iPhone OS 4 to open web services to Microsoft's Bing
Apple is working with Microsoft to broaden the iPhone's search and related web services from their current primary dependance upon Google to include additional support for Bing.
According to a report by TechCrunch, Apple's next revision of the iPhone OS won't drop Google for Bing entirely, but will expand the number of search options iPhone users see, and apparently make those options more visible.
TechCrunch originally reported Google would be entirely replaced by Bing search in iPhone OS 4, a claim that was later retracted in an update that said sources clarified "it's more complicated than this" and that Apple wouldn't be removing support for Google search.
Apple already provides an option to use Yahoo for web search in Safari, although that option is not obvious and requires visiting system settings to make the switch.
A parallel report by Kara Swisher in the Wall Street Journal "All Things Digital" blog indicates Microsoft has been asking that Bing search be added to the iPhone's search options for some time, and also wants to make the choice more visible to users.
Microsoft has also been in talks with Apple to get its mapping services integrated into the iPhone. Individual iPhone apps have already made use of Microsoft's mapping services, but Apple's own Maps app on the iPhone and iPad is hardwired to Google's mapping services.
Last fall, Apple purchased Placebase, a mapping service designed to overlay demographic, economic and environmental data on top of maps. It has since been speculated that Apple planned to use the acquisition to either build an alternative mapping service for iPhone Maps, or more likely, add additional layers of features on top of the current Maps data to differentiate the iPhone from Google's own map app for Android.
Google wrote the iPhone?
Last fall, TechCrunch writer Michael Arrington stated that "Apple expressed dismay at the number of core iPhone apps that are powered by Google. Search, maps, YouTube, and other key popular apps are powered by Google." He added, "other than the browser, Apple has little else to call its own other than the core phone, contacts and calendar features." That comment was repeated in the most recent article regarding Bing.
Arrinton's dismissal of the iPhone OS as being little more than a client for Google services was further exaggerated by fellow writer Erick Schonfeld, who wrote ?in fact, some of the best apps on the iPhone?Mail, Maps, YouTube, Search?were developed by Google.?
In reality however, Google hasn't written any of the client apps Apple bundles with the iPhone OS, which is why the company responded with some degree of surprise when Apple launched the iPhone with its slick Maps app and mobile Safari browser leveraging the open APIs Google provides for its mapping services. Apple worked closely with Google to support serving Flash-free video to the iPhone's YouTube app, but the design and implementation of that client app were still Apple's work.
Google also had nothing to do with the development of the iPhone's Mail application. Google's own mail service for Android is actually split into two apps: one supporting GMail and another for standard Internet email accounts.
Apple's platform strategy requires control
At the same time, Apple's iPhone partnership with Google in web services, which pair Apple's easy to use client apps with Google's powerful backend services, has most certainly been strained by Google's increasingly brutal portrayal of Apple and the iPhone as a dystopian environment out of "1984" along with recent comments by Andy Rubin, Google's VP of engineering, that outrageously compared Apple to North Korea.
It is likely that Apple will increasingly want to lessen its dependance upon Google and leverage alternative web service providers. That is an available option for Apple precisely because it chose to control its own client apps on the iPhone rather than delegating that work to Google or other third parties. That's also the reason Apple cites for not approving certain apps, including Google Voice, that would effectively replace core iPhone apps.
Apple has learned painful lessons in the past about delegating its platforms' core apps to third parties. The original Macintosh handed the productivity software market to Microsoft and created the desktop publishing market for Aldus and Adobe; those companies then took their apps to Windows in the early 90s, leaving Apple largely stranded and powerless to do anything about it.
In the late 90s, Apple again found itself at the mercy of Microsoft in web browsers. When Microsoft all but abandoned the Mac version of Internet Explorer, Apple set out to develop its own independent browser in Safari. That has since given the company the unfettered ability to lead and innovate both on the Mac desktop and on the iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.
Apple's desire to maintain control of its platforms' destiny also plays a large role in the company's refusal to support Java, Flash, or Silverlight on the iPhone OS and its lack of support for Windows Media DRM on the iPod. Both decisions have made it far easier for Apple to rapidly update and secure the iPhone OS and introduce new features and changes.
