Linked List: September 28, 2012

Friday, 28 September 2012

Hate to Say ‘I Told You So’, Where by ‘Hate’ I Mean ‘Draw Great Satisfaction From’ ★

Yours truly, back in May:

Here’s the thing. Apple’s homegrown mapping data has to be great.

Mapping is an essential phone feature. It’s one of those few features that almost everyone with an iPhone uses, and often relies upon. That’s why Apple has to do their own — they need to control essential technology. I suspect Apple would be pushing to do their own maps even if their relationship with Google were still hunky-dory, as it was circa 2007. (Remember Eric Schmidt coming on stage during the iPhone introduction?) But as things actually stand today between Apple and Google, relying on Google for mapping services is simply untenable.

This is a high-pressure switch for Apple. Regressions will not be acceptable. The purported whiz-bang 3D view stuff might be great, but users are going to have pitchforks and torches in hand if practical stuff like driving and walking directions are less accurate than they were with Google’s data. Keep in mind too, that Android phones ship with turn-by-turn navigation.

(Via Raging Thunderbolt.) While I’m at it, some Twitter feedback today suggests I haven’t made it clear who I think is at fault. I thought it was obvious: this whole thing is entirely Apple’s fault. I don’t blame Google for withholding turn-by-turn, voice navigation, and vector map tiles from Apple. Google negotiated in their own interests. Nor do I blame Apple for breaking away. Like I wrote, the situation was untenable.

It was Apple that decided to put all its mapping eggs in Google’s basket in 2007, and what Apple did after breaking away from Google was entirely up to them. They came up short. (Although likewise, it’s nobody but Google’s fault that they don’t have a standalone Google Maps app ready to go in the App Store.)

‘Instawhatsit’ ★

This week’s episode of my podcast, The Talk Show, with very special guest Marco Arment. Topics include: iPhone 5, accessibility features in Instapaper, Instagram filters, the future of photography, and more.

Brought to you by two excellent sponsors:

Macminicolo — Low cost, high performance hosted Mac servers.
Game Your Video — Fun, super-simple video editing and filters app for the iPhone and iPad.

Apple Launches New App Store Feature Section for Alternative Maps ★

Another gracious and humble response to the Maps situation.

The new Maps app is weak. That’s the core problem. But given that hand to play right now, this is a good move.

Why Mobile Safari Doesn’t Have a Unified Search/URL Field ★

MG Siegler and I talked about this last week on The Talk Show. I agree with Killian Bell — pretty sure Mobile Safari still has separate fields for URLs and web search so that they can use the special URL keyboard (no space bar, “.com” button, etc.) when editing a URL.

Apple Maps in Ontario: Not Good ★

Jason Matheson wrote some code to search for 2,000 cities and town in Ontario using the new iOS 6 maps. Pretty damning results. (Would be interesting to see the results of the same test on iOS 5, with the Google maps data.)

The iPhone 5’s Low Light Boost Mode ★

Jim Rhoades, developer of the Scout Camera iPhone app:

However, after posting a thread to the Apple developer forums I’ve learned that 3rd party developers CAN take advantage of this special “low light boost mode”. (Thanks Apple!) […]

They chose to make the low light boost mode optional, as the increase in light sensitivity comes at the cost of some increased noise (not surprisingly). Making it optional was a good decision.

Great news.

A Letter From Tim Cook on Maps ★

Humble and honest.