Did Google Maps's "consistency" help it climb to #1 in maps?

Before google maps, online maps were an insult to the user. You would get a 200px by 200px image of a crappy map surrounded by 10 ads that flashed at you. If you wanted to scroll to the right you had to click an arrow. It would then take about 30 seconds for the map and adds to reload.

Google did maps right, and eventually yahoo and map quest followed, but by the time they did it was too late everyone was using google maps and had no reason to switch.

I barely ever use satellite view for anything but casual amusement.

I don't expect feature labels to remain identical between views; the background intensity and purposes of the views are so different it makes sense to change their labeling. For example, there's less room for text if people are looking at the photographic detail between roads. (This also explains why some of Google's competitors move the road labels over roads on satellite views: it is reasonable to assume that people switched to satellite view to see non-road details, which you wouldn't want to obscure with labels.)

I also don't rapidly toggle between map and satellite views, and tend to look at the satellite views at a greater zoom than the map views.

Once you drop the idea such consistency is optimal, the causality could be the reverse: because the other services are behind in usership, they're being more innovative in optimizing satellite labeling.

1. The most popular mapping site also has the most consistent satellite/street maps. 2. The inverse is true with the least popular mapping sites. 3. Because there's correlation, there's causation.

Another big point in Google's favour is how their maps look. Back when Google Maps came out, the other maps were bitmapped and horrible to look at on the screen and in print. The quality of Google's maps is much more like what you see in a proper street directory. And they've made it look that good at every zoom level. Quite amazing.

I've never used Bing Maps, so it was interesting to learn in this article that they've improved the design of their default map view recently. It looks good. If the appearance of Google's maps was some part of their success, we should see Bing's market share rise in the future if they can convincingly beat Google in this area.

I don't think most people switch to satellite view, or care if those views are consistent.