According to a report by TechCrunch, Apple's next revision of the iPhone OS won't drop Google for Bing entirely, but will expand the number of search options iPhone users see, and apparently make those options more visible.
TechCrunch originally reported Google would be entirely replaced by Bing search in iPhone OS 4, a claim that was later retracted in an update that said sources clarified "it's more complicated than this" and that Apple wouldn't be removing support for Google search.
Apple already provides an option to use Yahoo for web search in Safari, although that option is not obvious and requires visiting system settings to make the switch.
A parallel report by Kara Swisher in the Wall Street Journal "All Things Digital" blog indicates Microsoft has been asking that Bing search be added to the iPhone's search options for some time, and also wants to make the choice more visible to users.
Microsoft has also been in talks with Apple to get its mapping services integrated into the iPhone. Individual iPhone apps have already made use of Microsoft's mapping services, but Apple's own Maps app on the iPhone and iPad is hardwired to Google's mapping services.
Last fall, Apple purchased Placebase, a mapping service designed to overlay demographic, economic and environmental data on top of maps. It has since been speculated that Apple planned to use the acquisition to either build an alternative mapping service for iPhone Maps, or more likely, add additional layers of features on top of the current Maps data to differentiate the iPhone from Google's own map app for Android.
Google wrote the iPhone?
Last fall, TechCrunch writer Michael Arrington stated that "Apple expressed dismay at the number of core iPhone apps that are powered by Google. Search, maps, YouTube, and other key popular apps are powered by Google." He added, "other than the browser, Apple has little else to call its own other than the core phone, contacts and calendar features." That comment was repeated in the most recent article regarding Bing.
Arrinton's dismissal of the iPhone OS as being little more than a client for Google services was further exaggerated by fellow writer Erick Schonfeld, who wrote ?in fact, some of the best apps on the iPhone?Mail, Maps, YouTube, Search?were developed by Google.?
In reality however, Google hasn't written any of the client apps Apple bundles with the iPhone OS, which is why the company responded with some degree of surprise when Apple launched the iPhone with its slick Maps app and mobile Safari browser leveraging the open APIs Google provides for its mapping services. Apple worked closely with Google to support serving Flash-free video to the iPhone's YouTube app, but the design and implementation of that client app were still Apple's work.
Google also had nothing to do with the development of the iPhone's Mail application. Google's own mail service for Android is actually split into two apps: one supporting GMail and another for standard Internet email accounts.
Apple's platform strategy requires control
At the same time, Apple's iPhone partnership with Google in web services, which pair Apple's easy to use client apps with Google's powerful backend services, has most certainly been strained by Google's increasingly brutal portrayal of Apple and the iPhone as a dystopian environment out of "1984" along with recent comments by Andy Rubin, Google's VP of engineering, that outrageously compared Apple to North Korea.
It is likely that Apple will increasingly want to lessen its dependance upon Google and leverage alternative web service providers. That is an available option for Apple precisely because it chose to control its own client apps on the iPhone rather than delegating that work to Google or other third parties. That's also the reason Apple cites for not approving certain apps, including Google Voice, that would effectively replace core iPhone apps.
Apple has learned painful lessons in the past about delegating its platforms' core apps to third parties. The original Macintosh handed the productivity software market to Microsoft and created the desktop publishing market for Aldus and Adobe; those companies then took their apps to Windows in the early 90s, leaving Apple largely stranded and powerless to do anything about it.
In the late 90s, Apple again found itself at the mercy of Microsoft in web browsers. When Microsoft all but abandoned the Mac version of Internet Explorer, Apple set out to develop its own independent browser in Safari. That has since given the company the unfettered ability to lead and innovate both on the Mac desktop and on the iPhone, iPod touch, and iPad.
Apple's desire to maintain control of its platforms' destiny also plays a large role in the company's refusal to support Java, Flash, or Silverlight on the iPhone OS and its lack of support for Windows Media DRM on the iPod. Both decisions have made it far easier for Apple to rapidly update and secure the iPhone OS and introduce new features and changes.
Comments
In the meantime, they could use Bing just to spite Google.
mmmm.... I understand but I don't like Apple getting anywhere near MS. I wish Apple had another option.
I guess you didn't read the article.
