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Wikipedia Mobile Apps Switch To OpenStreetMap
Techdirt reports that the latest versions of Wikipedia's mobile apps have switched to OpenStreetMap from Google Maps. Says Techdirt's commentary: "One wonders how Google didn't see this coming — or if they did, what exactly their strategy is here. OpenStreetMap is gaining a lot of momentum, and in some areas even features much better data. The real lesson here is that there's never an incumbent that isn't at risk of being unseated, no matter how widespread the adoption of their product or service—especially if they make an anti-customer decision like Google when it put a price tag on Maps. The situation also points to the long-term strength of open solutions: while a crowdsourced system like OpenStreetMap never could have put together a global mapping product as quickly as Google did, over time it has become a serious competitor in terms of both quality and convenience."
If this and DuckDuckGo start gaining momentum google may find itself in Altavista's shoes.
Acquiring the data isn't the only cost. Serving tiles to millions of clients each day can't be cheap. Who pays for that, if there aren't any ads and the service is free to use?
The openstreetmap project does provide a fantastic result, but for me it is lacking satellite imaging (as google does) or satellite imaging and aerial pictures (as bing/microsoft does) Having the images can be very handy... I see very often people who need to determine the distance between two points and for that, the images are easier than the maps.
How come? Wikipedia was Google's whore for years!
Well I guess Google carefully considered pros and cons before charging for maps and if they didn't is their problem.
The summary (yes, I didn't RTFA) seems to imply that the right or normal thing would be that google dominated the maps landscape. Well, obviously they have to compete with everyone else and if a decision makes them lose clients it's their problem. Maybe that loss was calculated and they calculated they'd get more benefits in the long run if they get rid of non-paying customers.
In my country there are very good 1:25000 maps, but the trails in the wooded areas can be off by hundreds of meters because they we mapped before the time of the GPSs and there's no way to use a theodolite acurately on a forest trail. Come the GPS: I take a track, clean it up a bit, upload it to OSM and the trail is now a lot more accurate than the best maps available...
Non-Linux Penguins ?
Last time I checked, maps is still free for people to use, they're just charging for commercial use, but that makes perfect sense. If you're a business, I can't see why you'd be complaining about having to pay a little something that makes it easier for your customers to find you. Nobody is forcing you to use Maps. Go ahead and switch if the expense is too much for you. As TFS states, there are other alternatives.
Hooray for the free market!
This can't be true. Once a monopoly gets established it's grip cannot be broken by market forces. We need government to break up monopolies.
I love Jesus, except for his foreign policy.
Once again, OpenStreetMap highlights that Clayton Christensen's idea's about how low-end disruptive innovation works seem to hold true. (I, too, have also used Duck Duck Go for almost a year now.)
DaveyJJ
lets see how their map server handles a good old fashioned Slashdotting !
This might be a little "tinfoil hat", and I doubt very much if it is the main reason why google started charging - but I just wonder if longer term thoughts like project glass might factor into their decision.
Products like Glass are basically just one big world of maps - mapping, satellite, traffic, public transport. Giving that away completely free no-strings-attached forever would just allow others to make products without the overhead that google have to shoulder alone. Something like glass is a long way off, but perhaps there may be a small degree of laying down the norms early on.
For basic mapping openstreetmap is completely fine, but if all of the finer granularity (streetview, satellite, traffic data) is required then that costs a lot of money to acquire/maintain - and fair enough if google want to start asking those that use it to contribute.
Give http://open.mapquest.com/ a try. It uses OpenStreetMap data while including many mapquest features, including satellite imagery.
"... it costs us a fortune to do this shit, someone better start paying."
??
If Google really cared they would fix Android Chrome to reflow text, instead of discriminating
I like the concept of openstreetmap, I have an account, and I've contributed a couple of edits for the area where I live. However, what really seems to be missing is a decent way of getting directions. The only service for this that I know of based on OSM is yournavigation.org, and the quality of its results is simply unusable.
As an example, try the following in both yournavigation.org and google maps:
from: 2233 west loma alta drive, fullerton, ca, usa
to: north mount baldy road, san bernardino county, california, usa
Google maps does it in 12 steps, and the directions are totally intelligible. Yournavigation breaks it down into 30 steps, many of which are totally unintelligible.
There is also a usability barrier, because OSM's user interface doesn't provide any hint of how to get to a navigation site such as yournavigation.org.
There are various other usability issues with OSM. For example, it took me a really long time to figure out why it couldn't locate my house's address. The reason was that my street is officially "west loma alta dr," and I had to edit the map in order to tell it that an alternate name was "loma alta dr." The search engine for google maps was smart enough that it just matched without the "west." (There isn't any "east loma alta drive.")
Find free books.
