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plotaroute admin Tuesday 16 Feb 2021 09:28:07
Thanks for all your comments. We do understand that the loss of Google maps is disappointing for some and this wasn’t a decision we wanted to take, but sadly Google's licensing restrictions prevent us from offering Google maps alongside other services that we want to provide.
As we said in our announcement, this does mean we can now look at new opportunities that were previously not open to us, either for contractual or technical reasons. The first of these we announced yesterday and we’ll be making further announcements in due course as new developments are completed.
Thanks for your ongoing support.
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Tom Bampton Tuesday 16 Feb 2021 10:04:42
This is great news; thanks for the OS maps.
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Andrew Duncan Tuesday 16 Feb 2021 11:36:04
It is of course disappointing to lose Google maps, but - as a UK user - it's great to have OS maps. I'm also an OS subscriber. Before, I used to toggle between Plotaroute and OS Maps browser tabs. Now I will just toggle between Plotaroute and Google Maps. If anything this will be easier because there's no need to sign into Google Maps.
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Maryka Sennema Tuesday 16 Feb 2021 11:50:30
"Google's licensing restrictions prevent us from offering Google maps alongside other services that we want to provide." I don't think I understand this? Can you explain?
Also... just because these are services you want to provide doesn't mean your users will find them useful or necessary. Personally I only want Google maps as an overlay so I can compare roads (at times OSM lags behind Google) and also for the Streetview function. If neither of those exist I will find it difficult to justify using (let alone paying premium for) Plotaroute. I don't know what extra things you wanted to do with Google maps but basically what you already provided worked fine for me -- others can speak for themselves.
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Fred Hiking Tuesday 16 Feb 2021 13:12:36
It is possible to update the satellite maps used. (Austria) Out of date for at least 5 years.
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Marc Riv Tuesday 16 Feb 2021 13:34:43
Very disappointed in losing google maps - but I do get it. However, I am even a bit more disappointed that the new features you have added only benefit US users. I never considered this a US focused product until now and this will definitely impact my decision to continue my subscription.
Marc.
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leepton hais tee Tuesday 16 Feb 2021 15:23:18
i use this web app to make my track and load in another app connected with the treadmill that allow to run looking streetview routes , whitour gmaps and streetview split screen it's uselees to me . i think that i will quit here
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Mark Mensen Tuesday 16 Feb 2021 18:59:25
I only purchased the premium membership because of Google Maps. I won't be renewing my premium membership tha tis due up next month. The other maps are useless to me.
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plotaroute admin Wednesday 17 Feb 2021 08:59:30
A number of you have asked if we can share more information about the reasons for removing Google maps from the desktop version of our premium route planner. We can’t go into too much detail, but licensing restrictions were the main driver behind the decision, as well as technical limitations and risks. Google places a number of restrictions on how its maps can be used and we felt that these restrictions both limited us from developing new features that our users have been asking for and also caused an unacceptable level of risk to existing services.
These are by no means the only issues, but just to give a few examples:
- We are not allowed to use Google maps as part of an app that provides route navigation, which is an area that our users most want us to develop.
- Google map directions don’t include road surface data that would be needed to develop ‘surface breakdown’ features requested by many of our users.
- If Google terminated its contract with us for any reason, this would have resulted not just in the loss of Google maps but in the complete and immediate loss of service for all our premium members, as Google map based applications can only be provided using Google’s own platform. While we believed this risk to be low, the impact of such a decision would have been catastrophic.
There are numerous other issues and we were of course very aware that Google’s maps are popular, but ultimately we came to the conclusion that continuing to depend on Google maps was too risky and limiting, and therefore not a viable option.
We want to ensure we can provide a dependable service that is driven by what our users want rather than what our suppliers want and, although these will never be 100% aligned, we feel that this is the best direction for plotaroute and the majority of our users. We appreciate that this may feel like a backward step for some, but we ask you to bear with us as we continue to develop new features throughout 2021.
Obviously we appreciate that everyone’s needs are different and we will never be all things to all people, so if you feel that the loss of Google maps is something you can’t live with, we understand that and will be sorry to see you go. But we hope you’ll stick around and continue to benefit from the services we offer both now and in the future.
There isn’t really any more we can add so we won’t comment on this any further, but hopefully that’s provided a bit more background to our decision.
- We are not allowed to use Google maps as part of an app that provides route navigation, which is an area that our users most want us to develop.
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Zenon _K56 Wednesday 17 Feb 2021 14:35:31
With removing GoogleMaps a scale map disappeared from plotaroute.
Thanking you in anticipation of your action.
Well, if you don't know what's going on, you know it's about money.
In my opinion it makes no sense to have GoogleMap and to raise the user’s annual payment to very high level.
I prefer not to have GoogleMap and pay not too much.
Taking this opportunity I would like to thank for the wonderful product you gave its users for a low price.
