9 ms·

My quality of life would decrease significantly without Google Maps. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. are distracting fluff, but navigation is the killer app.

My quality of life would decrease significantly without Google Maps. Facebook, Instagram, Twitter, etc. are distracting fluff, but navigation is the killer app. I live in Chicago. Google Maps knows when the bus is coming, and which buses to take to get somewhere quickly. I don't have to plan very far ahead or keep to a strict schedule to make certain trains, since I know I can just pull out my phone and figure out a reasonable way to get home when it's time. As a student from another city, I have only enough understanding of the geography to read Google Maps critically - for the details, it's indispensable. Just uninstalling Facebook might be a nice middle route though.

pessimizer 13y ago
Chicago is easy. It's laid out on a grid with a very few diagonal arteries. Texting CTABUS XXXX to 41411(where XXXX is the stop number) tells you when the next bus is coming. There's only a couple of trains, and they shouldn't be very hard to get a handle on. All of this is easy for me to say (having been born in Chicago), but there's really not a lot to memorize. It's no New York. Edit: Here's a tip; memorize the major East-West boulevards on the North side (their order, if not their number.) The city is Cartesian, and that helps a lot with the conversion.
- superuser2 13y ago
  Yeah, but I don't have bus stop locations memorized (except around campus), and the most efficient route depends on exactly when you're traveling. Having Google figure this out for me is really convenient.
Nicholas_C 13y ago
>Google Maps knows when the bus is coming, and which buses to take to get somewhere quickly. I recently visited SF and mostly used public transportation to get around. Google Maps was awesome.
yeahboats 13y ago
I have a nokia 301 that I bought for the smaller form factor, good battery life and some international use, and found that I used it a lot more for many of the reasons listed in the article. If I need to, I can still check my email/the weather/bus times, but every now and then I find myself switching back to my smartphone for the same reasons you list. Not having maps is extremely limiting. Sure, if I'm going a few places I can check google maps beforehand, plan out a route, and get to my destination. The flexibility to deviate from that is completely lost, and why I have to alternate between the two phones.
ronaldx 13y ago
As soon as I realised that Maps were the only feature of a smartphone that I valued positively, I went back to carrying a dumbphone and a map. Battery life trumps navigation, for me, comfortably. If I'm lost after a long day, I need the option to phone my destination.
- nilkn 13y ago
  For what it's worth, if battery life is important, my Note 3--about as far as you can get from a dumbphone--has amazing battery life. The battery meter barely goes down after an entire day. I occasionally don't charge it for two days and it's still green and going strong. It's literally never died on me. And I don't do anything particularly to keep the battery life up, like reducing screen brightness.
  - ronaldx 13y ago
    Good battery life, but online testing suggests that it will die before day's end if you use it for internet browsing. For comparison, I occasionally don't charge my phone for two weeks. Edit: apologies for editing :)
    - nilkn 13y ago
      > Good, but other tests say it dies after 9 hours of browsing. I wouldn't really know, because never have I been in a situation where I actually used my phone nonstop for 9 hours. =] For my typical usage, the battery will last several days at least and probably a bit more if I put more effort into reducing battery consumption. I actually don't know how long it'll last since it's never died. Definitely not two weeks, but long enough for me to not really worry about the battery life. All that said, I can definitely see the appeal of a phone that lasts two weeks. I think the Note 3 sits at a decent compromise between that and my old phone, a Galaxy S3, which could barely last 8 hours (of typical, very intermittent usage).
  - zxexz 13y ago
    I bet it still doesn't beat my Nokia C139 :P
abdullahkhalids 13y ago
One feature I noticed in moving from a developing country (Pakistan) to a developed one (Canada) was how horrible city structures were in Canada. In Lahore (8+ million people) it's easy to tell someone visiting the city for the first time how to get from point A to B. No one uses smartphones for maps, because they don't need to. Buses are usually so frequent you don't need to wait more than 10 min. In Canada, I see everyone using Maps to navigate because the cities are structured so bad it's hard for even the natives to navigate.
- StandardFuture 13y ago
  Wow, I honestly would have never thought that cities would have better (easier to navigate) layouts in countries like Pakistan. I am very interested in learning some details on what exactly you mean by this. :)
  - abdullahkhalids 13y ago
    So I was specifically talking about moving from place to place without the need for maps. I am only comparing with Calgary and the greater Toronto area (not Toronto city). I am sure other cities in NA are different. One reason is that Lahore is divided into gated housing authorities (which is bad for a lot of other reasons) but to get to your destination you just need directions to the the gated community. One inside, everything is neatly divided into grid structured blocks and numbered streets which are easy to navigate. Calgary's streets have names not numbers. (Erin Grove, SE) tells me almost nothing about where the street is located. Even if I were a native I would need a map for unfamiliar streets. Also, because people in Lahore are generally poor (most people don't have cars) and not very literate, the city grows in a way that they can navigate. Nothing to be proud of, but that is probably the reason I would say Lahore is 'better' designed.
- chm 13y ago
  That's quite a generalization you're making. Most of Montreal is served by 10 minut buses - that is, most time between two buses is 10 minutes. And there are buses 24/7 on big streets. And there's the metro. And there's the train if you want to go on either shore.
tjpick 13y ago
Navigation is pretty handy, but the thing I really love about a smartphone is having a decent portable camera always with me. To quickly take a snap to share with family (mms, email or social media), when you otherwise would have missed that is pretty cool.
- pjbrunet 13y ago
  Depends on the dumbphone. With a smartphone you have to turn it on, swipe your password and/or unlock it somehow, then tap the camera app and then tap/press something to take a picture. And you might get an error message, "Battery too low to use flash." My dumbphone you press-hold camera button and that's it.
  - superuser2 13y ago
