am deleting all Google software from my iPhone. Going to try out some other options. Tired of being the battering ram. Open to suggestions to bring home the message to Apple.
"Open to suggestions to bring home the message to Apple."
Buy something other than Apple. Nokia WP have great mapping solutions - but also I don't see that Google are at fault anyway, so Android is an option too. There's no obligation for them to have to write applications for Apple, especially when they're in competition. Should we complain that Apple haven't released Apple maps for Android (or anything else) (assuming it was any good)?
(And Apple get more than their fair share of software support anyway)...
"Open to suggestions to bring home the message to Apple."
Can't comment on WP8 properly yet as it's not out, but I have the Lumia 710 with WP7.5 and it's extremely good and usable. And with specific regard to the maps, they are very good and can also be downloaded for use offline which can be a big help. The Nokia Drive tool which plots routes and gives vocal directions works really well, ime. Highly recommended.
.. would take a 30% (is it?) cut of the probably-not-that-huge advertising revenue generated by a Google Maps App for iOS, you have to wonder why Google would want to do one.
I think I read that Apple was paying Google around $1 billion annually for the maps app in the past. And that had no turn-by-turn, as Google saw that (correctly, so far as I'm concerned) as a really great USP for Android.
I'm sure the Apple maps will improve over time. The Android one has. And Apple are busily recruiting all available ex-Google Maps devs ..
I realise that most of the people commenting are clearly so directionally challenged that they are incapable of getting anywhere without their noses stuck in a smartphone.
Go to google maps, when prompted to install a webapp on the device say yes. Enable safari location services and hey presto you have a google maps app.
I'm not an apple fan but it is sad just how much time people that don't have an apple device spend taking pot shots. Clearly Android and every other non-apple device is so flawless that it's not worth writing about but seriously - get a life. It's JUST a phone.
Can't it just run the Java one?
My 2005 bog standard feature phone ran Google Maps. Today even some dirt cheap Nokia S40 would run it. It was the full thing, only lacking in sat nav (which the Iphone version never had anyway).
It didn't matter that Google hadn't written one especially for my make and model of phone, because it was Java, and worked on any phone. So presumably Apple users can just run this.
Oh wait.
(Seriously though, I do remember the days when companies would support all makes of phones. Now it's just "Get this on your Iphone", despite it being a smaller platform than the likes of Android or S40 - sorry, like most people I don't have one. Even Google are at it, their web page only seems to show support for mobile software for Android and IOS. Despite this news item, it seems their only non-Android support is for Apple.)
"Now it's just "Get this on your Iphone", despite it being a smaller platform than the likes of Android or S40 - sorry, like most people I don't have one."
I think this is mostly due to higher-up management of these firms all have iPhones, so they want an iPhone app they can show their buddies. Android etc. doesn't even occur to them.
Also, consider dev. costs, none of these platforms are cross-compatible like JavaME was, I think it'd be foolish to target more then iOS, Android & WP (and possibly Blackberry - depending on the app.)
My wife, a non-expert, is complaining about her web site, which is on a mac on iCloud.
It recently lost its link to the google map insert used to show the way to her business premises, and does not appear to have a way to get it reinstalled..
Is this an unlucky coincidence, or is there something conspiratorial going on here?
Actually it's Android users who blindly follow others when they are told lies like:
- you'll be able to upgrade your 1 year old phone
- you'll get your upgrade on the day it's released
- Android is "open source" (except for all the technologies from other companies that we license... or don't ;-)
- Android is a "stable" operating system
- Etc., etc., etc.
you'll be able to upgrade your 1 year old phone
Yep, was able to do that.
you'll get your upgrade on the day it's released
Generally install a custom rom, so not really accurate to answer this one myself
- Android is "open source" (except for all the technologies from other companies that we license... or don't ;-)
Android is open source. No-one ever said the other stuff was. Much like Ubuntu is open source, but the (official) NVidia driver isn't. Not hard is it?
Android is a "stable" operating systemv
Seems pretty stable for me, the only major fragmentation, really seems to be in terms of UI etc. You can still take an Android app and run it on any Android device (so long as the installed version is new enough). I'd call that pretty stable, especially given the multitude of devices it runs on.
Oh, and as we're poking fun, it goes without saying that we can still find where we're going!
There are many better mapping and navigation apps for iOS than just Apple Maps and Google Maps. iOS users do not miss Google Maps in the least, especially since the iOS version of Google Maps was so lame (it didn't have turn-by-turn navigation, or other features).
Clearly iOS users DO miss the maps that were provided by Google for Apple's Maps app, as the numerous blogs, websites and news sites have attested to.
As for lack of turn-by-turn, etc. features, blame Apple - it was their app and always has been.
