“No doubt the images popping up on the Internet of misnamed cities and misplaced landmarks [in Apple’s new Maps app] don’t comport with the usual narrative surrounding Apple, a company that’s enjoyed approving media coverage for metronomelike execution as it’s redefined standards of excellence in its smartphone and tablet computing platforms,” Charles Cooper reports for CNET.
“Apple could have kept Google’s more reliable and mature mobile mapping app, but it made a strategic decision about something it needed to own and monetize. Put another way, getting rid of Google Maps was more important than delivering a less-flawed Apple Maps app and dealing with the grumbling.” Cooper opines. “But how long is that [grumbling] going to last? Many may remember the heart attacks over ‘Antennagate,’ when some owners of the then-new iPhone 4 complained about weak or lost signal strength when they touched an area near the device’s antennas. That also was supposed to be the end of the world as we know it. Nowadays it’s just a footnote and Apple’s shares are hovering near an all-time high.”
Read more in the full article here.
MacDailyNews Take: With every major Apple product release we get the same old overblown, overreactive, wastes of time. (BTW: We used Apple’s Maps this weekend to travel back roads 240 miles through three US states and it was absolutely FLAWLESS. In fact, it suggested the same exact routes that Google Maps did – we checked.)
These brouhahas that happen when Apple releases a major product are a result of the media echo chamber, some amount of planned FUD by companies that sell other mapping apps or competing phones, and are all the result of a desire of every media outlet on earth to somehow use the name “Apple” in a story and also to cater to those who aren’t getting an iPhone 5 this weekend, who therefore won’t have the most gorgeous useful pocket computer ever designed and built, and who therefore need something to assuage their envy of those of us who do. (“Look, Mable, there’s one of those new iPhone 5s. The news says that the Maps don’t work, so we don’t need to feel bad that all we have are these plastic iPhone wannabes that AT&T guy told us to buy.”)
Maps has placed about 10 businesses near my house that actually exist in another town. They also placed a hospital near my house that doesn’t exist. That’s a lawsuit waiting to happen.
Do not fret… Nokia 920, Nokia Drive and Nokia Maps will be very happy to look after your needs.
“…to cater to those who aren’t getting an iPhone 5 this weekend, who therefore won’t have the most gorgeous useful pocket computer ever designed and built, and who therefore need something to assuage their envy of those of us who do.”
True MDN. My plastic iPhone wannabe is an iPhone 4S.
Me too!
I use maps for my work daily, works flawlessly for me so far.
I did a quick check for routes to places that I normally travel to, the instructions were accurate to a similar degree that Google maps were.
I will continue to compare the new maps with my auto GPS until I’m satisfied with the relative accuracy.
I’ve done this with Google maps too!
I wish Steve was around to write “Thoughts on Maps”.
We’ve seen this all before: no disk drive, no drive bays, no serial ports, no flash, no optical drive…. Whatever.
I’ve got two words for you: “Maps” and “Passport”. Three years from now the industry will understand the brilliant chess moves of the master and there will be a gnashing of teeth and blood on the touch screen…
I do find Maps to be of too-low contrast and difficult to read. I wish the streets were wider and the background darker. Given the images are vectors, maybe a setting for colours/contrast like label size?
I just wrote the following to the beta.fool.com site:
~~~~~
Much as I appreciate the insights about Apple vs Google Map apps, this article is RIDDLED with wrong information. You’re providing nonsense to your readers. Then they in turn, believing you to be knowledgable, spread that nonsense even further. Shameful ignorance. Write me if you’d like correct information. I’d be glad to help.
Examples of wrong information in the article:
1) “In the 1990’s, Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) drove Apple almost to extinction by its manipulation of two core technologies Internet Explorer and their Office Suite.”
No. There was no near extinction. Apple self-inflicted its own $1 Billion write down as part of its ongoing scourge of Marketing-As-Managment. MS had nothing to do with it, nor with Apple’s return to profitability.
2) “Many may remember the heart attacks over ‘Antennagate,’ when some owners of the then-new iPhone 4 complained about weak or lost signal strength when they touched an area near the device’s antennas.”
No. The problem was due to actually TOUCHING the antenna. Signal attenuation was a chronic problem throughout the industry at that time. Technology ignorance focused on Apple’s problem in the press.
3) “To this day, HTML5 which is based on JavaScript.”
No it’s not. HTML5 includes a wide variety of technologies, including ECMAScript, the contemporary name for what now includes JavaScript as well as ActionScript and JScript.
4) “…it is clear to see why the Mac OS platform was very frequently left out altogether, and many sites simply put up a message “Your platform is not supported.” “Not supported” was one of the factors driving down Mac sales.”
No. That never happened. The ECMAScript project incorporated JScript that Microsoft inflicted on the Internet allowing browsers such as iCab to already include JScript at the time that Microsoft abandoned IE on the Mac platform. There was no ‘factor’ driving down Mac sales apart from bad press, public perception due to bad press and Apple’s own Marketing-As-Management blundering.
I think four examples helps you understand my point. If you’re going to write about technology, please consult with people who understand that technology and can fact check for you. I continue to find the Motley Fool gang to be wanting in technology comprehension.
