Google Earth on the iPhone proves Googlers can do math

710

Owen Thomas

10/28/08 03:20PM

Filed to: GooglePhone

Joel Johnson of Boing Boing Gadgets is shocked, shocked that the team working on Google Earth, Google's 3D interactive world map, launched a mobile app for the iPhone before writing one for Google's Android operating system, which now runs on all of one clunky phone sold by T-Mobile, the also-ran of the U.S. wireless market. He calls the decision "inexplicable." I don't think it's hard to understand at all: Google Earth programmers actually want people to use their app, rather than have gadget bloggers write posts celebrating their clever strategery.

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posna Owen Thomas 10/28/08 08:29PM

Watch it on your comments about the Google phone!

I love the phone and I think it is awesome. There a pros and cons to the device but I no longer feel the size is one of them. Having a keyboard, pearl mouse and touch screen allows for some lightening quick productivity. The camera quality is 1.2 mp higher and the GPS is real, not some crappy hack of cell phone tower triangulation.

Yeah, I'm a PC!

posna posna 10/28/08 09:19PM

@posna: Not that Google is PC, but you catch my drift!

ShivangiImbibery posna 10/28/08 11:13PM

@posna:

The iPhone 3G does have real GPS. It's the original iPhone that had the crappy cellular triangulation bullshit.

I'm not a PC!

posna ShivangiImbibery 10/29/08 11:30AM

@ShivangiImbibery: well then it is not as good as the gphone. On a side by side comparison, the gphone gps pretty much sh*ts on the iphone... check it for yourself..

also, on att's website it says they use a combination of gps and towers to do it. Read this...

Assisted GPS means that it first looks to the cellphone towers to find your approximate location and then uses real GPS after this to track your position much more accurately. Using the cell phone towers means that it's much quicker to find your location, although I wonder what it will do if there is no coverage or if it can't work it out, will it use real GPS too?

This isn't like a satellite navigation unit you'd find in a car though - all of the maps are downloaded every time you use them, meaning you need good cell phone coverage to see the map and use GPS. This is by no means a good replacement for a tomtom and is definitely not a good idea for people who go exploring in remote areas.

sample032 Owen Thomas 10/28/08 04:17PM

Tilting the phone to tilt the camera is a horrible idea.

LeeGeryon sample032 10/28/08 04:33PM

@sample032: They put a big switch in there just for people like you. I happen to think it is kind of cool to flip it up and see some of the terain detail, otherwise you might as well just be looking at google maps. I think the moral of this story is Jeff who from boing what?

mikelikespie sample032 10/28/08 04:34PM

@sample032: It's actually kind of cool... I mean the app isn't all that functional (neither is any google earth incarnation), so why not have another bell or whistle?

sample032 mikelikespie 10/28/08 04:40PM

@mikelikespie: Because I don't want to be bowing to strangers as I try to tilt the camera.

It's either that or looking at the profile of the iPhone instead of looking at what's on the screen.

FaceMelter Owen Thomas 10/28/08 04:43PM

That guy has weird fingers.

SeemaBabas FaceMelter 10/28/08 06:23PM

@FaceMelter:

Not everyone can have perfect Apple fingers. :P

posna Owen Thomas 10/29/08 11:34AM

How about the fact that android will be on every carrier except att in the next few years, does that ring a bell?

Too bad apple is locked in to att for five years, android penetration will be far higher at that point being it will have various phones from almost every carrier using it.

I'm sorry to bare the bad news, please don't have a Mac Attack! ;)