    >With a smartphone you have to turn it on, swipe your password and/or unlock it somehow, then tap the camera app and then tap/press something to take a picture. And you might get an error message, "Battery too low to use flash." With a generic "smartphone" you do, with an iPhone you just swipe up from the bottom right corner. It's nicely sandboxed outside the lock screen - you can see the photos you just took, but to review other photos you need to enter your PIN.
    - leoedin 13y ago
      Newer Android phones (4.0 upwards I believe) also allow quick camera access from the lockscreen.
  - kalleboo 13y ago
    > My dumbphone you press-hold camera button and that's it. Sony smartphones work the same way
- keithpeter 13y ago
  'Opportunistic technology' has applications in the classroom. I have an old OS Blackberry Bold and I use the camera in class to photo student work and email it to a webmail account in-lesson then pop it on projector. I also use music player with 3.5mm lead to play podcasts &c. Fairly quick to use. Students encouraged to photo screens/whiteboards and email them in &c. As a more mature (cough) person, I make limited personal use of social media and tend not to have very high traffic. The 'smartish' aspect is all data collection.
rdl 13y ago
Even when I know a city well, having realtime traffic info from Google Maps is really useful.
kfcm 13y ago
As a student from another city, I have only enough understanding of the geography to read Google Maps critically - for the details, it's indispensable. Amazing that those people in ancient times--of what, 5-7 years ago?--could survive without smartphones and Google Maps. People used to have maps, or just go out and explore new places. Not only learn the streets, but find great restaurants, coffee shops, stores, meet new and interesting people. I am amazed daily at how these things have instilled learned helplessness into people in such a short time span.
- superuser2 13y ago
  Good point. I'm guessing students were less bold with CTA and took more cabs, or else avoided going out unless they knew the could afford a lengthy adventure getting home. It wasn't impossible before, but it's certainly easier.
- jrlocke 13y ago
  Argue the convenience is not worth the privacy costs, but don't suggest the convenience is trifling. Sure, these tasks were all possible, but it's clear that a smart phone can replace your map, bus schedule, train schedule, subway map, Zagat guide—in many cases not only is it a substitute but a patent improvement.
  - deleted 13y ago
    [deleted]
- GeneralMayhem 13y ago
  I'll be off your lawn in a moment, but first, you might want to consider that just because something can be done the old way doesn't mean that that's superior, that smartphones are in fact very good at showing you new places to go, and that "wanting machines to do tasks that machines are better at than humans" and "helplessness" are not synonymous.
  - growupkids 13y ago
    Navigation is a perishable skill. Overreliance on GPS has been shown to degrade navigation skills and other brain functions [1]. 1. http://phys.org/news/2010-11-reliance-gps-hippocampus-function-age.html http://phys.org/news/2010-11-reliance-gps-hippocampus-functi...
pjbrunet 13y ago
I went back to a dumbphone and those rare times I need a map (unfamiliar city) I either write down directions before I leave or just flip open the laptop.
- pjbrunet 13y ago
  Funny last night found my Walmart "dumbphone" (rebranded blackberry?) has a Java version of Google Maps that's actually useful.
ccernaf 13y ago
There really are many other apps that are useful besides just Google Maps though. It's great to have a phone that can play music for the gym, have an app like venmo for small transactions when you forget cash, or a portable e-reader for the bus or train, or uber for just-in-case situations... and many more. All of these aren't indispensable, but they just make life so much easier and better. I definitely agree with you that removing social network apps is a great way to improve productivity a bit. And of course, if you don't need the apps listed above, then, yes, there isn't much point in paying extra for a smartphone. But please realize that many people are willing to pay for the significant convenience that a smartphone affords them. Not using a smartphone just because of the battery life or durability though is silly. A specialized case will nearly solve both problems. There are privacy concerns and productivity concerns and price concerns, sure. But this is the future - and we should be trying to address those concerns and change them for the better, not fight smartphones altogether.
JonnieCache 13y ago
Do you not have electronic bus stop signs in chicago?
mercer 13y ago
I'd say it's all about learning how to avoid misusing a powerful tool. I bet when we discovered fire we initially burned down a few forests by accident before we discovered, say, safety matches. Or when we discovered the wheel as a method of transportation we probably careened of a cliff here and there before we developed brakes and crumple zones. I've heard a number of my friends complain about facebook, initially, and later about smartphones. While I understand that the 'pull' of checking what's going on in your social network, or checking out the latest funny picture posted on reddit, I think the solution is not (necessarily( to get off facebook or get a dumbphone, but rather to learn how to responsibly use a potentially highly addictive tool. Perhaps this is a problem that only plagues these kinds of transitional periods. I've noticed, for example, that my younger sister (~15) is absolutely addicted to her phone and whatsapp, and my parents, who are generally quite responsible and firm in how they raised us, don't even really seem to notice the problem. And perhaps that's because it's so new, like television was once.
- hereonbusiness 13y ago
  Smartphones are devices made for content consumption with a phone added on top. Not consuming content would be misusing it. Like buying an expensive TV to watch the news once a day. Why waste money on things you won't utilize most of the time?
  - mercer 13y ago
    First off, I think you're misinterpreting what I mean with 'misuse'. I meant it in the context of 'health', and I don't really care what the intended purpose was. The television, for example, is a great invention and I love watching shows and movies in the comfort of my home. You could say the 'use' of a tv is that you watch as much as possible so advertisers can make money. I think we can still agree that watching tv all day is 'misuse' when it comes to your mental or physical health. Second, 'content consumption' is a bit vague. I'd say a smartphone is worth having because so many people use whatsapp instead of sms, because it has google maps, because I can check my trello board occasionally, because I can check the weather, and very frequently to find out how to get from A to B using public transport. None of that requires me to be constantly 'consuming', but it's still very useful. In fact, For a full two years I had a smartphone (Nexus) with no data plan, and it was still worth having. It functioned as my calendar, notepad, dictation device, and even maps (although it is less useful offline).

