When it comes to mapping our cities, Google Maps and Apple Maps are streets apart. No map is ever perfect, and the difference between Google and Apple is starkly emphasised when it comes to correcting errors. Here’s what happens …

Google Maps

I notice that in getting directions for cycling from North Lambton to Wickham that the suggested route doesn’t take into account recently constructed cycle paths around Waratah Station.

1. I report the problem to Google Maps.
2. One minute later I receive an e-mail acknowledgement that the report has been received.
3. Four days later I receive an e-mail saying that my report has been reviewed and accepted, and that a correction to the maps will be made.
4. Three months later I receive an e-mail saying that the correction is now live on Google maps.

Now three months is fairly glacial in the digital age, but nevertheless, it was a very straightforward matter of problem observed, problem reported, problem corrected.

Apple Maps

Now here’s what happens with Apple Maps when you report a problem, like this non-existent section of street in North Lambton …

1.  I report the problem to Apple Maps.
2. Nothing.
3. Still Nothing.
4. Three months later I report the problem again.
5. Nothing again.
6. Nothing, not even an acknowledgement the report has been received.
7. Two years later, still nothing, not even the sound of crickets chirping, a complete and utter vacuum.  Just as well for Apple that they can’t hear people scream in a vacuum.

Mark Maclean charitably suggests that Apple is engaging in a new cartographic discipline called ‘speculative topography’ – I have many other suggested names for Apple’s mapping endeavours, none of them as charitable as Mark’s.