Crowdsourced traffic app Waze comes to BlackBerry (beta)
Waze's BlackBerry beta map app rivals Google Maps.
(Credit:
Screenshot by Jessica Dolcourt/CNET)
Google Maps may tell you where to go, but it won't give you cupcakes. Waze, on the other hand, tempts you to use its map app by dangling digital treats and other social gaming incentives.
Starting Tuesday, BlackBerry owners can try out Waze in beta form. We jumped into a
car with Waze and tooled around San Francisco testing out the new BlackBerry beta while hunting for e-cupcakes.
While you use Waze's turn-by-turn voice navigation, real-time traffic, and other location-specific alerts, the app simultaneously sends anonymous information, like your speed and location, back to its database to improve the service as a whole. This is crowdsourcing put to practical purpose, especially when the Waze community pitches in by reporting navigation and mapping errors and traffic accidents from their phones.
As for those cupcakes we mentioned, Waze uses them and other gaming conventions to further engage the user base. Collecting digital representations of cupcakes or other road goodies when you drive by a certain location earns you bragging rights and points, though not real-world morsels. (The cupcakes have turned into "blackberries" for this special release--har dee har har.) For Waze, making a game of its map app gets users involved, and that means more valuable road information for its database where those details are otherwise slim or lacking.
Unfortunately, Waze misbehaved more often than it should have on our BlackBerry Bold 9700 during our driving demo. We witnessed confused navigation and an error message. Even without the bugs, Waze offers far fewer features than the
iPhone version that had also come along for the ride. We got the hang of navigating the map on BlackBerry, though it could be more intuitive. As far as hardware goes, Waze will use the Menu button and the "i" and "o" keys for zooming in and out. There's also some functionality in pressing the track pad.
If you've got a BlackBerry 8900, 9000, 9630, or 9700--but not the Storm--you can download Waze's beta. As an extra incentive, Waze is offering an
iPad to the user who drives through the most blackberries from May 4 to May 14, 2010. Waze is also available for iPhone, Android, Windows Mobile, and Symbian phones.
Excerpt from:
Crowdsourced traffic app Waze comes to BlackBerry (beta)
Microsoft Creates Whole New UI Experience, Copies iPhone App Store Experience
I watched WMExperts‘ coverage of Microsoft’s big Windows Phone 7 Series keynote at MIX10 yesterday and while I once again wasn’t wowed by the hyperactive quadrilateral tiles of the home screen, the workflow/funflow of moving through the panoramic hubs continued to impress. While Microsoft deserves a lot of credit for creating one of the few new, post-iPhone user experiences/interaction models, however, it’s interesting to note that they’re pretty much copying entirely Apple’s closed iPhone App Store model.
That’s right, free developer tools (like iPhone), no app distribution outside the market (like iPhone), except for beta and enterprise (like iPhone), which means no side-loading (like iPhone), and little-to-no multitasking (like iPhone… at least until iPhone 4.0), and push-notifications to handle alerts (like iPhone). (They do, however, claim they will be far more transparent than Apple has thus far been with the App Store approval process).
On one hand that’s a huge compliment to Apple’s highly successful, if sometimes controversial App Store model. On the other hand, users of previous Microsoft handsets up to and including the most recent Windows Mobile 6.5.x have seen open app installation and ubiquitous multitasking as bragging rights over the iPhone going on 3 years now. The mainstream consumer Microsoft is obviously targeting with WP7S will no doubt find it simple and clear. The traditional base of tinker-happy, ROM-cooking, power users? Likely not.
What think you, is Apple’s App Store model something Microsoft should have emulated?
Microsoft Creates Whole New UI Experience, Copies iPhone App Store Experience is a story by TiPb.
