I came so close to getting our app off of Google Maps a few months ago, we'd be saving literally thousands a month. But the "look" of the map from open street map, map tiler, etc was deemed too different and the team was scared it would negatively impact our users. The Maps API is definitely getting worse, and the pricing setup seems like it was cooked up by someone from Microsoft. Also Maplibre and its various wrappers are so much nicer to work it.
I feel like with custom vector based styles, you should be able to get pretty dang close to cloning the look of it? Also subjectively, I find the protomaps basemap themes to be much nicer.
I've been following Alex Wellerstein off and on for a few years now, since I discovered that he was a science adviser for a crazed nuclear-history TV series called Manh(a)ttan, so I read this post about NUKEMAP when it originally appeared. I wonder whether the situation with Google Maps is any different now. I'm not a developer, so I don't need to know. I'm just curious.
> I wonder whether the situation with Google Maps is any different now. I'm not a developer, so I don't need to know. I'm just curious.
As the Google Maps APIs/libraries already exited the "growth" phase where the focus is acquiring new users, and entered the "squeeze" phase, I'd say it's worse today than it was in 2019.
Seems today the best solution is to self-host Protomaps which offer very fresh OSM extracts, and if HTTP range requests are on the table, single-file hosting of the whole world map.
it doesn’t even need to be particularly fresh. for the purposes of this map, it could update just once or twice a decade with no real value loss to anyone using it.
I came so close to getting our app off of Google Maps a few months ago, we'd be saving literally thousands a month. But the "look" of the map from open street map, map tiler, etc was deemed too different and the team was scared it would negatively impact our users. The Maps API is definitely getting worse, and the pricing setup seems like it was cooked up by someone from Microsoft. Also Maplibre and its various wrappers are so much nicer to work it.
I feel like with custom vector based styles, you should be able to get pretty dang close to cloning the look of it? Also subjectively, I find the protomaps basemap themes to be much nicer.
Would it be possible to run an AB test?
I've been following Alex Wellerstein off and on for a few years now, since I discovered that he was a science adviser for a crazed nuclear-history TV series called Manh(a)ttan, so I read this post about NUKEMAP when it originally appeared. I wonder whether the situation with Google Maps is any different now. I'm not a developer, so I don't need to know. I'm just curious.
> I wonder whether the situation with Google Maps is any different now. I'm not a developer, so I don't need to know. I'm just curious.
As the Google Maps APIs/libraries already exited the "growth" phase where the focus is acquiring new users, and entered the "squeeze" phase, I'd say it's worse today than it was in 2019.
Since then, Open Street Maps is self-hostable and supports all of these calls you'd need to remake this.
And no throwing $1500/month at google for what amounts to 3 colored circles on a map.
*OpenStreetMap.
Seems today the best solution is to self-host Protomaps which offer very fresh OSM extracts, and if HTTP range requests are on the table, single-file hosting of the whole world map.
it doesn’t even need to be particularly fresh. for the purposes of this map, it could update just once or twice a decade with no real value loss to anyone using it.