I think it's an exaggeration to suggest Maps is going to break them, but given the quality of Maps and the issues with lightning cables, it could be a sign that Apple aren't being as careful about quality as they claim to be. Their USP is ultimately that they're cool (what other differentiation do they actually have?), something that won't hang around if they become known as the Alfa-Romeo's of the smartphone arena (look cool, break too often).
I think it'll take a while to burn through those cash reserves though, in all seriousness if everyone stopped buying tomorrow, it still takes time to burn that much cash (assuming they don't go splashing it in an attempt to regain trade)
Interesting... From my quick cruise through Google maps via Safari, it had everything the original App had. Car/Walk/Bike/Bus, layers, traffic, routing, 'locate me' button, etc.
I'm a somewhat heavy mobile map user; In my opinion, neither are perfect but both are acceptable. Just gotta learn to work with them.
Observer1959
(untitled)
Obviously many of you are not aware that Google's Map app on iOS did not offer turn by turn voice navigation as it does on Android. How many version of this app was it going to take for Google to offer this feature on the iPhone? I'm glad Apple decided to move on and offer this feature to its users. The app will improve and Google can drop dead.
Introduce a Google Maps app for £499 that comes with an up-to £499 rebate when you trade-in your iPhone for an Android phone, plus on maps.google.com detect if the browser user agent identifies as an i-device, then display the message "Sorry, a flash plugin is required to view this content".
I'm somewhat missing content here. Apart from dissing Apple there seems to be an appreciable lack of decent articles that people read and comment on.
I've started to read The Register many, many years ago (yes, I'm a veteran) for the snappy, wide-ranging and sometimes even witty reporting on all things IT. Lately The Register seems to do nothing but cater to the IT-equivalent of embassy-burning muslims everywhere. The problem is that there is no lack of this anywhere and to be honest, mostly the comments, that is: your readers are better at it than your authors anyway. You've become an Apple-haters forum. Your reviews seem to be written by someone musing about devices over a pint or five decorated with PR images straight from the company PR department. The only articles that draw hits and comments are "Apple fucked the Prophet's daughter!!!" or such.
(Full disclosure: I'm writing this using Google Chrome on an Apple Macbook, in my pocket is an iPhone 4, besides me lays a Google Nexus 7 Android tablet, my feet rest on a PC running FreeBSD, my job is keeping a flock of Windows-PCs, Linux-Servers, Android-Phones and iPads happy.)
I'm a brain-fanboi and what's going on here is insulting my brain and my decency.
So: "The hand that bites IT" needs to rear up its head and look around for a change. There's more than Apple in IT, you know.
This post has been deleted by its author
...was in the app store even before iOS 6 was released - which also replaces the native Youtube app as well as the maps app.
iOS user's usage data is clearly still quite important to Google and I do not believe for one moment that they do not have an iOS map app ready or almost ready to go as soon as they think the time is right for them to release it.
Of course they are enjoying the media attention that this is generating and waiting for the handful of people that will actually switch to Android merely because of that.. but once the fuss has died down Google would be daft to just ignore what is still a huge chunk of the market - regardless of the Android 'market share lead' Schmidt was keen to remind people of.
Bing maps makes a mockery of iOS6 maps. Good info locations, accurate roads and junctions, good direction calculation and to top it off Aerial Photos of a lot of places in the UK that can be rotated. Yes its not a glamorous 3d rendering, but very few people actually live in the tiny area where this has been implemented.
Apple have REALLY fooked up on this one.
They should change their slogan to "There's an better app for that on another smartphone"
I've come to think that Google should make a paid version Google Maps for the ios6 users. Without the great Google Maps, iphone 5 or ios6 users are desperate.
Providing a paid version of Google Maps for iOS users will definitely bring big profit margin for Google. No providing one to ios6, wil bring bigger Android market share. Well either way a win-win for Google.
Great move Google!
Look, this is really simple. Put yourself in the position of Apple execs and think ahead....location services are already a big deal and are going to be huge into the future. At the core of providing locations services is mapping - basically knowing where people are and what is nearby. Google have an excellent maps infrastructure and they've spent a lot of money on developing it over many years http://universal-machine.blogspot.co.nz/2012/09/google-ground-truth.html
Apple made a strategic mistake back in 2007 when the iPhone was launched - Google Maps shouldn't have been on it and Apple should have put their own (crappy) maps on it. But they didn't. Now they recognize this error and know they have to get into maps or loose this entire market segment to Google forever. They're not about to do that so they will spend large over the next few years to make Apple Maps as good as Google's. Fortunately Apple have lots of $$$$s in the bank and this will encourage a mapping feature war which is good for us all.
Not many people I suspect will ditch their iPhone because of the iOS 6 map-fail (hint: maps.google.com works just fine in Safari on the iPhone & iPad). So in the long run Apple will have saved their share of locations services.
The Register 
Biting the hand that feeds IT
Copyright. All rights reserved © 1998–2024