I think this is more of an ideological move. Google Maps is not free content like Wikipedia itself. OpenStreetMap however, shares many of the same values as Wikipedia itself; such as its use of an environment that encourages contribution by others, the use of licensing that encourages the sharing and rebuilding of content instead of forbidding it, and so on.
Not 3 stories ago we get a post about how android is not a good buisiness model because apple is making 250x as much on every i-device sold as google does on every android device (http://mobile.slashdot.org/story/12/04/08/0546247/google-earns-2-per-handset-apple-575). Perhaps suggesting that its better for business to have the walled garden approach. Now there's this story about how google is losing out because a competitor is more open. Based on that it seems google is toast because they are too open while also not open enough. Seems rough to be getting attacked from all sides but then again, consistent $billions in profit probably soften the blow.
I love OpenStreetMap, but in the UK it verges on useless for creating free SatNav software. This is due to the crazy policy the British government has of making the postcode database (that's the Zip code database for you Americans) only available for a price. And the price is thousands of pounds. Navigating without the ability to find postcodes is very unpleasant.
That alone should be a reason for Wikimedia to give Google the boot.
Wikimedia works because it treats its patrons as readers instead of mindless consumers. One might compare it to the difference between a good library and a corporate chain book store.
easy, for every single good open source thing, you have to wade though a 40 mile wide pile of shit open source things.
People always act like there is something wrong with others for not seeing it before, but the reality of open source is that any drunk/child/failing student/general moron/company/or software genius can make it, and oh boy is there a fuckton of the stuff, with a fair majority of it being right up shit.
You cant see it coming cause its like looking for a needle in a haystack.
If you do things the UNIX way, you can easily beat the features and convenience of Gmail.
Good point. But if each domain's administrator has to research and cobble together tools from disparate sources and then write his own glue code, that's a strike against convenience. So what collection of UNIX-way tools do you recommend that "easily beat[s] the features and convenience of Gmail"? Say I'm running Debian or Ubuntu on a server that I administer; what all should I apt-get install? Furthermore, one still needs a server on which to run this collection of tools, and Gmail on a domain is free of charge for up to 50 users.
After several years wasting my time I finally gave up trying to get Google to correct the many errors on my local map. Businesses labeled anything from a street to a mile from their real location, roads names sometimes completely fictional and equally misplaced and copious scatterings of other errors. I live in a large city in England, no excuses there, just plain lack of care.
I'd like to believe this might push them to try harder, to actually solicit and act on feedback. The truth is Google seem incapable of finishing anything they offer the public and accuracy is something only needed for tracking advertising clicks. Given how often Maps has failed me seems like an ideal time to follow Wikipedia. Not running Maps on my phone is a bonus all by itself, with its autoloading instance at powerup and multiple services designed to restart each other if you try to unload the app.
I hope that the powers at Wikipedia knows what they are doing: The popularity and influence of Wikipedia is directly powered by its high Google rank. Without the referals from Google Wikipedia can fade into oblivion faster than its assent.
I think this is more of an ideological move. Google Maps is not free content like Wikipedia itself.
You are probably right about this. Unlike the previous examples of major Google Maps users switching to OpenStreetMap that were triggered by Google's pricing changes, this particular case is primarily based on the compatible ideals of OSM and Wikipedia. On the Wikipedia blog post announcing OSM support for the app, they even explicitly state: "This closely aligns with our goal of making knowledge available in a free and open manner to everyone. This also means we no longer have to use proprietary Google APIs in our code, which helps it run on the millions of cheap Android handsets that are purely open source and do not have the proprietary Google applications."
It's not just a recent development either. Wikipedia has been using OpenStreetMap on some of its websites for years - the German and French editions as well as several smaller languages have built-in OSM maps in each article with a coordinate (e.g. see the documentation for the feature in the German Wikipedia here). There are also several projects for linking and collaboration between the two projects.
No one has mentioned yet that both Wikipedia and Open Street Maps are open content projects. Wikipedians sometimes contribute to OSM and vice versa. In all situations, wikipedia will always choose for the most open option available. (If there are multiple fully open options, it sometimes will choose all of them, Just Because They're There . )
for you it may be in a better position to recoup the map making expense.
I went there and it... does maps. Wow. Google maps does a lot more than just showing me a map. I do like that it is editable though when you find a mistake.
Currently hooked on AMP
But Open Street Map's founder Steve Coast works for Microsoft. Both Microsoft and "Apple" are backing OSM. Both Bing and OSM share map data. So yeah, OSM is gaining lots of momentum, because Apple and MS want it to replace Google maps and have financially motivated it.
The way I see it -- note, that this is pure conjecture on my part -- is that this is not some ideological or heroic move on Wikipedia's part to support open source on their mobile app.
I see it as either a nudged move(as in an influential "donation") by two juggernauts that want Wikipedia to move away from their competition Google on the mobile front, because Google Maps is already dominant and Android is becoming a titan in the mobile space.
