Title is editorialized because the original is, frankly, clickbait garbage

  • Ilandar@aussie.zone
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    7 months ago

    I am pretty over these videos of people whining about the amount of data big tech collects while refusing to move to alternatives because “muh convenience”.

    • UraniumBlazer@lemm.ee
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      7 months ago

      For those unaware, Organic Maps (uses OSM) is really good! It’s good for 90% of all ur navigation needs. For the rest 10%, there’s no good alternative to google maps unfortunately.

        • Ilandar@aussie.zone
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          7 months ago

          Some further clarification on the closed source thing from their FAQ:

          Why is Magic Earth free? What is the business model?

          Magic Earth is free for all our end-users but we also have a paid Magic Earth SDK for business partners. For instance Selectric.de (a supplier for navigation solutions for ambulances and fire trucks), Smarter AI (developing ADAS systems) or Absolute Cycling (using the platform on bicycles). For more info on the SDK, you can check magiclane.com.

          Will Magic Earth be Open Source?

          No; since it is also used commercially (we have a paid Magic Earth SDK for business partners), we cannot make the code public.

        • UraniumBlazer@lemm.ee
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          7 months ago

          Traffic updates aren’t exactly a problem for me as I travel everywhere using my bicycle/public transit.

          The only problem I face is that I can’t get public transit information on OSM. Now ideally the city should be the one making this information accessible. Unfortunately for me, I currently live in a shitty city (although not for long). Therefore, within a matter of months, Organic would meet almost 100% of my navigation needs.

      • jherazob@beehaw.org
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        7 months ago

        My issue with these is that my use case is public transport, for that it seems like GMaps is still unbeatable, i hope to find an alternative as good or better based on OSM soon because it’s the one tool i still have no alternative to

        • Obi@sopuli.xyz
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          7 months ago

          Where are you from? Where I live (in the Netherlands) there’s an official tool from the public transport services which works just as well as gmaps to plan your train/tram/metro/bus journey.

        • Facebones@reddthat.com
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          7 months ago

          If you’re American, some of them support transit now. I have Magic Earth and it supports it in most major metro areas (and even my dinky little city I believe lol)

        • UraniumBlazer@lemm.ee
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          7 months ago

          Same same. This is a problem in shithole cities. Good cities have their own transit apps (which are like Uber for public transit).

      • ReversalHatchery@beehaw.org
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        7 months ago

        I think 5 out of that 10% is supplemented by OsmAnd. But it does not have public transport schedules and traffic data.

        • lemmyvore@feddit.nl
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          7 months ago

          There are often individual apps for various cities and transport organizations.

          Traffic has always been a mixed bag. Yeah it’s nice to be able to see that street A is more busy than street B. But so can everybody else, and they’re all going to use street B now.

          • BearOfaTime@lemm.ee
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            7 months ago

            Meh, I find most people don’t even bother.

            I use secondary routes 90% of the time by default, because they’re just as fast with less mental effort and less risk.

            Why go with all the lemmings?

          • ReversalHatchery@beehaw.org
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            7 months ago

            But so can everybody else, and they’re all going to use street B now.

            In my experience that’s not how it works out. It’s about balancing the load, while making the driver take the least amount of detour needed.
            Street B only has to handle the remaining traffic, and street A has a chance to unclog or at least be a faster route as some of its traffic does not exist anymore.

            • lemmyvore@feddit.nl
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              7 months ago

              The app doesn’t control what people do, it just makes recommendations based on busy segments, based on data which is already obsolete by the time it’s being used. Ultimately the lemmings will do whatever their lemming brain tells them to.

              (That is, assuming the app doesn’t actually try to spread people around the various routes. But I doubt that any app maker wants to assume responsibility for that.)

              Ultimately traffic apps are mostly useless. You can’t “solve” traffic congestion with apps any more than you can make water flow faster through a pipe. Congestion is constrained by available road space and choke points. Google Maps is mostly an excuse for Google to collect location data, with a thin layer of features on top to make it seem worthwhile.

              • ReversalHatchery@beehaw.org
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                7 months ago

                Water does not think, it flows where it can.
                People while driving cannot know which route isn’t clogged, because cars are not flowing like water. If that would be the case all the small streets around main roads would be full too. If a street is clogged, and the driver sees it, they can decide to go on a different route, but in waze if they are using it to plan a route, it’ll try actively to avoid roads that are too busy.

                • lemmyvore@feddit.nl
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                  7 months ago

                  If that would be the case all the small streets around main roads would be full too.

                  They are. If they aren’t then your city is not really that busy. It’s actually a major problem in some cities for the residents of small residential streets that suddenly start getting lots of traffic because their street gets recommended on Waze or Maps.

        • michael_palmer@lemmy.sdf.org
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          7 months ago

          Traffic data? If a grandmother had a penis, she would be a grandfather To implement this function, Osmand should gather location data from every user.

