The iPhone news that has dominated the week, and probably will continue to be a story for a while, is the new Maps app. While the old version used Google's mapping data, the new one ditches that for an entirely Apple-created version. Not many people like it. It's incomplete, has bad data, and is generally a big change. Some of the discussion about it this week:
- 9to5Mac has a good roundup of all the recent reporting.
- The New York Times reports that Google will have its own Google Maps app for iOS ready by the end of the year. Which is kind of weird, right? Apple must have told them that this change was coming close to a year ago (they told the public about it almost 6 months ago). Why did Google wait so long to do anything?
- As usual, John Gruber has some insightful thoughts about the switch.
- Apple is reportedly hiring members of the Google Maps team to address the problems with Apple Maps.
- For those unhappy with the new Maps app, I've got some tips about using still Google Maps on your iPhone.
In other news, the iPhone 5 is a huge success--5 million sold in one weekend.
In Apple-related law and order news:
- A group of people--reported in some places to be as many as 2,000--rioted at a factory owned by Foxconn, Apple's major manufacturing partner in China earlier this week. The uproar was supposedly caused by a fight between workers from different assembly lines.
- In New York City, Apple-related crimes have spiked 40% in 2012 (growing 10 times faster than other major crimes) and now account for 14% (!!) of all major crimes there.
- iPhone 5 thefts have hit Apple Stores around the world, from Japan to Tennessee.
AT&T's plan to charge extra for FaceTime over cellular may not last long.
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