Or as for compatibility it just makes sense; MS and Apple don't want Google maps on their mobile devices -- just like they don't support any 3rd party plug-ins -- but they do want OSM and have said so with their wallets. By going this route, it will probably make it easier for Wikipedia to implement their app onto these closed off devices; as in MS and Apple will give them lots of support to do it.
Anyways, was this Slashdot article just a coincidence, or is it part of some strategic FUD attack against Google, when considering the prior article below this one about them... Don't answer that, I've already assumed the answer.
Waze is fantastic, it's based on Open Street Maps, it provides turn by turn directions, but even better than that it lets you share data like road hazards, police locations, traffic perils, and so on.
You can get it for iOS, Android and I think even Blackberry at the moment. Probably even WP7.
One of the nicer things is that you can use it as a tool to record new roads it does not know about yet, and submit them - a regional overseer will review any additions/corrections and thus everyone gets better data.
The directions can be a little wonky sometimes but are generally roughly reliable.
"There is more worth loving than we have strength to love." - Brian Jay Stanley
Open Street Maps is like most open projects, incomplete.
And when you have a program and it's incomplete, that's one
thing. But an incomplete map is stupid. Because it's useless.
Shouldn't they color code areas that have 'no data'? Like my
neighborhood that's been here since 2003.
-AI
For me, it is far better to grasp the Universe as it really is than to persist in delusion
waze does not use openstreetmap and never has. any data you contribute does not go into an open database of any kind, you "donate" it to the project owners.
it's the opposite of open.
Think about something here. Google is a service that lets you get directions, view the map in different views on your computer, see what's around, etc. Much of the data they use comes from various other companies, because .. well, the other companies have it and Google doesn't. Google has to pay them for that data, and it also limits what Google can let customers do. (f.e. it's against the terms of service to cache Google Maps tiles.)
So, think about it. Google would rather much use the OSM data for their project, than have to pay other vendors. The fact is, OSM is lower quality in many areas, and probably will be for years. If Google switches to OSM tomorrow, and the quality goes down, 99.9% of people aren't going to give a shit about "oh it's open". To them, they go to Google maps, and look up directions - that's all the know.
But again, (for those of you bitching about things Google doesn't correct) - Google doesn't own the map data it uses on Google Maps. Google owns the street-view data and some other data (geo-tagged Picasa pictures people contribute, WiFi spots they scanned, etc.).
I am sure that if/when OSM matures, Google will adopt it in a heartbeat. Still, Google likes open-ness, but quality is paramount. Wikipedia likes quality, but open-ness is paramount.
The Google Maps of Cambodia are useless here because they use Street Names and everybody here uses Street Numbers. Google have been told zillions of times but they obviously don't give a crap. I guess the market is too small for them to bother. Open Street Map is much more usable here.
"Flags are bits of colored cloth that governments use first to shrink-wrap people's brains..."
Coz I can tell you the quality of maps in my part of the world is *waaaaaaaaaaaaaay* below par of Google Maps. No Satellite view. No Street View - and even that took about 4 minutes to load...
What could the population of Wikipedia users using the mobile app and looking at articles that have map info be on a given day? 12?
I prefer a void in conversation to a vacuous one.
So add it? That's kind of the whole point of OpenStreetMap. If you see a mistake in your neighborhood, YOU can go fix it and it shows up on the map immediately. Adding basic roads for a new subdivision can be done in a few minutes if you are familiar with the area.
So how is all this open content protected from vandalism?
It does no good to edit maps in Map Maker, particularly if your edit includes data that has changed in the past two years. Google relies on DBpedia.org and NAVTEQ for mapping data, both of which can be two or more years old. If the edit you contribute doesn't match these "official" sources, your edit will be denied. Even if you manage to get an edit approved, some "Ape" will come along after you and revert it. I spent many hours improving Google Maps through Map Maker, until my local government assigned new E-911 addresses for my area and the Apes insisted they were wrong. These Apes were even so self-righteous in their refusal to accept empirical evidence that the changes I had submitted were actually correct. The Apes also do incredibly stupid things like displaying irrelevant, numerical magisterial district designations in place of city names. I completely gave up on Google Map Maker when a simple correction I submitted hadn't been approved after months of waiting. This was because the data from their "official" sources was outdated. Many more months later, it's still outdated! So, guess what? OpenStreetMap now pounces the shit out of Google Maps in my area!
I've tried really hard to like OpenStreetMaps, even contributed several street names and fixed some bad street geometry issues in my neighborhood... but overall it's next to useless here in Brazil. And I live in one of the largest cities here (metro area with 6 million people).
So, yeah, maybe it's useful in the US and Europe, but not everywhere...
If Google does not like the present restrictions inside the US, they are free to move their headquarters to any country they please, aren`t they? They can furthermore promote their view of a 'free internet' from anywhere respecting the laws of that particular country.