pessimizer 13y ago

Chicago is easy. It's laid out on a grid with a very few diagonal arteries. Texting CTABUS XXXX to 41411(where XXXX is the stop number) tells you when the next bus is coming. There's only a couple of trains, and they shouldn't be very hard to get a handle on. All of this is easy for me to say (having been born in Chicago), but there's really not a lot to memorize. It's no New York. Edit: Here's a tip; memorize the major East-West boulevards on the North side (their order, if not their number.) The city is Cartesian, and that helps a lot with the conversion.

superuser2 13y ago
Yeah, but I don't have bus stop locations memorized (except around campus), and the most efficient route depends on exactly when you're traveling. Having Google figure this out for me is really convenient.

Nicholas_C 13y ago

>Google Maps knows when the bus is coming, and which buses to take to get somewhere quickly. I recently visited SF and mostly used public transportation to get around. Google Maps was awesome.

yeahboats 13y ago

I have a nokia 301 that I bought for the smaller form factor, good battery life and some international use, and found that I used it a lot more for many of the reasons listed in the article. If I need to, I can still check my email/the weather/bus times, but every now and then I find myself switching back to my smartphone for the same reasons you list. Not having maps is extremely limiting. Sure, if I'm going a few places I can check google maps beforehand, plan out a route, and get to my destination. The flexibility to deviate from that is completely lost, and why I have to alternate between the two phones.

ronaldx 13y ago

As soon as I realised that Maps were the only feature of a smartphone that I valued positively, I went back to carrying a dumbphone and a map. Battery life trumps navigation, for me, comfortably. If I'm lost after a long day, I need the option to phone my destination.

