“Apple’s decision to ship its own mapping system in the iPhone 5 and iOS 6 was made over a year before the company’s agreement to use Google Maps expired, according to two independent sources familiar with the matter,” Chris Ziegler reports for The Verge.
“The decision, made sometime before Apple’s WWDC event in June, sent Google scrambling to develop an iOS Google Maps app — an app which both sources say is still incomplete and currently not scheduled to ship for several months,” Ziegler reports. “Apple apparently felt that the older Google Maps-powered Maps in iOS were falling behind Android — particularly since they didn’t have access to turn-by-turn navigation, which Google has shipped on Android phones for several years.”
Ziegler reports, “The existing deal between the two companies was still valid and didn’t have any additional requirements, according to our sources — Apple decided to simply end it and ship the new maps with turn-by-turn.”
Read more in the full article here.
They could have made it a downloadable option like iBooks instead of removing it entirely from iOS 6. That would have mitigated many complaints about an unready maps app.
That said, maps is not central to my iOS experience. Other things like mail, music & productivity apps take precedence.
No pain, no gain…
Gaggle needs to be completely kicked to the curb, the sooner the better. Hopefully Moleface will get thrown under the bus in the process…
All this noise about the problems with Maps.
Phooey
I haven’t had a problem yet, even though I may. The thing is, Google Maps on iOS would never be as good as on Android, that in itself made it a broken/inferior product. Out of the gate iOS Maps is a better product than Google Maps for iOS. iOS Maps is just going to get better. That’s a given. It won’t be long before iOS Maps is considered better than any version of Google Maps.
I love the new maps but I don’t live in Thailand or one of many poorly covered areas that got a shit sandwich in the crippled new iOS maps.
If Apple fixes the coverage in the rest of the world then it will be a credible product. It’s not there yet tho.
hell, there ain’t no place to go in Thailand anyway.
How about Great Britain?
eh, ya seen one Big Ben ya seen ’em all.
The Google approach to maps on iOS versus Android closely mirrors the Microsoft approach for Office, Exchange/Outlook, and other applications on OS X versus Windows. Leave the Mac version behind and crippled to slowly and subtly push users towards the “preferred” platform.
The Google situation also closely resembles Apple’s relationship with Samsung. Previously partners with Apple, both companies have stolen IP to compete with Apple. If Apple wants to maintain its position of strength, it has to strike back in big ways whenever and wherever possible. With Samsung, Apple pursued litigation which also indirectly impacts Google via Android. With Google, Apple has now struck at all four core functions underpinning the Google ecosystem – mobile advertising, media (video, music, books), search (Siri), and maps. If Apple continues scoring on the legal front, as well, then Google just might begin regretting its opportunistic backstabbing.
But what would Steve say?
Two items. Steve got burned more than once over not having control over an application. Critical apps will come under Apple control. Its happening now. iWork, maps, camera, music, etc.
The other item is “I am going thermonuclear war over android”…. As Siri pulls users from Google search, and maps keeps data away from google, one by one, google loses users and that means their chargeable advertising rate goes down as they lose users (eyes). One step at a time.
Apple will never kill google, just take away billions of dollars in revenue…….. you know…… sort of like RIM.?????
Just a thought,
I agree. But not having any problems with Maps here in Philly.
I love Maps. It is very well done. I don’t miss Google maps one bit!
Huh? Did i miss something??
Wrong, BLN. Google wouldn’t give Apple turn-by-turn, so why should Apple continue to support Google? And then you want Apple to support two Maps apps?
Apple needed to make a clean break, and this was a way to stick it to Google for Google’s refusal to give iOS users turn-by-turn navigation. Well played, Apple!
For driving, there is no comparison, the ios 6 maps are so much better. Good choice Apple!
Apple screwed Google and a significant percentage of its customers in one fell swoop.
I disagree. Google screwed first.
Google denied Apple turn-by-turn navigation for years while making it available to its Android customers.
You figure -who turned out to be the loser!
Im loving the apple maps. Way faster and turn by turn has been great to me.
I still like Waze better than both.
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I am a fan of the new Maps app. I’ve used it in five states now and it’s been wonderful. The turn by turn directions are accurate and the mapping is fast. I thought it was going to be lacking in the traffic reporting department, but that has been spot on as well. It may sting a little for Apple because the app seems incomplete to some, but as they build on it over time, I expect it to become an extremely polished app.
