Post-Macworld Wrap-up Part 4: GMaps Knows Just Enough
Everyone wants GPS in the iPhone. And GPS will eventually come to the iPhone. But the measured pace of its rollout is a perfect study in the care with which Apple treats its users and our ability to acclimate to features.
Step 1) Chances are, your previous phone (the last one you owned before the game was changed) did not know where you were, and if it had any idea, it wouldn’t tell you. If you were a power user, you knew how to browse to a map and could figure out where you were on the map and 12 minutes later, you could navigate to where you wanted to go. But by that time, you were already there, so never mind.
Step 2) You bought an iPhone. The Google people (they’re so smart) provided you with a neat and quick way to tell your iPhone where you were and use two fingers to quickly figure out what was around you. Your iPhone did not know where you were, but you understood why. The hardware required was not practical and look how you can flip from picture to picture - who the hell cares where you are. Anyhow, maybe you don’t want your phone to know where you are. That might be kind of creepy. If you need directions, tell it where you are, tell it where you want to go. It tells you how to get there.
Step 3) You update your iPhone to 1.1.3 and as it turns out, the Google people (they’re really smart) have contracted with a company that can do what the police do to figure out where you are, but only with a certain amount of precision. The radius of the guess is huge - ‘where you are’ turns out to be somewhere in an extra large crop circle. Time to get some directions. Tell it where you want to go, tell it where you are, no wait, don’t tell it where you are - let it figure out where you are if it’s so damn smart. Oh, it knows enough to kind of get you started. That’s kind of cool, and not yet creepy. You are slowly acclimating to the idea that your device is location-aware. But you’re okay with that.
Step 4) You start to become impatient. Yes, your iPhone has some faint idea as to where you are, but you’re so over the geewhizbangness of its quaint simulation of awareness and you want it to know where you are at all times because you’re sick of having to ask it where the nearest Arby’s is - it should just alert you on a constant basis. Your iPhone has met needs you did not know needed meeting, and now you want it to meet other needs it has not yet met. You are over any implications of creepiness, you are hungry for some roast beef and you want some goddamn GPS in your phone.
Step 5) Macworld 2010 or something. Did you see the liveblogs? It’s your lucky day. Built-in GPS standard on all new iPhones (which they’re naming iPhone Beef ‘n Cheddar for obvious reasons).
Image courtesy Macworld
Post-Macworld Wrap-up Part 1: MacBook Air
Post-Macworld Wrap-up Part 2: iPhone 1.1.3
Post-Macworld Wrap-up Part 3: iTunes Movie Rentals and AppleTV
