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The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

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Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#81

Post by jpdoctor »

karlshea wrote: post #63
lhnz wrote: post #56

It seems like the quality level maintained by Steve Jobs is quickly deteriorating in favour of business moves designed to wrest more control off Google. They are operating in a very similar way to other companies now. Google executives must be laughing very hard right now. If I was Google I'd avoid releasing a Google Maps application for at least a year and let the Android handset manufacturers ruthlessly exploit And…

And you came to this conclusion based on one bad app? Quite the leap it seems. What's missing in all of these conversations is that Apple's contract with Google for mapping ended this year. No one knows what really happened for Apple to make this change.

> No one knows what really happened for Apple to make this change.

I find it very unlikely this move was prompted by Google. Honestly, it looks positively amateurish the way the change was implemented by Apple.

I will admit it will drive my next phone purchase: Maps are my #2 usage after mail, I very much depend on it to get around.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#82

Post by rictic »

Geee wrote: post #64
rauljara wrote: post #19

The "roller coaster" effects in the 3-d view are my favorite. They've got some smoothing algorithm going, or it wouldn't curve the way it does, but the elevation data must not have a high enough resolution. Google has made this sort of thing look so easy for so long, but it's clearly very hard to get this stuff right. So, I guess it's not that surprising that apple messed up something incredibly hard in their first a…

I don't think Google has 3D view at all. Those 3D maps were created by a different company whom Apple recently acquired. You can probably find the same errors from here as well, http://maps.nokia.com/webgl/

http://www.google.com/earth/explore/products/

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#85

Post by rictic »

buro9 wrote: post #68
SoftwareMaven wrote: post #62

I look at this and can't believe Apple wanted to ship with this. And I mean that literally, not incredulously. I believe Apple wants to be in carol of its mapping future, but this product isn't ready yet, and I don't think Apple is so delusional to not be able to see that. So that makes me wonder what happened in contract negotiations with Google to force it out. Did Google flat-out say "No"? Seems unlikely. Was it j…

Adverts. Spatial adverts are a big thing now, with a big future. I would speculate that beyond the cost of licensing the maps or the contractual stuff is that Apple did not want to deliver to Google more advertisers that would further entrench Google Maps as the dominant player. Apple need to be able to build their own POI database and knowledge of where all advertiser businesses are in order to get that revenue long…

I'm not sure whether you're saying that there weren't google ads in the old iOS maps, but I'm fairly sure I saw an ad there when I did a search for Pizza Hut a week ago in SF.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#86

Post by vineet »

lhnz wrote: post #56

It seems like the quality level maintained by Steve Jobs is quickly deteriorating in favour of business moves designed to wrest more control off Google. They are operating in a very similar way to other companies now. Google executives must be laughing very hard right now. If I was Google I'd avoid releasing a Google Maps application for at least a year and let the Android handset manufacturers ruthlessly exploit And…

Or, Google can release their Map application ASAP and try to build more of a foothold in the iPhone market. I guess then they would have to fear Apple rejecting their app when the time is convenient.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#87

Post by ralfd »

finkin1 wrote: post #34

Can't wait to see the consequences of this. I hope Google delays their iOS maps a while so people can get frustrated with Apple.

I don't understand your giddyness. It would be better if there would be competition instead of Google having a map monopoly.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#88

Post by Osiris »

vineet wrote: post #86
lhnz wrote: post #56

It seems like the quality level maintained by Steve Jobs is quickly deteriorating in favour of business moves designed to wrest more control off Google. They are operating in a very similar way to other companies now. Google executives must be laughing very hard right now. If I was Google I'd avoid releasing a Google Maps application for at least a year and let the Android handset manufacturers ruthlessly exploit And…

Or, Google can release their Map application ASAP and try to build more of a foothold in the iPhone market. I guess then they would have to fear Apple rejecting their app when the time is convenient.

I'm pretty certain that Google won't be able to release a Maps App for iOS because it would violate the terms of replicating built in functionality. People can use the mobile web version, though.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#89

Post by misnome »

lbotos wrote: post #28

So I've been seeing all this hatin' on HN this morning so I figured I should check it out on my device. I mapped my commute (1 hour) and the only oddity I saw was the waviness coming off of a bridge. Beyond that Philly's buildings were all rendered correctly and my route was exactly the same as Google maps. YMMV P.S. I must say It was really cool to see Cira Centre (The Amtrak Building) rendered in 3d. http://en.wiki…

Try living somewhere that isn't a big US city. Of course the major population centers are going to be highly worked on. It's elsewhere, that google maps has gotten so good on, that people are complaining about.

The satellite imagery is as bad as googles was, but more than six years ago.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#90

Post by brudgers »

thereallurch wrote: post #43
smikhanov wrote: post #33

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Apple will have something much better in one year It certainly will be better but I'm not holding my breath about Apple maps surpassing Google Maps any time soon. Google bought a Rasmussen brothers' company (what eventually became Google Maps) in 2004. That's eight years of product development, data collection, storage and refining -- all at Google's pace. Will Apple find some shortcut to compress this time in one-tw…

I'm sure google is sitting on a treasure chest of map related patents, too.

With TerraServer, Microsoft got into online mapping before Google was even incorporated (and when putting a terabyte of data online was so far beyond the leading edge that it was a Microsoft research project). Their strategic partner Nokia has been in the mobile mapping space for some time as well.

Given the relative sizes of patent portfolios prior to Google's acquisition of Motorola Mobility, I wouldn't bet on Google should the IP wars shift to mapping...of course I wouldn't bet on Apple either.

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/TerraServer-USA

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