      • vatlark@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        Wow, organic maps is really nice, seems like a much cleaner user interface than OsmAnd, whereas OsmAnd has more options.

      • LordKitsuna@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        I genuinely don’t understand how anyone can believe this, I keep trying it over and over and over and it fails on the absolute most basic of business searches. And some of the directions it gives are just completely nonsensical, and it’s voice guidance is absolutely terrible making it fairly easy to miss a Direction if you’re not able to be looking at the screen

        I hate giving my location to Google but at the end of the day they are still the only GPS navigation that doesn’t suck at basic navigation

        • UraniumBlazer@lemm.ee
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          7 months ago

          Do u live in some place less humans live? Like a village or something? OSM is mapped by volunteers, which means that less OSM enthusiasts around you = worse mapping. Perhaps you could start a little bit of mapping?

          As for the voice navigation, well Organic doesn’t have its own voice. It uses ur phone’s native text to speech engine. If u have completely degoogled ur phone, then u probably would be using some other tts engine (which most probably sucks ass).

          As for the searches, yeah, they need a better local search engine.

          • LordKitsuna@lemmy.world
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            7 months ago

            I don’t just mean the voice, even just HOW it gives directions. Google maps gives you multiple warnings for a turn , one way before, one approaching, one right at. It also will often tell you which lane to take a turn in if multiple exist (use the second from the left lane to turn left) if your next turn is right after with little warning.

            It’s been a hot minute so i can try again to see if it’s changed but directions were terrible with little extra warning and no taking the next direction into account.

            The map was also just… Messy, little outlines for buildings everywhere a bunch of random green squares all over the map that I couldn’t figure out how to turn off and wasn’t even sure what they were meant to represent other than they seemed to roughly correspond with grassy or treed areas but for using it as a navigation app that is extremely annoying because it just makes the whole map of cluttered mess and makes it difficult to really tell what I’m looking at when I’m trying to drive and need to see my next Direction quickly and easily at a glance

        • Inevitable Waffles [Ohio]@midwest.social
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          7 months ago

          Yes, it does. I have used it successfully for months. My main issue is I need traffic data due to a new job and figuring which route to take. AFAIK, no other nav app has traffic data. That’s the only real bummer.

          • Kilgore Trout@feddit.it
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            7 months ago

            HERE WeGo has traffic data but of course, as in Google Maps, it sources from other users of the same app.

            If not many people use HERE, then the data is also not reliable.

    • umbrella@lemmy.ml
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      7 months ago

      also a lot of open maps alternatives rely on YOUR contribution to be good instead of a hired team at some corpo.

      use it and help out with it and you will have your open mapping app!

      • angrynomad
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        7 months ago

        Osmand doesn’t even have an easy way to contribute…I’m not sure it even exists in the app anymore

          • angrynomad
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            7 months ago

            Brilliant idea, they probably should put a crypto reward or something for better motivation

    • PrivateNoob@sopuli.xyz
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      7 months ago

      Well change can only be done through voicing disapproval first, although Google will most definitely won’t stop the data gathering in Maps.

      Well It’s understandable if a lot of people wouldn’t switch over to OSM-based apps. I’ve tried OSMAnd, and I observe 3 drawbacks. Lengthy public transport calculation (fair since it’s computing on the phone), no reviews in POI areas (really hard to catch up on), weird results in transportations

      • AggressivelyPassive@feddit.de
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        7 months ago

        Most people (public and private) never go beyond disapproval, though.

        You’ll hear people complain about this and that, but never even looking for an alternative.

      • Ilandar@aussie.zone
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        7 months ago

        Well change can only be done through voicing disapproval first

        Yes, but if you as the consumer never actually stop giving the company your money and/or data then there is little incentive for them to change. Just complaining by itself does absolutely nothing to a company the size of Google. You need to actually follow it up by using your limited power as a consumer to support an alternative. Only then, and if enough people do the same, will the first company consider making changes. If they don’t, at least you are supporting an alternative project and helping it to improve so that it may one day feel like less of compromise.

    • T (they/she)@beehaw.org
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      7 months ago

      I always try to keep in mind there are a lot of people that are simply unable to transition to alternative apps because they lack knowledge and time to do research on such things. What we see through videos isn’t the majority of the people, it is people that make content for the majority.

      People have hard times getting into more technical stuff already. Expecting people that are struggling to survive in capitalism to spend their free time learning about underground alternatives or to turn into sys admins and host their own stuff is out of touch if reality in my opinion.

      Edit: just wanted to add, I wouldn’t say the problem is on the people, but on big tech that predates on them

      • Ilandar@aussie.zone
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        7 months ago

        Those people aren’t complaining. The guy in the video specifically mentioned Open Street Maps as an alternative, but only in the context of “well maybe one day Google will go in this direction”. He has zero interest in actually switching and ends up making a bunch or excuses justifying his Google Maps usage. He is not trying to be part of a solution here, he is just whining.

