I already posted this over in the v3 group, so perhaps people can go over there <https://groups.google.com/forum/#!forum/google-maps-js-api-v3> to respond.
>From the latest post over at the geo developers blog - http://googlegeodevelopers.blogspot.com/2011/04/updates-to-google-maps-apigoogle-earth.html it would seem that users of the free google maps api will now no longer have a choice as to whether to include ad layers or ad information on their maps. The blog doesn't really reveal in what form these ads might be displayed, but as a user of the maps api, primarily for display or collection of scientific data, I really don't want my users being distracted or worse, confused by such advertising. Unfortunately we're not 501c3, but we're not making money on these apps either. I see that we would qualify as an existing app, and as such could "opt-out" as a grandfathered application, but I feel like this decision could very well alienate both future users, making them groan when they see a google map in an application, knowing they'll need to ignore ads, and developers, who are going to start putting energy into other mapping platforms (of which there are now several really good alternatives) , especially when it comes to using maps in applications where a user is logged in, and expects that the information on the map is coming from that application. I hope that perhaps these points might be moot, if a design is reached that provides apps in a very unobtrusive way, but I'm wondering how others feel about this, and whether it would be worth starting a public petition to either reveal the designs for these new ads, or to stop this process altogether. -- You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups "Google Maps API V2" group. To post to this group, send email to [email protected]. To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [email protected]. For more options, visit this group at http://groups.google.com/group/google-maps-api?hl=en.
