DISQUS

Matt Brubeck · 1 month ago

This wasn't all Google's doing. TomTom disclosed their third-quarter results yesterday, too. Their profits were down almost 50% compared to last year. So their business was already shrinking before Google started maintaining their own U.S. geodata. The Android announcement at the same time was just one more chapter of a story that's been going on for a while.

tacanderson · 1 month ago

Totally agree Matt. You can see TomTom was on a downward trend. I think in the short term they'll be the first casualty. Harmon still has a long life ahead I'm sure but not an easy one.

geechee_girl · 1 month ago

Free is not always better. For example: I can't drive and chew gum at the same time, so a map I can barely see on my phone that I would have to hold while trying to drive is not good for me (or anyone). So, no Google Map app here - sticking with my large screen, safe driving TomTom :) (also @clubtomtom on Twitter actually replies to people and helps if you need it - None of the online Google presences ever reply to people. Plus, their products are clunky. Don't get me started on Google Voice... Docs...)

tacanderson · 1 month ago

Geechee. I totally hear you. But free doesn't have to be better or even as good. Encarta vs Britanica taught us that.

People are already Putting iPhone mounts in their car to use Google maps mostly hands free. And Maps Navigation isn't tied to just a phone. Android is Open sourced, there's no reason Google or someone else could make a dedicated GPS with this.

This is just the first warning shot. But it's going to be an ugly battle that Google is more well equiped to fight.

Droid Forums · 1 month ago

I think this had more to do with TomTom reporting earnings that were nearly 50% lower then last year then with Google's announcement.

http://www.droidforums.net

wesR · 1 month ago

It's interesting how the courts have really lagged behind the technology in regards to privacy, monopolies and market power. Yes smaller companies are fragile but the incredible power that monster companies like Google (and Facebook and Microsoft, the old gray man) is something that should be taken seriously by both our governments and venture capital groups looking for innovators. It's bad for the economics of the US and Canada to have companies with this much market power aggregating so much information about the public. Lagging even slower behind the courts are we the people who willingly lap these information services up without questioning the power we give Google and others.

tacanderson · 1 month ago

It's a difficult situation. I'm not one prone to government involvement - I don't have any more faith in them than I do the Big Co's, (SarbOx isn't the answer). But what scares me the most isn't the intentional privacy violations but the unintentional ones that will come from the companies not even realizing how much power an data they have.

And, if histories any indicaator, I'm afraid people will need to get badly hurt before anyone does anything about it.

Itamar Rogel · 1 month ago

Good discussion here... Indeed the creation of data silos is a problem, and one not so easy to balance. I think the solution might be found in government regulation of data visibility, ownership, mobility & security, having rigid rules governing:
1. The users' ability to understand what data a given corporation has about them and to view it
2. The absolute ownership of the users on their data and their ability to have it, in acceptable effort - removed, exported and mobilized (to another service provider).
3. Definition of "classes" of data sensitivity and what measures are required to protected the data at any such given "class" (not all data types are created equal; obviously i.e. your health records are more sensitive than your Flickr photo collection).

Companies would still hold the data, but this kind of guidelines can make that situation more acceptable to live with.

Since it seems that market forces haven't really succeeded in upholding the above guidelines, thus some degree of regulation is (sadly) required. The problem is that this would make it harder to maintain cloud-based services (thus hurting innovation), and even might render some business models (which enabled some free web-based services) ineffective... Still, in the long run - it seems like the least price to pay in order to maintain innovation (allowing new entrants to the market to compete effectively) and users' trust and freedom.

Jeff Hora · 1 month ago

Succinct analysis. You are well aware of the difficulty larger companies have with incubating disruptive business/products, especially if they could, in ANY way, shape or form, even shave the cash cow, let alone compete with it. We need to reassess how "internal start-ups" can be given room and oxygen to blossom into the goodness they can be (or crash and burn, so we can learn for next time).
Another scary point you make is about PEOPLE becoming scared of Google's ubiquity. There are well recognized security concerns, and I still get a little wiggy if I find my data is being housed in ONLY one place (and/or by ONE company). If diversity is good for us in other areas, this might be another place to look for it.

tacanderson · 1 month ago

Jeff, internal startups is a whole can of worms I've had to try and swallow before :p This is why big companies tend to acquire companies than start their own. It's cheaper to let 5 -10 startups battle it our and acquire the winner than it is to try and launch one silver bullet. There are legions of Ivy League PhD Business professors that specialize in just this very thing, I won't claim to do it any justice I'm a couple of blog posts.

The data concern is a tricky one. (Pardon my uber geek analogy here but) it kind of reminds me of Star Wars where the Emporer wins no matter what the Jedi do. He's playing both sides.

On one hand it's scary how much information one company may posses about you but what happens when multiple companies start "housing" your data and now multiple companies can start comparing multiple data points about you. Or even more likely we simply tell the World everything they need to know through our mobile/social activity. There's no way to know which way will prove the better way until one fails. An that could be a costly experiment.

danbobinski · 1 month ago

Hiya Tac,

Great post. It inspired me to blog a bit about why I decided not to run with Google to power my office operations (http://bit.ly/4q902e). There's just too much opportunity for things to go south. The title of your post was most apropo.

PS. Like geechee_girl and a few others, I'll be avoiding Google's Maps Navigation. I'm sticking with my Garmin ... code named "Bambi" (because I find myself saying "yes, dear" every time she talks). ;-)