    • Substance_P@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      The problem for me is when someone sends me a location pin it is almost always a Google map link. I have the same issue with people in my community using whatsapp.

      • Ilandar@aussie.zone
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        7 months ago

        Can’t you just open that in a web browser? Take the address, put it in an alternative map app. Problem solved.

        • Substance_P@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          I guess you are right, for me I just try to avoid all Google links and products in the first place. I understand that you can tweak privacy controls and settings that allow you to manage how your data with Google is collected, I could also use a privacy browser or incognito, but my main issue is not giving any of these juggernaut corporations a chance to swing and cash in on my personal data.

          • Ilandar@aussie.zone
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            7 months ago

            Sorry, I’m a bit confused. Is your problem that you feel forced to use Google Maps? Or that you feel forced to ignore your friends because they use Google Maps? I assumed the former with my initial reply, but now it sounds like your have the latter problem.

            • Substance_P@lemmy.world
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              7 months ago

              I’m not ignoring my friends; I’m just pointing out that due to the convenience of these apps, the people around me use them without seeming to care about their privacy implications.

              • Ilandar@aussie.zone
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                7 months ago

                Is that actually a problem for you? It’s their life, they are free to do whatever they want. I’m trying to understand how this actually affects you since your original reply started with “the problem for me is…”.

    • SomeGuy69@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Which GoogleMaps alternative has user reviews? I downloaded organic maps suggested here and there are no reviews. When I’m in a new town I need to know where I can and where I shouldn’t eat, shop or stay. At least there are some icons on organic maps, but that’s it.

      • Ilandar@aussie.zone
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        7 months ago

        The “user” reviews on Google Maps (and similar platforms like Yelp) can be fake. Go to the Fake Review Watch channel on YouTube or visit their website if you want to see real examples of this. This is a service that businesses of all sizes, all over the world are paying for - sometimes on a massive scale.

        However if you still really want to rely on Google reviews, use GMaps WV.

        • SomeGuy69@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          Not when you’re new in an unknown city. In my local city the ratings still make sense, I compared it with my own experience, so why would that change drastically elsewhere? It’s often the only option you have, visiting every website individually is too time consuming and doesn’t tell you anything about the service either. I bet even you look at reviews. It’s easy to say their are faked but there is no non faked alternative.

          • drkt@lemmy.dbzer0.com
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            7 months ago

            what the f are you doing that you need to vet this many businesses in such a short time span?

            I seriously don’t look at the reviews; I don’t even use google maps because it’s useless to me as a pedestrian.

            • Onse@lemmy.ml
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              7 months ago

              Visit a new city and spontaneously finding a good restaurant matching your criteria. I heavily rely on reviews for this usecase as well as being able to search e.g. for „vegan restaurants“ in a certain area, which also matches reviews with the word in it.

  • kbal@fedia.io
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    7 months ago

    Normal people: Gladly give google maps access to location data at all times and never think about it

    Me: Instinctively worry that on the rare occasions I do use google maps it’s somehow identifying me and keeping track of all the locations I look at, so I sometimes look at random places I’m not really interested in just to throw off the algorithms.

    But most of the time I prefer osmand.

    • SomeAmateur@sh.itjust.works
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      7 months ago

      Osmand is really cool and it’s really capable but I understand that it isn’t for people who don’t want to tinker a bit to make things work just right for them.

      For that Organic Maps is what I recommend.

        • tuhriel
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          7 months ago

          I usually use OsmAND for my motorbike tours where I love the adaptable UI. But importing round trips is a big hit or miss, where most of the time it just skips all intermediary stops

          And for daily “driving” (hehe) I do miss some traffic info :-(

        • SomeAmateur@sh.itjust.works
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          7 months ago

          Idk how the new user experience is now but back when I first downloaded it I wanted a hybrid of sat imagery when cell signal allowed, with an overlay of offline OSM data. This was for two reasons, hiking and to see if the mapping in that hike area needed any major land use edits.

          Anyway I had to fiddle with the menus and settings for a while to get the overlays where I wanted it to be. Don’t get me wrong I was able to figure it out but for users who want to install and go it can be understandably frustrating

    • mojo_raisin@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Or have your phone location turned on and be super boring back and forth. When you deviate use a burner.

    • refalo@programming.dev
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      7 months ago

      You: thinking they weren’t already tracking you by a zillion other means including wifi/bt and cellular triangulation

      Me: google-free wifi-only phone with all radios/mic/camera physically disconnected unless I need something specific

    • utopiah@lemmy.ml
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      7 months ago

      Normal people: Gladly give google maps access to location data at all times and never think about it

      Yet also same normal people get utterly genuinely shock when they see a map of their past locations for the last 3 months.

