How tiny commuting app Transit is beating Google Maps | Hacker News Reader

How tiny commuting app Transit is beating Google Maps

venturebeat.com

16 pointskevingibbon11 comments

Buried the lead: "Transit integrates tightly with local cities that offer real-time data from GPS-enabled trains and buses. That integration is now easy, but the legal work sometimes is not. And the legal challenges that some cities have had with Google have opened doors for Transit. In one case — I cannot reveal the name, but it is a top-five global city in terms of population — the city has broken off negotiations with Google and approached Transit for an exclusive." (paragraph 12)

Its been a while since I looked at this but Google used to encourage cities to publish this data publicly in a structured form. If that's still the case then the "legal" issue is that the city are more interested in royalty income than efficient use of public transport. The use of the word "exclusive" supports this hypothesis.

Post title: "How tiny commuting app Transit is beating Google Maps"

From the article: "Ultimately, Vermette knows, a tiny commuter’s app that focuses on buses and trains is not going to beat the massive, well-funded, and multifunction Google Maps — in downloads, users, and time spent in app."

???

That's right. Sounds like hype.

"which provides real-time bus and train schedules in just 37 global cities" yeah, sure, global it is! Dont they teach the meaning of the word global in the US elementary schools anymore?

Yeah, like this other paragraph about a future announcement, one of the top 5 cities by population: they are all asian. Is it Tokyo? Only one of these that publishes GPS data for its transit system. Or is it "global" = US?

Given Tokyo's huge number of independent transit operators, there's no real authority to grant any "exclusives."

By the same token, getting real-time info out of all of these operators would seem a huge task...

But given the nature of Tokyo transport, it's hardly necessary in most cases anyway—everything runs extremely frequently, and pretty much exactly on time (so scheduled times are usually all you need), and the system's emphasis on rail over buses means that variability due to traffic conditions is rarely a concern.

That's good to know for when we launch Tokyo, thank you.

Definitely not in the top 5, not sure why he said that...

"And it never helps to get a boost from partner."

Nice typo right?

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