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The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

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Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#301

Post by bluthru »

ilaksh wrote: post #217

But you're still going to buy Apple because that is what all of your rich and trendy friends use. I have never owned an Apple product. The main reason for this is related to class and/or culture and financial circumstances. My family was always very frugal and on the lower side of middle class. And honestly I'm frugal and so when I buy devices I am focused on value and bought a laptop with a good graphics card and ot…

>And honestly I'm frugal and so when I buy devices I am focused on value

The iPhone is $200. You still can't get a tablet that matches the iPad 3 for $500. Saying Apple is expensive is like making one button mice jokes.

Value is a product of usefulness and longevity, plus resale value. It's ridiculous to proclaim that Apple products aren't high on value--I still use my 2007 MacBook Pro running Mountain Lion. It works out to well under a dollar a day and I didn't have to make any compromises in the process.

>The future is open source phones that you print out in 3d on your desk.

The future is also a Star Trek replicator, and just as relevant to the discussion.

>Apple is none of these things.

Because talented people want to be paid for their efforts, and I'm fine paying people for doing great work?

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#302

Post by ryannielsen »

spitx wrote: post #287
ryannielsen wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So… you two both personally knew SJ? And SJ, while he was leading Apple, was always without fault? If that's the case, how do you explain Ping? MobileMe? The G4 Cube?

I think it was the MobileMe team he humiliated and necked out of the door. Part of Apple lore. Now everybody knows that Apple's history with cloud-based initiatives have been less than stellar, and no time was that more clear than during Apple's klunky MobileMe rollout a few years ago. Server down time and extremely slow loading times had many wondering how Apple let a product that seemed beta at best roll out to the…

I know many people who were and are on that team, and am well familiar with the described meeting. That meeting doesn't change the fact that Apple shipped MobileMe while SJ was CEO. It was a bad product that had a horrendous launch; SJ could have delayed the launch or killed the product, but didn't.

Jobs was a marvelous CEO, but Apple made many missteps – some larger than the current uproar over iOS 6 maps app – while he led the company. Without having personally knew the man, one cannot claim what SJ would have done in this situation. Plain and simple.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#303

Post by ryannielsen »

enraged_camel wrote: post #289
ryannielsen wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So… you two both personally knew SJ? And SJ, while he was leading Apple, was always without fault? If that's the case, how do you explain Ping? MobileMe? The G4 Cube?

All of those were relatively minor projects, and likely off Steve's radar, which is why he could only berate the teams after the release. But maps is a major part of any smartphone experience - everyone knows it. And Steve would definitely would have paid close attention to it, especially since it involved trying to outdo a competitor's product.

MobileMe was – and is, as iCloud! – a major corporate initiative. It touched almost every product Apple was working on at the time, affecting iOS, OS X and iTunes. It required significant capital investment in back-end infrastructure, and was announced by SJ himself and demoed by Shiller at the WWDC '08 keynote.

At the announcement it was couched as "Exchange for the rest of us" – it was trying to outdo a competitor's product. (To say nothing for how it countered many of the features Google was trumpeting for Android…)

SJ was absolutely aware of MobileMe, and was intimately involved with many parts of the product.

And, given all of that, it still was a flop of a launch. A launch that was so bad, I'm sure it was a motivating factor in the iCloud rebranding.

And to claim the G4 Cube was a minor product is just amusing. SJ was incredibly proud of that machine when he announced it. And you know he was deeply involved in its design, from day one.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#304

Post by fpgeek »

taligent wrote: post #172
buro9 wrote: post #68

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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…

None of this is true. Google doesn't own their own POI database they license it from others and to date Apple hasn't approached these companies. So it isn't about the POI database. It's more about the fact that Google was withholding data for Turn by Turn and 3D.

Zagat and Frommer's aren't comprehensive, but surely they're at least important POI databases?

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#305

Post by fpgeek »

astral303 wrote: post #209
mavhc wrote: post #178

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unless you want, say, security updates. You're also forced to buy a new phone/device if you want them after x years too, where x is a low number

Where X is a number considerably higher than for Android. Look at the number of years the 3GS has survived and compare that with your average Android phone not getting latest OS updates or any security updates. But I agree that anyone buying a new phone is stuck with iOS 6.

It depends on what kind of updates you're talking about. OS updates are a problem, but I personally know that the G1 got around 3 years of Maps app updates, and given the current OS version distribution newer devices are likely to do even better than that.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#306

Post by dude8 »

I just got a Mac but this is the first time their closed source monopoly crap has bit them in ash. The more it happens the quicker they will change. It's a good day.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#307

Post by Mythbusters »

misnome wrote: post #286
ryannielsen wrote: post #278

Earlier quoted context omitted.

So… you two both personally knew SJ? And SJ, while he was leading Apple, was always without fault? If that's the case, how do you explain Ping? MobileMe? The G4 Cube?

At least they were functional, and it's not like they pushed ping and blocked every other social network from working on macs. As far as what Jobs would have done; the state of the maps is a plain embarrassment - I can't see why anyone has released this, let alone anyone with as much care about details as Jobs.

What is equally sad is that people put up with this substandard implementation of a core smartphone functionality. That Nokia 920 looks more and more appealing at this point of time with Navteq maps an OIS enabled camera, the two most used functions on a smartphone.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#308

Post by jad »

qq66 wrote: post #170
jad wrote: post #96

Earlier quoted context omitted.

> 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. This stuff gets so tiresome. Apple has been buying maps companies for years . Steve Jobs personally ran acquisitions at Apple. He decided which mapping companies to buy and when he did he probably had a good idea of how they would fit into the platform. Development…

It's not that tiresome. Jobs would have clearly done things differently. He would have either 1) paid retail prices for Google Maps API access until Apple could build a shippable product, or 2) Gone on stage and painted Google as a big evil bully who was stealing good Maps from iPhone users -- the media headlines would read "Google Reneges on Loyal Apple customers" or something like that. Notably, the second option i…

> Jobs would have clearly done things differently.

What's almost as tiresome as the now persistent refrain of "this wouldn't have happened if Steve was still alive" are claims to know what Steve would have actually done if he were still alive. Your second option is ridiculous on its face.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#309

Post by fpgeek »

dholowiski wrote: post #205
jasonlotito wrote: post #190

Earlier quoted context omitted.

And can be set as the default app so when I click on a location, it takes me to that location without forcing me to jump through hoops in copying the text, and then clicking over and eventually pasting it? You know, like it was in iOS5? Awesome!

That is not a "map" thing that's an IOS thing. If you want to change default applications, better switch to android.

Or jailbreak, from what I understand.

Re: The Amazing iOS 6 Maps

#310

Post by fpgeek »

snogglethorpe wrote: post #226
ChuckMcM wrote: post #115

Earlier quoted context omitted.

You are probably correct. However if you look at Google's moves in the maps API with respect to charging money the simplest explanation is that Apple and Google could not come to terms on the price for access and so Apple went with 'plan B'. Given the pain Apple is causing Google in its patent assault I don't doubt for a minute that the senior management at Google would have any regrets about 'losing' the Apple map b…

> I also don't expect Apple to approve any Google "maps" application any time soon either given how strategic it is for their mobile business. Soooo, their users don't matter? "Business strategy" is more important? This is Apple?!

Yes, this is Apple.

See: The In-App Purchase controversy with eBooks and other applications. For example, did demanding the removal of all links to Amazon.com from the Kindle app (because Amazon didn't want to hand their eBook margin to Apple by using Apple's IAP API) make anyone other than Apple better off?

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