Had a really interesting trip around Cape Town the other week, sightseeing a friend’s childhood haunts there.
Guess what we used? Street View.
And with that, the “Google Maps license had expired” argument is no longer valid.
Not really…
“according to our sources”
and
“Apple apparently felt that”
Are a clear bullshit signal.
Author has no authenticated sources and is attributing thinking to Apple or Tim Cook when he has no more idea than you or I have what their decision making process was (nor even the parameters they based those decisions on).
Complete and utter bullshit.
The assertions that the license had already expired and that was another reason GMaps were dumped, were backed with even less authority, but it didn’t stop anyone saying so.
Pot, kettle, black.
Those assertions at least come from more reliable sources than Verge.
“Those assertions” are trumped by DaringFireball’s sources which back this story up:
http://daringfireball.net/2012/09/timing_of_apples_map_switch
The author claims the decision was made a year in advance. That sounds like almost too late: The time it would take to build up a database and infrastructure for crowd-sourced data updates and integrate it into the OS had to be substantial. I’m not at all surprised that the decision didn’t wait until expiration.
So Google forced Apple’s hand, rather than Apple getting monopolistic. Same old story from back in the Microsoft days, when MS made sure the Mac version of software was always behind the Windows version.
Yeah, that trick is starting to smell familiar isn’t it? Good point.
And MS is about to pull similar crap again, mulling over making MS Turd cost more for Mac users. I only am forced to use MS Turd at work. None of the home computers need it.
Who’s scrambling? I understand the that Apple paid Bloggers, reviewers and pundits have no love for Google but man some of the stuff that gets inked is 100% propaganda.
Apple Inc. share price I was sure was going to overtake the scrambling Google post iPhone 5 release but…
Apple Inc. $673.54 Google Inc. $749.16
Go figure! Not bad for a scrambling company who have not announced the release of anything new since the 7″ Nexus Tablet.
Apple is worth mearly three times what Google is — to be precise, $630 billion vs $245 billion.
Share price alone means zip. Doh. The value of the stock is the MARKET CAP (number of shares x share price) not the share price alone. You either don’t know that (troll by ignorance) are you are a trying to bait (a troll on purpose).
in 2009 Google had peaked over 700 and apple peaking around 170 for the first time.
Not bad for Apple Quadrupled from its peak in 3 years while Google just beat its own peak for the first time,
Go Figure!!
So basically Google is acting like Microsoft- MS watered down Office for Mac; Google watered down Maps for iOS. Apple has learned from their past mistakes.
I bet most of the complainers propably don’t even drive car, let alone depend on Google maps ( if you do you know GM is not very reliable).
A lot of peeps ride the bus. For me that was a cool feature. I only had to use it once just to give a friend help on what bus to take. So i could really careless. I could see some people who would miss it though.
But like its been said over and over, Google maps was absolute shit on iOS though. Holding the phone upside down to keep the dot going in the same direction as you are so not to get confused (at least that’s what I would do). Sometimes in the middle I’d have to give my phone the figure 8 motion to get the GPS back on track. That would only happen on google maps cuz I never had to do that on any other GPS app.
This quenches the arguments many made before deriding Apple for not having turn-by-turn in the previous iOS and Maps. It was, essentially, Google’s fault. Apple remained mature and professional by not pointing a finger of blame during that time.
Google better start looking forward to the Apple Search Engine. They have iOS Maps and the search Engine is the only missing part in the Apple iOS universe. Death by a thousand cuts.
I hope if apple release a search engine it is not as poor internationally as thier maps. Especially if they remove the option to use googles search engine. I’m not bothered about whatever disagreement is going on between google and apple I just want my iOS device to deliver a best in class experience and compared to the maps on competitors phones that currently is not happening.
I would think search would be an easier task. Of course that would be my opinion.
Maybe that’s why Apples building all these massive data centers. Potentially for search. Or Apple could just make Yahoo or Bing the default search engine.
I do agree, they are building out for “Big” usage in the future and those centers would allow a handy little Search Engine by Apple. When Google’s Patent expires on their Search method… Well, I expect a handful of pain for them.
I haven’t had any problems with iMaps, but i am not a big user. I am not a poor so my vehicles all have GPS in them and I dont need a phone for GPS turn by turn nav. It is more of a novelty than anything else.