First of all i’m a 61 year old male and i don’t see as well as i used to. last spring i was surprised to find that i had not got the memo and they changed the Triborough bridge to the rfk bridge. this caused me to get a bit lost at night in the bronx.” Perfect, flawless” google maps on my i phone apparently thought that it was more important for me to see an unbroken blue line than the street name under it . in this cell challenged neighborhood my blue position dot was lets say slow in updating and the drivers in this neighborhood did not lets say appreciate me slowing down trying to read (some missing) street signs to determine where i was . google maps almost cost me my life and were terribly frustrating. i tried apple maps today and the search is a bit rough but once it was established where i wanted to go the huge direction balloons were a great help especially easy to read at a glance while driving . I am a 3-d cad designer and i could see the problems with the bridges were that the program that renders the flyover was having problems interpreting where the bridge ended and the shadow begins as the shadows were shifting around on moving waterI hardly think this is apples fault and a reasonable person would understand that the bridge and the Eiffel tower are still ok. I am glad to have apple mapping and i know apple is working as fast as they can to improve it and i do not think they should have delayed its inclusion .
I spent the afternoon testing Maps — looking for addresses, well-known places, etc. I went to dozens of places during a couple of football games. It performed flawlessly. So did Google maps. Pick your poison and quit yer bitchin’.
” Things can only get better ”
Howard Jones ….
I’ve use Apple maps all weekend and its flawless for me. I was like people (media) really hate Apple!
A NO BRAINER ISSUE:
WITH THE IPAD BEING SNAPPED UP BY CAR COMPANIES AS AN ON BOARD DISPLAY, IT’S ESSENTIAL THAT APPLE LOOK TO THE FUTURE AND SECURE IT’S OWN APPLICATION WITH TURN BY TURN FUNCTIONALITY.
If only Apple had invented the Caps Lock key.
Its so much fun to read the MDN view, they are Apple apologists thru and thru. How sad, if the product fails customers its a failure. Saying it works in the US so who cares about the other countries it doesn’t work in is unacceptable.
Apple failed to have a product that worked and your excuse is its 1.0, well guess what beta is not 1.0 is .X(beta) so either get with it or fold up your tent.
In all of this, I must say the current version of Apple’s Map needs improvement and I look forward to it.
Travelling in rural Africa last May with the previous Map was a pleasure to use because it accessed Google data. Now, most streets have plain disappeared and the satellite views are of very poor resolution. This is a matter of life and death sometimes.
For a first time effort, Apple’s latest offering is aesthetically pleasing and functionally superior, except–it does not have complete access to existing data! I hope this is fixed soon, so that the universe can continue to unfold as it should.
I LIKE APPLE’s Map app.
We live in Albuquerque, NM, USA and have used it for a couple of days without any problems. Can find, and route to, rural locations without issue. We use Around Us, Urbanspoon and other apps to find stuff and it all works well.
We used Google on our iMac to find a small lodge in a small town northern NM and Google’s sat photo didn’t provide photo resolution to tell if they had separate cabins next to a river, or were those cars parked in a lot. We got on iPad and used Apple’s Map sat image to look at it and it was perfect – they were cabins so we booked it!!!
From what I could see of a Google Maps and Apple Maps comparison, there was little (if any) resolution difference in sat photos. The worse I can say is that Apple Maps sat photos are not as up-to date. The photo of my property does not show the fence I put up almost two years ago. Google Maps showed it within 6 months.
Apple’s mapping proram uses Tom Tom and other mapping data from other companies. For almost all purposes it will do a great job of mapping your route (and now finally with voice turn by turn – which Google Maps never offered to the Apple consumer). Thus for me its already a better product on the first day.
Aside from some launch complaints made mostly for the sake of complaining, all Apple’s Maps need now are the data points that millions of its users will supply in the next few months to make it even better than the competition (like the rest of the Apple ecosystem).
Uh, maybe I don’t WANT the world knowing where I love and maybe on purpose the data points are off by a few miles?
But I LIKE the Salvador Dali-like “Persistence of Memory” renderings!
http://www.moma.org/collection/object.php?object_id=79018
In all of this, I don’t think I’ve once heard any mention of how craptastic the new maps is for city dwellers re: public transportation. I live in New York City, and there simply is NO comparison; going from a maps app with public transportation to one that doesn’t? I feel like in the early 2000’s, but with an awesome piece of hardware (iphone5). Not cool at all.
For the complainers, go to “googlemaps.com” on Safari & add it to your desktop on your iPhone 5.
I used the new maps in Seattle last week. No problem. What’s all the fuss about. Web hits for FUDs that all
For all Maps users who don’t have a problem with their map data, great for you. But there are enough unlucky users, especially outside the US, whose data IS wrong & not just in a trivial way. They have a legitimate complaint so let them vent/express their frustration & don’t accuse them of FUD, just because you don’t experience the same frustration.
And saying, “You know where your house is, never mind the fact that it’s a block away IRL from where Maps shows it to be, just wait for the data to improve”, is unreasonable. If I KNOW that the data can be so off, how can I trust Maps to direct me to other addresses which I’m not familiar with? I won’t be able trust Maps to work just at the time I have need of it. And by removing a trusted Google maps App before a trust-worthy Apple Maps App is capable of being delivered, when Apple prides itself on the “It just works” tag line, that pisses buyers of the iPhone 5 right off.
Yesterday my wife used the GPS in our Honda for directions to a meeting. It failed to route her to the right location. She pulled up Apple’s map app on her phone and it took her right to it! This is the second time Apple’s map has worked better than Google or something else.
Ever notice how people take sides? There is a huge battle of wits between apple/android users after every article I read. I have a GS 3 and an iPhone 5 and they are both less than perfect. The fact remains you people who argue are really wasting lots of time and energy bitching about one opinionated point of view or another. Most surprising is how articulate and obviously well read some of you seem. Lets leave the arguments to Apple and Google, together they will sue each other over every important innovation until the courts demand they are all stripped out of their so called smart phones. Then where will we have to talk about?
If you have the map program pick a route, you won’t notice a problem. It’s when you try to find those back roads that are white on pale yellow that you will begin to curse the idiot that picked the colors for this awful app.