nilkn 13y ago
For what it's worth, if battery life is important, my Note 3--about as far as you can get from a dumbphone--has amazing battery life. The battery meter barely goes down after an entire day. I occasionally don't charge it for two days and it's still green and going strong. It's literally never died on me. And I don't do anything particularly to keep the battery life up, like reducing screen brightness.
- ronaldx 13y ago
  Good battery life, but online testing suggests that it will die before day's end if you use it for internet browsing. For comparison, I occasionally don't charge my phone for two weeks. Edit: apologies for editing :)
  - nilkn 13y ago
    > Good, but other tests say it dies after 9 hours of browsing. I wouldn't really know, because never have I been in a situation where I actually used my phone nonstop for 9 hours. =] For my typical usage, the battery will last several days at least and probably a bit more if I put more effort into reducing battery consumption. I actually don't know how long it'll last since it's never died. Definitely not two weeks, but long enough for me to not really worry about the battery life. All that said, I can definitely see the appeal of a phone that lasts two weeks. I think the Note 3 sits at a decent compromise between that and my old phone, a Galaxy S3, which could barely last 8 hours (of typical, very intermittent usage).
- zxexz 13y ago
  I bet it still doesn't beat my Nokia C139 :P

abdullahkhalids 13y ago

One feature I noticed in moving from a developing country (Pakistan) to a developed one (Canada) was how horrible city structures were in Canada. In Lahore (8+ million people) it's easy to tell someone visiting the city for the first time how to get from point A to B. No one uses smartphones for maps, because they don't need to. Buses are usually so frequent you don't need to wait more than 10 min. In Canada, I see everyone using Maps to navigate because the cities are structured so bad it's hard for even the natives to navigate.

StandardFuture 13y ago
Wow, I honestly would have never thought that cities would have better (easier to navigate) layouts in countries like Pakistan. I am very interested in learning some details on what exactly you mean by this. :)
- abdullahkhalids 13y ago
  So I was specifically talking about moving from place to place without the need for maps. I am only comparing with Calgary and the greater Toronto area (not Toronto city). I am sure other cities in NA are different. One reason is that Lahore is divided into gated housing authorities (which is bad for a lot of other reasons) but to get to your destination you just need directions to the the gated community. One inside, everything is neatly divided into grid structured blocks and numbered streets which are easy to navigate. Calgary's streets have names not numbers. (Erin Grove, SE) tells me almost nothing about where the street is located. Even if I were a native I would need a map for unfamiliar streets. Also, because people in Lahore are generally poor (most people don't have cars) and not very literate, the city grows in a way that they can navigate. Nothing to be proud of, but that is probably the reason I would say Lahore is 'better' designed.
chm 13y ago
That's quite a generalization you're making. Most of Montreal is served by 10 minut buses - that is, most time between two buses is 10 minutes. And there are buses 24/7 on big streets. And there's the metro. And there's the train if you want to go on either shore.

tjpick 13y ago

Navigation is pretty handy, but the thing I really love about a smartphone is having a decent portable camera always with me. To quickly take a snap to share with family (mms, email or social media), when you otherwise would have missed that is pretty cool.

pjbrunet 13y ago
Depends on the dumbphone. With a smartphone you have to turn it on, swipe your password and/or unlock it somehow, then tap the camera app and then tap/press something to take a picture. And you might get an error message, "Battery too low to use flash." My dumbphone you press-hold camera button and that's it.
- superuser2 13y ago
  >With a smartphone you have to turn it on, swipe your password and/or unlock it somehow, then tap the camera app and then tap/press something to take a picture. And you might get an error message, "Battery too low to use flash." With a generic "smartphone" you do, with an iPhone you just swipe up from the bottom right corner. It's nicely sandboxed outside the lock screen - you can see the photos you just took, but to review other photos you need to enter your PIN.
  - leoedin 13y ago
    Newer Android phones (4.0 upwards I believe) also allow quick camera access from the lockscreen.
- kalleboo 13y ago
  > My dumbphone you press-hold camera button and that's it. Sony smartphones work the same way
keithpeter 13y ago
'Opportunistic technology' has applications in the classroom. I have an old OS Blackberry Bold and I use the camera in class to photo student work and email it to a webmail account in-lesson then pop it on projector. I also use music player with 3.5mm lead to play podcasts &c. Fairly quick to use. Students encouraged to photo screens/whiteboards and email them in &c. As a more mature (cough) person, I make limited personal use of social media and tend not to have very high traffic. The 'smartish' aspect is all data collection.

rdl 13y ago

Even when I know a city well, having realtime traffic info from Google Maps is really useful.

