We’re all aware of the big, public battles that go on every day in the mobile arena. You know the kind of thing: camera phones versus standalone cameras, mobile phones versus separate mp3 players, and so on. There’s one battle, though, that doesn’t get a lot of coverage at all, and it involves GPS. Specifically, it’s Google Maps, on mobile phones, versus standalone sat-nav boxes.
Thanks to the release of Android 2.0 (currently seen strutting its stuff in the Motorola Droid, over in the USA), it seems that we’re closer to seeing an outright victor, and there shouldn’t be any surprise, really, that it’s mobile phones which are coming out on top.
The reason, as you’ll see in the following video, is very simple: Google Maps will now do turn-by-turn navigation…
Hoooookay, that’s a pretty decisive blow for mobile phones, is that. The coolest bit is right at the end, where he uses Google Voice Search to say the destination out loud, and then the navigation app does its thing, whilst only having to press one button. It’s impossible to overstate how good a feature that is, since, y’know, it lets you navigate instantly, while you’re driving, without having to crash your car.
As you can possibly tell, this new development has rather impressed me. Oh, and the best news for us Brits (since we haven’t got the Moto Droid yet) is that HTC have said they’re going to update the HTC Hero with Android 2.0, so if you’ve got a Hero, you should be able to chuck your old sat-nav away, very soon. Now I just need them to update their Maps app for Windows Mobile, so I can stick it on my phone…
Oh, and finally, if you want some idea of how important an announcement this is, have a look at TomTom’s share price. It has plummeted.
Yup, looks like mobile phones might be well on the way to winning this battle…
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