Apk Link: https://cdn.organicmaps.app/apk/OrganicMaps-24081605-GooglePlay.apk
Note: If you don’t want to deal with stuff like this, I recommend you download and use it from F-Droid client or Accrescent AppStore.
Update: The app returned to the App Store.
It’s Google.
I’m certain that “Common violations” = “competes with our own products”.
It’s highly unlikely that this app even comes up on the radar insofar as competing with Google Maps.
The answer is probably more mundane - an automated system made an incorrect call. It keeps happening when it comes to these Play Store app reviews.
Or some troll decided it would be funny to report it.
Most likely scenario in my opinion too.
Indeed. “Never attribute to malice that which is adequately explained by stupidity”—or, in this case, an unaudited automated process. Now, I’m sure the fact that it competes with one of their products meant that they were in no particular hurry to address the issue, but I’m sure the original failure was process related, not anti-competitive practices.
Or maybe an automated system flagged it and an underpaid and overworked employee in a third world country reviewed it.
Does Google do that? Apple absolutely does it, but has Google ever done that?
Apple used to straight up steal the idea of existing apps. Lately it seems they favor buyout, like with dark cloud becoming weather, but it used to be that Apple would randomly swoop in and crush developers by creating a first party version of their app.
Ah, Sherlocking
Though at least sometimes an idea seems somewhat obvious
Hmm.
Never really looked into it before.
Now I downloaded it.
Google’s strategy seems to have backfired, in my case.
Streisand effect
technically true but the original Streisand effect was about an image that had been downloaded six times before the lawsuit; Organic Maps is definitely a lot less obscure than that
Strategy? You are assuming there was any intent behind it. The reviewers in third world countries are probably spending 30 seconds per app and are bound to make mistakes. Which in this case was reverted.
The reviewers in the 3rd world country are the ones who have to deal with the appeal. I guarantee you that the removal was some form of automated system. No human review is required for deletion from the playstore. The idea behind ithat is that legitimate app developers will appeal in cases where the automated system fucks up whereas the conmen will not.
Yeah, sounds about right. This isn’t a case of “Google maliciously takes down a Google Maps competitor” like people are saying.
Same. I’ve been using magicearth but I keep my eyes open for any alternative to a popular google app , just so I have a backup if something goes wonky.
The amount of corporate control that has slowly and insidiously crept into our lives will never cease to amaze me.
Capitalism baby. Gotta cannibalize, monopolize, and enshittifize for maximum profits.
giggles in F-Droid
“Ooh rah”
Hopium question: Can Google be sued for this as anti-competitive behavior and fined for “lost revenue”?
In theory yes. In practice or will require enormous resources to build a case against the army of layers that Google and the other giants can afford. I believe only the government now is big enough to do it, with the antitrust law.
Which I’m pretty sure they’re already gunning for Google, so this might be more evidence for their case.
Hope so. I’d imagine their lawyers will see this with joy.
The answer to “can X be sued for Y?” is always yes, you can sue anyone for anything, this doesn’t say anything about whether you’ll succeed.
You can install any apk on your phone (even unrooted) and there’s alternative stores such as f-droid, so why?
If this story blows up, organic maps is going to get so many more downloads and hopefully contributions.
I have been eyeing this crowd sourced map thing for a week or two. When I read about this headline today I learned there was a centralized app for it. I immediately downloaded it.
It’s called OpenStreetMap and there are many apps for it! Organic Maps is a good one and I like it for when I go abroad and want to preload an entire country instead of downloading maps on my paltry 33 or whatever gigs of roaming allowance (that also only works in the EU - if I want to visit the US, I get to pay out the ass for 250 MB or 1 GB at a time)
When listing an app on the app store, there is a footgun to watch out for. One of the questions it asks is “Is this app made for children” or “is this app intended for children” or something like that. If you say “yes” to this then that triggers extra stringent evaluation criteria. Many people will accidentally choose yes for their app because it’s a general purpose app which anyone can use (no porn, violence, etc) but that is a mistake. The intent of that question is to find apps that are ONLY for children to use and to evaluate them differently in order to keep children safe.
