At WWDC 2012, Apple “told us about the next generation of iOS Maps, which ditches Google’s API for Apple’s own technologies. The new version of Maps for iOS 6 will indeed include turn-by-turn navigation capabilities, similar to those provided by a dedicated GPS unit or the plethora of other apps that became available in the absence of an Apple-provided solution,” Jacqui Cheng reports for Ars Technica. “The application will be able to speak the directions aloud, too, and reroute based on what is happening in real time. Finally, a modern mapping application! But why did such a feature require Apple to divorce itself from Google before it could be implemented?”
Cheng reports, “The most obvious answer to the question lies in the Google Maps API’s terms of service itself. Google may offer most of its juicy data to developers for their third-party apps (including Apple), but it does place some restrictions on what kind of applications are allowed to be built using Google’s API. And in particular, Google restricts those making apps from its APIs from offering real-time navigation or route guidance in their own apps.”
“It looks like Google’s terms for use of the API clearly restricts companies like Apple from offering turn-by-turn navigation in their apps,” Cheng reports. “But this leaves at least one unanswered question: what if Apple and Google had worked out their own agreement that isn’t necessarily subject to the TOS that are applied to everyone else?”
Read more in the full article here.
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