311–320 of 705 posts
What alternatives are there? I'm trying to use OSM, but I find it to complicated and time-consuming to do anything.
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You'd pay 50-100 euro a month ? Why ? How did you arrive at this number ? Even before google maps, the standalone navigation devices didn't cost that much. To stretch this, if maps is 50-100 a month, how much is the total bill of all software you use ? Surely, the h/w, OS, browsers etc. should be orders of magnitude more than what they are today too.
> How did you arrive at this number ? Straight comparison to the other service I paid for for a while I gave up as it didn't seem worth it. > Even before google maps, the standalone navigation devices didn't cost that much. They costed a bunch and were a lot less useable in day to day life. There was no device that would tell me the schedule of the next train departing from the station 10 min from where I am, when th…
There is a free Android (+ iOS) app doing a) and c), it's Transit App, at least in 18 countries and 300 cities [0]. Gives you schedules and (multimodal) trip planning including car, bus, transit, train, subway, cycling, walking, rideshare, bikeshare, scooter rental. It has both scheduled and (near-)realtime information, detours, service interruptions etc. Shows you all the options you're interested in, rolled up by start time and total time, and includes cost(/estimated cost for rideshare).
In text format, on a super small screen, free.
> And I also get other people's position, and don't need to text them every 5 min to know if they're lost or stuck.
Well ok but very few people use that much. Why do you need it so much? Socializing? Hiking? Playing Pokemon?
I worked on Google Maps monetization, and then on Maps itself. Monetization was a dismal failure. I don't know how well they're doing now, but Maps was a gigantic money-loser, forever. I'd be a little surprised if it didn't still lose money, but maybe less. I don't what those "pin ads" cost, but I'd bet it's way less than a search ad. If you don't believe that, that's fine. "What about indirect revenue?" you ask? Goo…
Google Maps design is becoming less detailed over the years. It's really apparent when compared to OSM. It is necessary to search for a lot of things in Google maps as they are otherwise not visible. You can't really navigate off Google maps without turn-by-turn navigation. I wonder whether this is a strategic drive from Google to make maps more like search to enable advertising or whether they truly think this is th…
So the things most people care about have changed, streets are less important now and things like attractions or "active areas" are more important. Yeah, some people still read maps the "old way", but now probably those are in the minority so catering to them isn't worth it anymore.
Of course that's only one aspect next to the question of what makes the most ad money.
From experience, I know many people & businesses that use maps mostly for Business Intelligence, if you're Renting property of Buying property/businesses/real estate, Google maps has data up to 2008 (street view). Couple that with Satellite data, reviews, user-generated photos etc, and you've got a treasure trove.
Yes, the map UI is "busy" but I think we've evolved as users too. All google need to do now is work a way to Verify/Trust info around Pins/Comments etc, and they've revenue sorted.
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Depends. Basically, the API is free if all you do is display a map, keep the Google branding at the bottom, and add a few of those pins. Make one of those pins move because it's actually a car, and suddenly your cheeks are getting clapped with 6+-figure bills.
I don't think this is true for a while (5 years). There are view limits and I still find embedded maps that look just like this: https://stackoverflow.com/questions/50977913/google-maps-sho... .
Some sites we added it as an image to avoid this. Some sites got flagged as weren't allowed to do this and others have been ignored.
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Google Maps design is becoming less detailed over the years. It's really apparent when compared to OSM. It is necessary to search for a lot of things in Google maps as they are otherwise not visible. You can't really navigate off Google maps without turn-by-turn navigation. I wonder whether this is a strategic drive from Google to make maps more like search to enable advertising or whether they truly think this is th…
There was some articles on here about how maps have been changing over the years (also other map apps). The gist is that why would you need to show street names anymore? On printed maps that's the only thing you have, but that's not how most people navigate anymore. They search for a place or POIs and then use navigation. So the things most people care about have changed, streets are less important now and things lik…
I worked on Google Maps monetization, and then on Maps itself. Monetization was a dismal failure. I don't know how well they're doing now, but Maps was a gigantic money-loser, forever. I'd be a little surprised if it didn't still lose money, but maybe less. I don't what those "pin ads" cost, but I'd bet it's way less than a search ad. If you don't believe that, that's fine. "What about indirect revenue?" you ask? Goo…
Earlier quoted context omitted.
Depends. Basically, the API is free if all you do is display a map, keep the Google branding at the bottom, and add a few of those pins. Make one of those pins move because it's actually a car, and suddenly your cheeks are getting clapped with 6+-figure bills.
I wrote a system that incorporates Google Maps. It’s an open-source system that is used worldwide, by a few thousand loosely-organized nonprofits. When Google Maps suddenly required associated credit cards, it caused a great deal of trouble. It still causes problems. That’s because most of these entities are not 501(c)(3) orgs, with bank accounts and debit/credit cards. In fact, the organization enforces deliberate p…
Google’s UI is a complete mystery to anyone outside google that doesn’t know the lingo. It seems to keep changing too.
> Why won't you show me the street name? I've been running into this a lot lately. No matter how much I zoom -- no street name. This is Mapping 101.
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I’d like to see a defence of the reason why it’s so often a bit of a job to be able to read the street name… on a map. If only for the laugh I would have.
The article complains about 'clutter' - but have you seen a traditional printed map like [1] ? Personally I find them beautiful, but it's a rather Jackson-Pollock-esque beauty. One of the changes brought about by the digital mapping revolution was to allow much less visually complex maps. [1] https://blog.az.co.uk/z-map-company-supplies-london-emergenc...