Google Maps is great for A to B. I love it. Use it even if I know the route since traffic can be a pain. It appears fast for me. I'm very much disconnected from what the post says. I've used DOS, Windows 3.1, Windows 95 and so on. Now I'm on Mac and Fedora. Never will look back.
Let's remember here that most operations were executed against a cache of data on the local system. That cache is way too big to store on the local system nowadays, so of course we are going contact a server to perform the operations and we will experience network latency that will vary. US internet speed has stagnated. Some time in the future, if typical ISPs don't get their way and we get faster and faster connection speed then these latency complaints will be irrelevant.
Developers could do better in sending less data in general, but that will take more time. Does product management care much about latency if they are not given the mandate? We seem to all want features and more features, but less of the cruft that follows as a result of development, which is weird. Best way to vote in the end is to just build your own application however you can. Waze's features would have never made it into Google Maps if users were not using them instead of Google Maps.
Let's remember here that most operations were executed against a cache of data on the local system. That cache is way too big to store on the local system nowadays, so of course we are going contact a server to perform the operations and we will experience network latency that will vary. US internet speed has stagnated. Some time in the future, if typical ISPs don't get their way and we get faster and faster connection speed then these latency complaints will be irrelevant.
Developers could do better in sending less data in general, but that will take more time. Does product management care much about latency if they are not given the mandate? We seem to all want features and more features, but less of the cruft that follows as a result of development, which is weird. Best way to vote in the end is to just build your own application however you can. Waze's features would have never made it into Google Maps if users were not using them instead of Google Maps.