Stories
Slash Boxes
Comments

SoylentNews is people

posted by martyb on Thursday March 07 2019, @03:59AM   Printer-friendly
from the East-Bound-and-Down dept.

Google is rolling out Speed Limit information, and more importantly, Speed Camera alerts to Google Maps widely this week.

Google Maps is also rolling out the ability to see speed cameras on a much larger basis too. For users in the United States, United Kingdom, Australia, Russia, Brazil, Mexico, Canada, India, and Indonesia, speed cameras will be marked on the map. An audible alert also plays when users approach these cameras as noted in a smaller rollout earlier this week.

Interestingly, in Alberta this is actually being looked on favorably by government officials

"That camera is only facing one way," Sgt. Gottschling said. "Let's say it's only facing northbound, but you can approach southbound or eastbound ... you are still going to get Google telling you caution.

"So you're going to go slowly and cautiously through there which, lo and behold, is actually what we want."

Sergeant Kerry Bates with the Edmonton Police traffic division agrees.

"If it slows people down and they know it's there, that's good," he said. "It's fine. It does the trick."

Anyone else trying to figure the evil angle?


Original Submission

 
This discussion has been archived. No new comments can be posted.
Display Options Threshold/Breakthrough Mark All as Read Mark All as Unread
The Fine Print: The following comments are owned by whoever posted them. We are not responsible for them in any way.
  • (Score: 5, Interesting) by Rosco P. Coltrane on Thursday March 07 2019, @05:48AM (4 children)

    by Rosco P. Coltrane (4757) on Thursday March 07 2019, @05:48AM (#811038)

    Not everything evil people/organizations do is evil.

    But as far as Google is concerned, it's always helpful to remember this:

    1/ Google wants data. More data, more personal data, from more people.
    2/ Google can't force people to give them the data

    Their solution is to put out products that are so good people actually want to use them and give Google data voluntarily as a "payment".

    Showing speed cameras in Google Maps is certain to be a popular move, thereby attracting more people to the product. Not to mention, with this move, they'll essentially kill competitors such as Coyote, that essentially do the same thing (show speed cameras reported by other users): they're competitors because the users give data to Coyote, not Google, and Google can't allow that.

    Starting Score:    1  point
    Moderation   +3  
       Insightful=1, Interesting=2, Total=3
    Extra 'Interesting' Modifier   0  
    Karma-Bonus Modifier   +1  

    Total Score:   5  
  • (Score: 2) by Unixnut on Thursday March 07 2019, @10:57AM (3 children)

    by Unixnut (5779) on Thursday March 07 2019, @10:57AM (#811100)

    > Their solution is to put out products that are so good people actually want to use them and give Google data voluntarily as a "payment".

    Indeed, and as other gps apps have already had speed camera warnings for a very long time (I know waze has them, which is one of the apps I have used), I presume this is Google catching up to the competition due to losing users of Google maps (I have not used Google maps in years, preferring either wego.here.com maps (the old Nokia maps) or Waze).

    • (Score: 2) by martyb on Thursday March 07 2019, @04:20PM (2 children)

      by martyb (76) Subscriber Badge on Thursday March 07 2019, @04:20PM (#811177) Journal

      > Their solution is to put out products that are so good people actually want to use them and give Google data voluntarily as a "payment".

      Indeed, and as other gps apps have already had speed camera warnings for a very long time (I know waze has them, which is one of the apps I have used), I presume this is Google catching up to the competition due to losing users of Google maps (I have not used Google maps in years, preferring either wego.here.com maps (the old Nokia maps) or Waze).

      FYI: According to Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]: "Google acquired Waze Mobile in 2013."

      --
      Wit is intellect, dancing.
      • (Score: 2) by Unixnut on Thursday March 07 2019, @08:24PM (1 child)

        by Unixnut (5779) on Thursday March 07 2019, @08:24PM (#811328)

        > FYI: According to Wikipedia [wikipedia.org]: "Google acquired Waze Mobile in 2013."

        Heh, fair enough. I did not know that. I used Waze up until 2014 or so, but then switched to here maps, as they started supporting speed camera notifications as well, along with traffic and full offline maps (plus I prefer their interface, less like a childs toy).

        • (Score: 2) by martyb on Thursday March 07 2019, @10:47PM

          by martyb (76) Subscriber Badge on Thursday March 07 2019, @10:47PM (#811375) Journal

          So, as others stated, the 'evil' angle is freely providing something that -- as an intended side-effect -- gets them something they want: your real-time location info.

          See also: https://www.gwern.net/Complement [gwern.net] which is just as salient, today, as when Joel Spolsky wrote the original back in 2002.

          --
          Wit is intellect, dancing.