kfcm 13y ago

As a student from another city, I have only enough understanding of the geography to read Google Maps critically - for the details, it's indispensable. Amazing that those people in ancient times--of what, 5-7 years ago?--could survive without smartphones and Google Maps. People used to have maps, or just go out and explore new places. Not only learn the streets, but find great restaurants, coffee shops, stores, meet new and interesting people. I am amazed daily at how these things have instilled learned helplessness into people in such a short time span.

superuser2 13y ago
Good point. I'm guessing students were less bold with CTA and took more cabs, or else avoided going out unless they knew the could afford a lengthy adventure getting home. It wasn't impossible before, but it's certainly easier.
jrlocke 13y ago
Argue the convenience is not worth the privacy costs, but don't suggest the convenience is trifling. Sure, these tasks were all possible, but it's clear that a smart phone can replace your map, bus schedule, train schedule, subway map, Zagat guide—in many cases not only is it a substitute but a patent improvement.
- deleted 13y ago
  [deleted]
GeneralMayhem 13y ago
I'll be off your lawn in a moment, but first, you might want to consider that just because something can be done the old way doesn't mean that that's superior, that smartphones are in fact very good at showing you new places to go, and that "wanting machines to do tasks that machines are better at than humans" and "helplessness" are not synonymous.
- growupkids 13y ago
  Navigation is a perishable skill. Overreliance on GPS has been shown to degrade navigation skills and other brain functions [1]. 1. http://phys.org/news/2010-11-reliance-gps-hippocampus-function-age.html http://phys.org/news/2010-11-reliance-gps-hippocampus-functi...

pjbrunet 13y ago

I went back to a dumbphone and those rare times I need a map (unfamiliar city) I either write down directions before I leave or just flip open the laptop.

pjbrunet 13y ago
Funny last night found my Walmart "dumbphone" (rebranded blackberry?) has a Java version of Google Maps that's actually useful.

ccernaf 13y ago

There really are many other apps that are useful besides just Google Maps though. It's great to have a phone that can play music for the gym, have an app like venmo for small transactions when you forget cash, or a portable e-reader for the bus or train, or uber for just-in-case situations... and many more. All of these aren't indispensable, but they just make life so much easier and better. I definitely agree with you that removing social network apps is a great way to improve productivity a bit. And of course, if you don't need the apps listed above, then, yes, there isn't much point in paying extra for a smartphone. But please realize that many people are willing to pay for the significant convenience that a smartphone affords them. Not using a smartphone just because of the battery life or durability though is silly. A specialized case will nearly solve both problems. There are privacy concerns and productivity concerns and price concerns, sure. But this is the future - and we should be trying to address those concerns and change them for the better, not fight smartphones altogether.

JonnieCache 13y ago

Do you not have electronic bus stop signs in chicago?

mercer 13y ago

I'd say it's all about learning how to avoid misusing a powerful tool. I bet when we discovered fire we initially burned down a few forests by accident before we discovered, say, safety matches. Or when we discovered the wheel as a method of transportation we probably careened of a cliff here and there before we developed brakes and crumple zones. I've heard a number of my friends complain about facebook, initially, and later about smartphones. While I understand that the 'pull' of checking what's going on in your social network, or checking out the latest funny picture posted on reddit, I think the solution is not (necessarily( to get off facebook or get a dumbphone, but rather to learn how to responsibly use a potentially highly addictive tool. Perhaps this is a problem that only plagues these kinds of transitional periods. I've noticed, for example, that my younger sister (~15) is absolutely addicted to her phone and whatsapp, and my parents, who are generally quite responsible and firm in how they raised us, don't even really seem to notice the problem. And perhaps that's because it's so new, like television was once.

hereonbusiness 13y ago
Smartphones are devices made for content consumption with a phone added on top. Not consuming content would be misusing it. Like buying an expensive TV to watch the news once a day. Why waste money on things you won't utilize most of the time?
- mercer 13y ago
  First off, I think you're misinterpreting what I mean with 'misuse'. I meant it in the context of 'health', and I don't really care what the intended purpose was. The television, for example, is a great invention and I love watching shows and movies in the comfort of my home. You could say the 'use' of a tv is that you watch as much as possible so advertisers can make money. I think we can still agree that watching tv all day is 'misuse' when it comes to your mental or physical health. Second, 'content consumption' is a bit vague. I'd say a smartphone is worth having because so many people use whatsapp instead of sms, because it has google maps, because I can check my trello board occasionally, because I can check the weather, and very frequently to find out how to get from A to B using public transport. None of that requires me to be constantly 'consuming', but it's still very useful. In fact, For a full two years I had a smartphone (Nexus) with no data plan, and it was still worth having. It functioned as my calendar, notepad, dictation device, and even maps (although it is less useful offline).