Apple does have another option: Yahoo Search. As the article (which you apparently ignore) mentions that you need to visit the system settings to change to Yahoo. Apple could simply add Bing search and it would be little different to what exists today.
Try to read the article next time, please?
mmmm.... I understand but I don't like Apple getting anywhere near MS. I wish Apple had another option.
Yea... I hear ya...
I really wish Google wasn't pissing in every pool Apple is playing in.
Well, okay... I can see Googles side of story since the world is flocking away from the desktop and full speed toward the mobile surf anywhere, world and the though that one 800 pound gorilla be it MS or Apple or whoever is so quickly dominating the space would scare the CRAP out of Google.
I mean ... okay owning 80%+ of the MP3 players device market and music sales ... Good on Apple, Google couldn't give a flying phuk.
Mobile is a far more sensitive issue...
Google lives or dies by the searching and focused advertising... this IS how they survive.
Windows, Mac, Linux YAY! Viva la difference.. Google loves the mix and lack of control and Firefox... I'm certain a welcome addition to their web world. Safari too... it kept IE from being the dominant web browser AND something people don't consider... Google had every right in the world to enter the web browser market and I really believe they didn't in order to allow Apple to peruse the windows users with Safari and once Safari share in the windows world was shown to be insignificant it was then when Google finally pulled the trigger and rolled out Chrome.
And now the lines are drawn...
Google couldn't sit back and see Apple own the mobile space lock stock and barrel.. It would be an ENORMOUSLY risky think to have happen, I mean Apple has power and one just needs to look at how FLASH is rapidly being erased from the face of all the better web sites. Who else has that kind of influence?
Would Googles stockholders like to see Apple one day decide to use its iPhone dominance to the detriment of Googles bottom line?
Of course not... Google had to make the Android move or pay the extremely costly consequences.
Unfortunatly now Google has to go head to head with Apple...
iPhone -- Android Phone
iPad -- Android tablets
NBT -- Next Big Thing
BBT -- Bigger Bettier Thing
etc -- etc
Think of it like the great arms race from back in a kinder and gentler time...
So its Apple v. Google and everyone just has to deal with it.
Kinda sucks when you think the TRULY MAMMOTH things they could have accomplished with a really strong corporate team-up.
Oh well... this I guess is really for our own good... beacuse along with all of those good things they could get done its REALLY SCARY what BAD THINGS they'd be doing too.
I guess you didn't read the article.
Apple does have another option: Yahoo Search. As the article (which you apparently ignore) mentions that you need to visit the system settings to change to Yahoo. Apple could simply add Bing search and it would be little different to what exists today.
Try to read the article next time, please?
Yahoo Search actually powers Bing.
Bing Maps sucks. It doesn't support Mac browsers for all the features, the maps are old compared to Google Maps which are also old in places, and also doesn't have Street View.
What I'd like to see is Wolfram Alpha get to the stage where it does proper content searches of the Internet and provide valid results then Apple partnering with them to bring better content results than what Google and Yahoo and Bing bring about.
Search Engines are flawed beyond repair at the moment.
Yahoo Search actually powers Bing.
You've got that backwards.
I guess you didn't read the article.
Apple does have another option: Yahoo Search. As the article (which you apparently ignore) mentions that you need to visit the system settings to change to Yahoo. Apple could simply add Bing search and it would be little different to what exists today.
Try to read the article next time, please?
My meaning, obviously too subtle, was their own search as an option (not Yahoo!) as in Apple's own product called something like iSearch. I have discussed it several times before in this forum, hence the reference.
Is there any need to be so obnoxious?
Bing Maps sucks. It doesn't support Mac browsers for all the features, the maps are old compared to Google Maps which are also old in places, and also doesn't have Street View.
I've found quite the opposite. I usually go to Bing for maps because Bing seems to keep more current information regarding the tenants of certain locations (ie. hotels, restaurants).
... but, yes, you're right, they don't have Streetview.
All this is just to keep the customer base happy until the real product kicks in.
My meaning, obviously too subtle, was their own search as an option (not Yahoo!) as in Apple's own product called something like iSearch. I have discussed it several times before in this forum, hence the reference.
Is there any need to be so obnoxious?
I don't follow any particular person's comments here, so what you have written before was forgotten.
And it is your fault for trying to be subtle on the Internet. Please don't try that again.
didn't apple buy a maps company a while back?
