“Google’s Motorola Mobility subsidiary went looking for an address that didn’t actually exist in an effort to artificially portray Apple’s new iOS 6 Maps as deficient,” Daniel Eran Dilger reports for AppleInsider.
“An ad promoting Motorola’s Droid RAZR M is portrayed being able to locate an address that iOS 6 Maps directs to a wrong road name in what appears to be the wrong city,” Dilger reports. “‘Looking for 315 E 15th in Manhattan?’ Motorola Mobility posed on its Google+ site. ‘Google Maps on DROID RAZR M will get you there & not #iLost in Brooklyn.'”
Dilger reports, “The problem, as noted by reader AMD Pettitte, is that 315 E 15th Street is not an actual address in Manhattan. A public park sits on that side of the street, making none of the block’s odd numbers a valid address. The number will never be a valid address in Manhattan… If you’re searching for an phony address that doesn’t actually exist, you’re already lost. You can’t blame Apple, and neither should Google.”
Much more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: Desperation.
…and false advertising, aka fraud.
Why does MDN think that Google is desperate? Desperate for what? They rule the world right now in terms of market share on all sorts of fronts? Hell investors based on the stock price even like them more than Apple and that is even after the iPhone 5 launch.
Why is any of this an issue with anyone? Coke and Pepsi have a field day with one another in ad campaigns all day long and there is no reason why Google and Apple would no do the same.
Love Apple all you want but please stay focused on what matters and this does not matter to you unless you have issues with iOS maps and I do not. Works just fine in my area.
maybe not desperate, but definitely pathetic…
“Why is this an issue for anyone?”?????? You stink as a human. Why is world hunger, poverty, Nazi Hollocaust, fairness in advertising, theft, murder an issue for anyone, then??? If I’m not affected it doesn’t matter?
I’m using extreme examples, but right is right and wrong is wrong. And that ad is just wrong! I hope you dont ever get your same faulty logic applied to you someday. But if you do, then maybe you’ll understand.
Whether an investor likes a company has nothing to do with their nominal shareprice. Are you saying Berkshire Hathaway is the most liked company in the World? Of course not, so Google’s shareprice being higher has no bearing on likability.
Actually, Gary J., investors apparently prefer AAPL far more than GOOG; they value AAPL 2.5 times more than GOOG (AAPL: $630B; GOOG: $245B). The price of one individual share is really completely meaningless outside any context (market cap, P/E ratio, etc). Let us not forget; AAPL has been growing faster than GOOG pretty much consistently over the past 5 years (with few short periods of GOOG spurts or AAPL’s plateaus).
The rest of the argument loses value when you use the actual share price (isolated from the actual underlining value) as an argument.
Apple rules the world right now in terms of PROFIT per handset. So tell me who is really winning?
Not profit per handset. Apple leads in profit share in the whole smart phone market, by a wide margin.
Actually, I can’t bring to mind a single instance where Coke has mentioned in any fashion the #2 (or other) competitor in their ads. They are #1 and there is no need. Now, Pepsi, they are a #2 and desperately want to be #1, and nearly all their advertising is taking pot shots at Coke, constantly denigrating Coke consumers as being boring, misguided, misled (sound familiar?). Yes, Google is desperate and definitely on the defensive.
Gary J.: Investors buy or sell stocks to make money, not because they like one company’s product over the other. Most professional investors likely buy and sell both stocks frequently, taking advantage of price changes.
Coke and Pepsi can go at each other on whose taste test survey they came out on top of, etc. etc. But publishing a flat-out lie like Motorola did is plain wrong. Google Maps wouldn’t have found that address either. I have had many times when Google Maps couldn’t find an address I knew was correct and was just looking for driving directions.
BTW, I just put that address into Google Maps on my iMac as well as on my iPhone (Apple Maps). Both pulled up the park listed above. Therefore both are accurate (for that address).
Google’s business relies upon having exposure to users – a problem for Google because it doesn’t make the devices people buy. With Apple’s move away from Google Maps, Google has lost 100 million users – a massive loss of marketshare. Google is losing a little marketshare to Bing, but more to apps which replace search. Google never imagined that Apple would shut them out, but now they can see that this is Apple’s intention, and that will have a huge impact on Google. If Microsoft manages to make a mobile OS that people buy in reasonable numbers, Google will lose further marketshare. And, as we know, Android is in trouble for pirating Apple technology. Lots to ge worried about if you are Google…
Oh I don’t know, maybe it’s because THEY FAKED AN AD TO FALSELY SHOW THAT GOOGLE MAPS IS BETTER?
If that isn’t desperation than what exactly is it, Gary?
As for why they’re so desperate, it probably has something to do with the ad revenue and user statistics they’re loosing since Apple kicked the Google Maps app off of iOS.
Excellent placement of the ad for the Droid RAZR M.
Anagram for ‘desperation’:
A rope ends it.
Now now! We mustn’t encourage suicide. Merely point out suicidal behavior.
