zlacker

As users, we are assured that telemetry is only for the purpose of "improving products and services", "improving user experience", etc. If one company is collecting 20x as much as another, all else being equal, one would expect that this would be reflected in the quality of the product/service/experience.

Of course, Google's service is to advertisers, first and foremost. Users generally do not pay for what they receive from Google. Perhaps Google's paying customers, advertisers, are the ones seeing the improvement in the quality of service as a direct or indirect result of telemetry.

>>1vuio0+(OP)
I don't think this is necessarily true. I believe that Google Maps navigation and location accuracy is significantly better on Android than iOS (no claim on 20x...but anectdatally better)

Google Maps getting more precise telemetry data is actually so useful in improving the navigation experience in tricky intersections, overlapping roads, or low bandwidth areas where GPS signal and service can be spotty. I can speak from experience that friends with Android phones experience less jumpiness in their GPS location, less errors in navigation, and less of that pesky "You've Arrived" notification triggering when still far away from the destination.

>>1vuio0+(OP)
YMMV, but as much as I like Apple Maps and use it as much as I can, for the more complex/unknown routes I definitely rely more on Google Maps to get it right. I don't know if telemetry is the cause for the better service, but it is noticeably better for me.

Separately, I'm also a google customer as I run an Ad campaign for a small business (skilled labor), and the dollars spent on search ads are extremely efficient with an incredible ROI. Even with CACs in the 10s of dollars, with the size of the contracts being signed it typically costs much less than .5% of the total.

>>1vuio0+(OP)
You bet they are improving. I don’t know any big vendor who is worse than google in ux. Another question is, where is the good old “hiring few hundred users from different groups and watching what they do with a test device” instead of spying on millions of the same kind.

>>darkwi+u2
Also anecdotally speaking, conversely, I used to use Waze/Google Maps, and nowadays just use Apple Maps. The latter has been more than sufficient in my day to day travels. I can't think of any errors in navigation.

>>1vuio0+(OP)
If telemetry is used for improving services then why does every project who's UI decisions are based on telemetry[1] consistently rebuild their UIs in less usable and less user friendly ways?

[1] Pretty much anything from Mozilla or Google, Reddit, lots of others.

>>swiley+0a
Power users turn off telemetry and skew data?

>>Profes+w4
Just quickly comparing Apple Maps and Google Maps:

There is no Apple Maps web page. With Google I can do a complex route plan on my PC and my phone will have the "recent searches" in it ready to go when I get in the car.

Apple Maps doesn't show how packed the trains are. Google Maps shows me how full individual train carriages are!

Apple Maps can't provide cycling directions in my area (a world city!), Google can.

Apple Maps routinely provides driving time estimates that are 2x longer or 2x shorter than the actual time. The Google maps estimation error is more like 5-10% instead of 100%!

Google Maps has a trustworthy "star" review score for local restaurants. Anything that's mid-4s or higher with over a hundred reviews is definitely worth going to. For a popular local cafe Apple maps shows the worthless Tripadvisor score with just 16 votes. Google shows its own data with 357 votes.

Etc...

>>jiggaw+dS
I've found it varies by area to area. I switched from iOS to Android about a year ago and I miss Apple Maps. Apple's mapping and navigation is better here in New Zealand compared to Google. Overseas I've found that different services have strengths/weaknesses in different cities/areas.

>>swiley+0a
Because they're optimizing for some engagement metric and not user experience.

>>kiwija+o91
This must be a recent change because it used to be awful about 4 years ago. Regularly try and take me through roads that hadn't existed for a decade. Maybe worked around the city, but not outside or commercial areas.

>>jiggaw+dS
Consider trying https://openstreetmap.org, too.