I was also under this impression ...
However the company the purchased is more about 'overlaying data' on top of maps (edit) but after reading the article linked below they did also have raw map data (I think).
- Think economic data
- Think housing trends
- Think ...
Better yet read this story I just found it explains thing much better...
http://gigaom.com/2008/05/21/placebase/
Heres a snippit....
I wish I had more time to chat with Waldman, but he wanted to pitch me a new product from one of his clients. It’s called PolicyMap, and is based on Placebase’s PushPin technology. It aggregates all sorts of interesting data from various commercial and public datasets — home sales, crime, current year and five-year projected demographics, school performance, mortgage lending, employment and more — and puts them at the disposal of researchers, policymakers, real estate developers, investors and just everyday users. You should check it out.
So after reading... that meta data may or may not be part of placebase... At the time this article was written that data and idea looks to be coming from some unnamed client of theirs.
It seems the 'push pin' stuff is really what placebase was all about.
Apple should buy a promising search company like cuil or create a search engine on their own. They have the resources to fund $500 milllion a year a search engine will take. They have to go to cloud business anyway.
In the meantime, they could use Bing just to spite Google.
I don't think that will ever happen. Search engines make money from ads. These are the same kind of ads that Apple put down at the OS4 intro.
didn't apple buy a maps company a while back?
Yes, that was what I was referring to earlier although some people obviously don't follow what Apple do
I was really hoping this was to be announced at WWDC not any dealings with the dark side.
DaveGee, was the overlay option technology not on their own mapping system though? Or was Placebase using Google?
I don't follow any particular person's comments here, so what you have written before was forgotten.
And it is your fault for trying to be subtle on the Internet. Please don't try that again.
The 'subtle' comment was sarcasm, sorry I thought that was obvious too. The purchase of Placebase was pretty well covered here and elsewhere. Apple owning a mapping company seems relevant (and obvious) to a discussion about Bing I would have thought!
Yes, that was what I was referring to earlier although some people obviously don't follow what Apple do
I was really hoping this was to be announced at WWDC not any dealings with the dark side.
DaveGee, was the overlay option technology not on their own mapping system though? Or was Placebase using Google?
This is what is really unclear..
PolcyMap which is/was (?) built (?) based on (?) utilized (?) placebase is a live functioning web site and after viewing their demo and seeing screen shots from 2008 it certainly seems like each and every map had a copyright mark attributed to NAVTEQ.
So now I'm even less sure of exactly WHAT placebase is/was/owned but after watching a youtube video from last year prior to Apples purchase the maps used ALSO has the copyright NAVTEQ in the lower left corner so it seems pretty clear that placebase was NOT about the 'actual' lowest level maps - however thats not to say that placebase didn't own data found drawn over/on top of the raw maps.
/shrug
This was an interesting nugget I hadn't known before... NAVTEQ is a wholly owned subsidiary of Nokia Corporation.
Finally...
This may be of some help: http://www.policymap.com/blog/?p=2709
Apple is working with Microsoft to broaden the iPhone's search and related web services from their current primary dependance upon Google to include additional support for Bing.
its current primary dependance upon Google...
Why is no one capable of distinguishing between singular and plural?
Apple's platform strategy requires control
Apple has learned painful lessons in the past about delegating its platforms' core apps to third parties.
..or it's rather more precise: Steve Jobs wants total control over all Apple's platform strategy..
Can't blame the man for being a freak control, after all those painful lessons in the past.
Mobile devices like smartphone, that include the iPad and iPod touch, can't be separated from cloud-centric services. Google core business is exactly that; cloud-centric services, it's only a matter of time until every major and important features in iPhone will be overwhelmed with Google apps.
I'm pretty sure Steve Jobs has figured this out way long ago, maybe that's why he was back then embrace Eric Schmidt as a valuable partner during iPhone launch, but when the two got in a fight then it's time for Apple to act fast to enter the same cloud-centric services that Google already has. The biggest problem is, Apple need to sprint fast in order to catch up with Google.. This could take time, so it's possible that Apple is offering Bing services to fill in the gap for now.
Steve Jobs promised we won't be disappointed in the upcoming WWDC '10 next month, perhaps he's about to unveil their own version of cloud-centric services..?