I hate it when map apps spin. Just absolutely hampers any ability to develop a bigger picture idea of how you're navigating, and is terribly confusing when the app gets your heading wrong, as your friend found out.
I don't like self-orienting phone maps, but people who never learned to properly read a map are likely to have trouble with maps that don't self-orient. They're better off with self-orienting maps, even if the self-orienting map sometimes are incorrectly oriented.
Up is always north in my phone, and I’m always amazing how it trips people up