Are there that many people in the world who rely on a smartphone maps app to find their way to cause so much hysteria?
“I am not a poor” So what are you? What do the “not poors” of the world call themselves? 53%ers? Is that you Anne?
When you wage “thermonuclear war” there will be casualties. For all the complainers about losing google maps, get over it. This is what happens in war.
Google already publicly stated the other day that their maps app for iOS is NOT coming out soon. Make no mistake: this is a strategic decision on their part, and, if all plays out the way it looks now, it is a bad decision for them.
Google had known for quite some time that Apple is taking the maps app out of iOS and readying their own. They had enough time to put together an iOS app based on Android app’s functionality. I’m not an iOS (nor an Android) developer, but I don’t think it would have taken that long to build an app on the basis of the existing one. This task was given low priority, most likely in order to cause damage to Apple. Someone must have figured something out (when Apple’s Maps was shown at WDC), expecting some problems with the app. Giving a black eye to Apple by withholding the Google Maps app for a while couild build anger towards the platform. Once the maps app is released, proper publicity would make it much more appealing than Apple’s (by then widely discredited) solution, making it look like a saviour for a botched feature.
In reality, though, the mappsgate will likely go the way of the antennagate. With a little bit of white noise on the fringes, the crowds will embrace the new maps app, get used to it, get comfortable with it, by using it help Apple fix what needs fixing and eventually forget about Google’s maps. When Google does release their iOS maps app, many will likely try it, but in the end, most will come back to a sleeker, smoother, faster and, most importantly, add-free offering from Apple.
Another possible reason for Google holding off is that Apple reserve the right to reject an app that competes with Apple functionality. They don’t always but they might
iOS maps is way better. It automatically moves forward as you reach a turn. I like that. 🙂
The vast majority don’t even know about the maps issue and will probably just think it’s an enhanced google map or won’t notice the mapping errors. It’s just the geeks who like the gee-whiz features and try them all out on day 1.
Lots of people don’t even realize there’s an iOS 6 out and only download it because they were prompted.
There are dozens of map makers that can at least find the right cities and streets in the right towns: TomTom, Magellan, Garmin, Waze, Mapquest, Bing, etc…just to name a few, why is this so hard for a company with 100+ billion in the bank?
I like to find the right city in the wrong town once in a while.
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iOS 6 maps are a bit of extra work if you have to type in New York, to get some addresses to resolve, but once you waste those extra 3 seconds, the driving directions are def. better than google maps – which are just flat out wrong and in some instances route you to places where you are not able to make a left turn due to street signs.
So what?
Google – and everyone else – knew that Apple was working on a maps app in June and that iOS 6 was going to be released in the Fall. Did Google honestly think Apple was going to demo an app that everyone at the time knew was going to replace Google’s and release it with iOS 7 in 2013?
How much time was left on their contract is irrelevant. If Google was serious about creating a downloadable app to compete with the writing that was clearly on the wall, it would have been working on it since June 11 and in the app store for approval September 21.
So now Google is saying they’ll release something by the end of the year? What a joke! Apple will be polishing the hell out of its default app between now and then and Google’s offerings will arrive – if they ever do – with their characteristic thud. So long, ad revenue from maps; so long, location information from hundreds of millions of Apple devices!. I hope Google’s accountants have their red pens ready to document all the money that has been flying the coop since Friday.
Love MDN’s ridiculous spin on this one. Oh really? Apple sent GOOGLE scrambling? Nice try.
Umm. MDN commenters or MDN? I don’t see an “MDN take” for this article.
As far as “scrambling”, Apple didn’t – and doesn’t – care whether or not Google scrambled. If they did, it was because of their own ignorance, since the inclusion of Maps in iOS 6 was known in June. If Google wanted to compete, they should have had an app ready to launch when the new OS did.
I’d ask what your point is, but I know from your other comments that they’re a little light on content, so I won’t tax you.
Google (and the rest of us) knew Apple was working on their non-Google map app for years.
Why Google didn’t have their own app for IOS ready to go is complete incompetence! By the time Google has their app ready to go iPhone users will be use to Apple’s app and it will be too late. Google will have lost far far too many Apple users, permanently!
Google shareholders should be screaming at the board and CEO right about now.
So, did Google not allow turn-by-turn or demand unreasonably high fees from Apple to allow turn-by-turn when using Google’s map data?