If Google/Motorola Mobility is in such a comfortable position, why should they resort to misleading the public with such an obvious error as using a non-existent street address for Apple’s Maps app in their ads? MDN’s take is right. Major Fail.
As for the address 315 E 15th Street, according to city’s own official map, it is a valid one. You see, in Manhattan, street numbers are determined automatically, by the location. When a building comes up at such location, it gets assigned such a street number. Meanwhile, the address exists as a place holder of sorts.
So, as much as I’d love to argue this in favour of Apple, Google has plenty to argue away, in order to support the validity of this ad. The address is perfectly legitimate and valid. Soon enough (perhaps even as we speak), Apple will add it in, and Apple’s Maps will show it in the right place, at the south-east corner of Stuyvesant park, where it always was.
If we were to defent Apple, we could simply say that Apple correctly names the intersecting street at that address (315 E 15th St) as Nathan D Perlman Place. When you look at Google’s Map, no matter how close you zoom in, the street name never appears. This isn’t the same as incorrectly finding an address, but still, Google’s Map isn’t that perfect either. If one tries to navigate the neighbourhood by just looking at the map, rather than using search, they’d wander with their Android device forever looking for the Nathan D. Perlman Place…
If you build it they will come.
If you don’t build it, it’s just a number on a city database.
It does not exist anywhere else.
Even if the address did exist and iOS didn’t find it I think these kind of ads are sad. I think the new maps looks great. How long has google had their map service? Years and years. Give Apple that many years to prefect their service. I have never used Google maps for traffic info, didn’t even know they supplied that kind if info and I don’t know if they have that info outside the US. When it comes to public transport, why would you turn to Google maps for that? How do they even know? I use the App my local transportation company has supplied. I don’t know how you even can expect a maps App to know those sorts of things. I would not trust Google nor Apple to supply that kind of information. I would go to the local buss, train company for accurate info.
I’m not really sure what all the fuss is about when it comes to the maps app? Since Google themselves would not allow Apple to have turn by turn directions within maps application and the fact that about 98-99% of all addresses we search for on the new Apple maps functions just fine; other than some overly hyped story, by the usual “means and madness” this is really a good app that does what it says! With any new app built from the ground up, that has as much integration as this does, and has as many different resources to reference as this does, it is a pretty damn fine app! I have put this up against internal a GPS mapping system in a 2008 MDX and a pocket Garman system that is only a couple of years old and it does as well or better than either of these! We should remember that it was Google themselves that refused to allow Apple to use turn by turn directions within the old maps application. Just my opinion here however I suspect Google was hoping to cause this kind of disruption with the next launch of either the new operating system iOS 6 and / or the iPhone 5, just as BlackBerry did, years ago by refusing to allow anyone else to patch into their BBM messaging system. In the long run however, I believe the turn by turn directions within the maps application and further tightening up of the application in future editions will make it a top flight addition to Apple’s stable of apps. Yes it is right to criticize something when it is sub-par yes it is right to say mea culpa when a mistake or an insufficiency has been realized however, let’s give them an opportunity to fix it get it out.
“A public park sits on that side of the street, making none of the block’s odd numbers a valid address.”
Really? That’s news to me. I went to Stuyvesant High School back in the day, and I still remember the address: 345 E 15th Street. The building is still there, but has a new designation: The Institute for Collaborative Education.
Frankly, I wonder if one of the creators of the ad didn’t go to school at that address…
345 not 315… Check before you type…
The address on the iPhone has a “st” in it and the one in the moto doesn’t. Does that make a difference in what gets returned?
The address is 315 not 345. Enter Googles address into the US Postal Service web site and it comes up as an invalid address.
Well I just searched for it on Maps and it located the correct address instantly. So apparently the problem solving effort at Apple is humming right along.
Anyone want to guess how long this escapade will take to disappear? I give it till early December.
More evidence that Google has no ethics, now using Moto, otherwise irrelevant to do it’s dirty work of making up shit and running fake ads against Apple, who they ripped off the invite iPhone technology, while sitting on the board of Apple, while claiming… There is no conflict interest!
How much more pathetic can you get?
I can just see this database growing by the second with user feedback and input…I think I really like that concept, and I’m betting once this initial hollering dies down, most iOS 6 users are going to feel really invested in this Maps world, maybe even proud of contributing their own little pieces of the puzzle… In time, this Apple Maps will kick some serious rear, and no doubt
Google will rush out their own maps app for its so they can hang on a little longer. The competition will be great for iOS users and only improve both products while ‘bot users will be limited mainly to google’s maps.
Good call. Lets help Apple make its Maps function the best darn one available. Apple users helping Apple to help themselves…
I tested this out. Searching for 315 E 15th Mahattan, on the iPhone 5, takes you to the theoretical location, of the address, a public square…
#Desperation.
Well caught brother Dan!
Google: DESPERATION at work.
What’s particularly hilarious is that Google could have found plenty of actual Apple Maps blunders as examples. But when you’re DESPERATE, you’re one giant ball of blunders. Well done Google, idiots. 😛