    • Fleppensteyn@feddit.nl
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      7 months ago

      Giving it a try since I haven’t heard of this.

      It seems to have cool options, but for navigation it’s just completely unusable.

    • Dog@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Who in their right mind would charge a subscription fee to download and/or update maps?

      Edit: I only found out about this after my father downloaded the app on his phone, and it said he only has 5 downloads remaining before downloading the map for my state. It’s extremely dumb for a “privacy focused maps app”

      • oddsys@lemmy.world
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        7 months ago

        Only from walled garden app stores, the full unrestricted OSMAnd APK is available for free without restrictions from fdroid

        • Dog@lemmy.world
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          7 months ago

          But isn’t it open sourced? Can’t they have like a buymeacoffee? Not lock the most important feature behind a paywall?

          • kudos@lemmy.ml
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            7 months ago

            It’s not locked, build it yourself or download the apk from fdroid. If that is too complicated for you (or anyone else), maybe pay for the service being provided then?

            • Dog@lemmy.world
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              7 months ago

              Ahh yes, let me install an Android PacKage on an iPhone

              • AFaithfulNihilist@lemmy.world
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                7 months ago

                That just goes with a territory of having an iPhone. When you bought that device you signed on to a culture of consumption that is enforced by the developer of that device.

                The developer can’t force Apple to let the developer give it to you for free. Apple doesn’t tolerate free very well and anything that is free on Apple is likely either a privacy nightmare or is paid for by some subscription you have with Apple.

                This isn’t a problem with the app It’s a problem with the Apple.

              • kudos@lemmy.ml
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                7 months ago

                If only there was some alternative like paying for the software you use 🙄

      • delirious_owl@discuss.online
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        7 months ago

        If you really want to you can just download them outside the app for free. I like that it provides a free option for those with more time than money and a paid option for those with more money than time.

    • Ebby@lemmy.ssba.com
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      7 months ago

      Google saw neat idea, built cool software, users happy. Replace cars to generate map data with phones for utmost accuracy. Trends of maximizing profit from cool technology makes users sad and services suck like other popular sites. Host begs Google not to make maps suck next.

    • The Snark Urge@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Every free tech service can be (notionally) graded on how much value it offers for how much of your data it sucks up and monetizes. Most of the time we see an initial high value that gradually decreases as the developer gets greedy.

      Google maps has managed to become Google “best” service, but it’s important to be aware of the scale of problem we’ll see if they start squeezing it for increasing profits, since it sucks up so much of our data and manages to be so useful.

      That’s the bulk of it, but there were other points being made about solving for edge cases that seem less central to the point.

    • Kairos@lemmy.today
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      7 months ago

      Google has a massive leg up in its technology and use cases so everyone uses it. The guy described it as a “1%” problem (as in the last percent of use cases that are hard to add to the app) and Google doesn’t have as many of those.

  • FriendBesto@lemmy.ml
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    7 months ago

    Most people into Privacy, either stumbled upon the niche or work(ed) in some IT or related field. Have tried talking to the family, they are in denial or do not care. Or think that using WhatsApp is a wise choice and/or they are immune to ads. Somehow. It’s like talking to a goat who has more desire for habit over sense.

    I remember playing with Google Now, thinking it ‘neat’ and then within seconds realizing that in order for it to work optimally meant giving Google everything. It got me to root my phone and removed Goople Play Services and/or different ROMs. Today, I do not use Google for anything or use front-ends with a VPN or if ever really needed, Tor.

    Organic maps or OSMAnd. Plus, I find these two better for cycling and hiking, over Gmaps. If you must use Gmaps briefly, then GMaps WV from F-Droid.

  • ben_dover@lemmy.world
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    7 months ago

    what’s a good alternative if one’s using GMaps mainly for travelling instead of navigation (i.e. looking up nearby restaurants and getting reviews, public transport, attractions and their opening hours, etc.)?

    • Possibly linux@lemmy.zip
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      7 months ago

      Organic maps is what I use. Keep in mind OSM is built by the community so in places with lower tech literacy it will incomplete

    • blurg@lemmy.world
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      7 months ago

      Used to know someone who looked for cars around a restaurant, or long lines waiting to get into a tiny cafe, asked wait staff for interesting places they liked to go; went into non-chain stores where locals shopped (off the main streets); asked walkers and service station workers for directions. Always had wild stories about what happened, if you could get past their private nature. Weird fucker, unpredictable, never could get used to’m. Likeable enough, though.

  • utopiah@lemmy.ml
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    7 months ago

    I for one don’t talk about it… because I don’t use Google Maps. I briefly mention OSM or CityMapper when people send me GoogleMaps links but otherwise better to show than tell IMHO.