I think this is taken word-for-word from this Bloomberg piece: https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2019-04-10/google-fl...
It's a syndicated article
Google Decides to Monetize Maps
31–40 of 374 posts
Re: Google Decides to Monetize Maps
#32Google is really leaving the door open here for Apple to step in and offer a services bundle with a monthly fee that doesn’t involve stuffing advertising into every nook and cranny of the user experience. I generally prefer Google’s services to Apple’s but there might be a tipping point soon where I’m willing to sacrifice some features in exchange for a generally less creepy product.
Apple maps still has a ways to go. I say this as someone who tries to use it frequently because I much prefer its UI, especially with Carplay. But it still has much worse traffic data, still sometimes sends me on weird routes through neighborhoods that don't save any time nor distance, and lately has a fun glitch where it sometimes instructs me turn left instead of right or vice/versa because it apparently thinks my vehicle is facing 180° from what it actually is. The turn glitch has now happened to me several times across two different devices. I thought I imagined it the first time.
Re: Google Decides to Monetize Maps
#33I can't stress enough how much of a bad idea this is. I was stunned when a few days ago I was looking up something on Google Maps and started seeing advertised locations/suggestions. Even though I love the product and have been a fan of Google products for the longest time, their current strategy of monetizing everything they can is very off putting. The direction Chrome is taking is also concerning. Don't know what…
Why should they offer a free maps service? They are a business with shareholder responsibilities, not a charity, and maps must cost them a ton of money to operate.
They already make money with it by the data it collect and the users it retains.
Re: Google Decides to Monetize Maps
#34Maps has been awful and getting worse for a long time. If it's not routing me 25+ miles further to save "1 minute" (really a multi-minute slowdown in the 90th percentile) then its failing to give comprehensible directions in order to interpose business names. Maybe the monetization is finally makes competing with it attractive enough.
You already have other mapping options like Garmin. And you don't have to pay much for them either. They are 100-300 bucks. They work pretty well... and could really use a boost in what seemed like a dying market.
> mapping options like Garmin
Except Garmin - having been decimated by Google and Apple maps - is getting pretty bad too. I've been using them for >15 years with multiple devices and every update lately seems to make their routing worse AND for some unfathomable reason makes the GPS reception less reliable (if I were a sceptic I'd suggest they are trying to force you to go for a new model via slowly crippling the device with every update).
Re: Google Decides to Monetize Maps
#35Maps has been awful and getting worse for a long time. If it's not routing me 25+ miles further to save "1 minute" (really a multi-minute slowdown in the 90th percentile) then its failing to give comprehensible directions in order to interpose business names. Maybe the monetization is finally makes competing with it attractive enough.
Do you mean rerouting? Google Maps is tuned differently than Waze, which caters to drivers looking to shave off minutes or even seconds. It tries to keep directions simple and easier to follow (e.g. not making a large number of turns), even if that means a slightly slower route. That was a deliberate product decision, at least until a few years ago.
What kind of incomprehensible directions and business names are you referring to?
Re: Google Decides to Monetize Maps
#36I can't stress enough how much of a bad idea this is. I was stunned when a few days ago I was looking up something on Google Maps and started seeing advertised locations/suggestions. Even though I love the product and have been a fan of Google products for the longest time, their current strategy of monetizing everything they can is very off putting. The direction Chrome is taking is also concerning. Don't know what…
Why should they offer a free maps service? They are a business with shareholder responsibilities, not a charity, and maps must cost them a ton of money to operate.
OP is not saying they cannot monetise their product as they see fit (it's their product). No one is saying that.
But when you have been offering something for free for years, people get used to that being the way of things, users are not going to respond well to the increase in advertisement.
Had Google done this from the beginning, people would have been more accepting of it. Generally speaking, if you change a service for the worse, people are generally going to view it less favourably than had it started out how it will now become.
Re: Google Decides to Monetize Maps
#37A few months ago, I noticed navigaton saying thing like "take the next right, after Key Bank". Clearly an ad, as there is nothing ambiguous about the turn. Haven't seen it mentioned by anyone else, am I the only one?
It's mentioned in the article.
Re: Google Decides to Monetize Maps
#38Google is really leaving the door open here for Apple to step in and offer a services bundle with a monthly fee that doesn’t involve stuffing advertising into every nook and cranny of the user experience. I generally prefer Google’s services to Apple’s but there might be a tipping point soon where I’m willing to sacrifice some features in exchange for a generally less creepy product.
Apple maps still has a ways to go. I say this as someone who tries to use it frequently because I much prefer its UI, especially with Carplay. But it still has much worse traffic data, still sometimes sends me on weird routes through neighborhoods that don't save any time nor distance, and lately has a fun glitch where it sometimes instructs me turn left instead of right or vice/versa because it apparently thinks my…
Apple maps is inferior to Google in almost every respect in Asia. I open it now and again just to see if it’s improved and always switch back immediately to Gmaps. With hardware sales slowing Apple has a lot more incentive to improve it than they did when the iPhone gravy train seemed unstoppable though.
Re: Google Decides to Monetize Maps
#39> Before the changes, Owczarek’s startup got 750,000 free map views a month and then was charged 50 cents for every 1,000 views on top of that. Then Google started charging after 30,000 views and the cost was $7 per 1,000 views. His costs jumped from nothing to $5,000 a month.
Ouch. How could that possibly be worth it? Are they just trying to squeeze money out of businesses that are already locked into the Maps API? It seems hard to believe that your average startup that needs a map widget (like, for food or pharmacy delivery) would go with Maps instead of OpenStreetMap at that price level.
Re: Google Decides to Monetize Maps
#40I can't stress enough how much of a bad idea this is. I was stunned when a few days ago I was looking up something on Google Maps and started seeing advertised locations/suggestions. Even though I love the product and have been a fan of Google products for the longest time, their current strategy of monetizing everything they can is very off putting. The direction Chrome is taking is also concerning. Don't know what…
Why should they offer a free maps service? They are a business with shareholder responsibilities, not a charity, and maps must cost them a ton of money to operate.
What changed over the last 10 years, and why wasn’t it monetized earlier? Maybe because then they wanted to make a useful service and get some data for their search ads, and now they just want more money.