The news about Apple Maps being used three times more than its “leading competitor” is being touted as a victory from Apple. I see it differently. In my mind, the built in maps app should be used ten times as much as anything else. When you take your new iPhone out of the box Maps is right there. If you use Siri at all, it goes to Maps. Are one in every four people who own an iPhone really motivated enough by their dislike of the built in mapping solution that they take the trouble to go into the App Store and download Google Maps. Ugh.

In fairness though, I think the general opinion of Apple Maps is much worse than what the product has become. Apple Maps had a bad launch and suffers from what I’d describe as the “MobileMe taint”. It started badly and now for a lot of people it’s a joke. For a year or so after Apple Maps launched I used Google Maps instead of Apple Maps but as Siri became more useful and everything got more integrated, I gradually switched over to using Apple Maps full time. I’ve not had any problems. Apple Maps coverage and traffic data in southern California is just fine. While I’ve kept Google Maps on my phone (primarily for street view), I think the Apple maps user numbers as reported by Apple reflect a perception more than reality.