Yeah, I was looking into this recently, and even games like Roblox are labelled Teen (even though I think it’s obvious they target younger children).
Roblox would never pass a child review. There’s literal gambling on that shit.
Yet another reminder that Google is an unreliable company. Install Fdroid tonavoid Google’s mistakes.
@ModerateImprovement @istanbullu F-Droid is the only way out.
Thank you, Google. Now I’m using it and contributing to OpenStreetMap :D
Thanks again google. I had never heard of this app until you banned it. Now I’m running it on my phone. Top notch advertising for your competition.
Same, downloaded it and gee it’s so much better
Thx for.the post. Just installed via fdroid. Awesome app.
This app is great. If it offered some sort of traffic aware navigation routing I would use it as my daily driver. I live in the city and traffic conditions can make a huge difference. Unfortunately, I don’t think it has this capability. Hopefully someday.
The problem with live traffic awareness is, that it needs a lot of data to be collected all the time, something only Google or Apple with their monopolistic and privacy invasive ppwer can do. How it works (simplified) is that Google can detect if a lot of phones are on the same street and therefore assumes traffic. This data is, however, proprietary to Google. A FOSS App has the following problems:
- Too small of a userbase, to reliably track something
- Privacy conscious userbase, not wanting to be tracked
- If it had auch a feature, it would be opt-in, as FOSS does (usually) not try to be as evil as Google&Co.
- Usually limited server capacity to calculate if an aggregation is traffic
Solutions would be:
- Google is forced to make the data publicly available per API as part of some anti-monopolistic ruling
- A thrid party (e.g. cities) have their own monitoring of traffic and give public access to it.
So sadly similar dunctionality will not come in the near future in any FOSS app.
I’d be willing to share anonymized data as part of a collective traffic data alternative to Google. I imagine there would still be data fees associated with this data collection. We just really need to get an open source alternative to gmaps going. Gmaps is only getting worse. Like, what if something like Street Complete was also able to collect traffic data and feed it into a sharable database?
Alternatively, I wonder if they could buy traffic data from a third party like Garmin or something. I’d be willing to pay a small monthly fee to get away from Google.
Waze was able to do it (before Google bought them).
Waze still does it.
The data pulled in by Waze is independent from the data pulled in by Google Maps.
Waze doesn’t use Google’s traffic data, but Google does read data out of Waze’s.
Yet somehow Waze still has more accurate real time traffic info in the app.
Magic Earth has traffic. That’s the reason why I use it instead of Organic Maps.
I have looked at the routing on routes I regularly drive and it seems like Magic Earth has a better routing algorithm than Organic Maps. At least it doesn’t try to send me through the middle of a town when there is a route around the town using the highway as Organic Maps often tries to do.
I keep forgetting to update OM. Thanks for the reminder lol
Google can suck a tailpipe. Fdroid ftw
Well glad this article brought my attention to this app. Now I can download it and remove google maps from my devices
So, what about OSMand. Or Magic Earth. Or any other map app?
They’re not “good enough” - they dont provide the same comfy UI/UX that google maps and organic maps does. And organic maps is offline, so literally no data harvesting.
I prefer the UI of Magic Earth than Organic Maps. And ME also has offline maps/navigation, given that it also uses OSM.
Osmand is the best but it’s complicated and has too many features for a casual maps user. It’s UI is not that bad as others suggest. I have both installed cause organic maps doesn’t support saving routes/tracks.
I think OpenTracks could be a good lightweight alternative for simply saving tracks.
I have that too but i just use osmand cause it’s more convenient to just create a route for bike. I use open tracks when I need to track my speed, distance, etc.
Honestly the osm ecosystem is really good. Best part is it’s always getting better.
Haven’t heard of Organic Maps before but I just installed from the apple app store for solidarity 🫡
This is the way.
Mmhmm 😁
