New maps seem better today.

February 15, 2012

I just wanted to say a big thank you to whoever has been working on the maps. Maps seem to be loading better and faster today. I can scroll in closer than I could yesterday with the aerial views. Thank You! Thank You! Thank You! The quality of maps here at GC.Com was always a favorite feature of mine. Didn't realize it until it all went away. I hope the improvements will continue.

February 15, 2012

I disagree. It's not the map loading that is slow (although it is much slower than Google mps), the problem is when I move the map and new caches pop up on the map, I can't get any info from them for a very long time. I can see the icon, but hovering my mouse over them does nothing. Clicking does nothing. Moving them closer to the center of the screen does nothing. I have to zoom in one level to get it come come "alive". It's extremely irritating.

BRING BACK GOOGLE MAPS!

3.1k · February 15, 2012

Oddly, I wasn't having much problem with the new maps yesterday (other than no aerial view). Today, however, I experienced the incredibly slow load times that others have complained about. If I turned off "My Hides," all the cache icons (hides, found, unfound) disappeared for a very long time. Only the first two or three "Filterable Cache Types" appeared on the left. Only the outline of the zoom controls were visible. And if I dragged-and-dropped the map, I had to wait and wait for the new cache icons to appear. Arg!

At the moment, however, all appears to be well again (other than no aerial). Keeping my fingers crossed.

Edited February 15, 2012 by CanadianRockies

7.3k · February 15, 2012

BRING BACK GOOGLE MAPS!

That's not going to happen, so why yell?

We knew this was coming, we knew that Google wanted to start gouging charging for the use of their maps....what do you want Groundspeak to do about it? Start paying the ransom fees demanded by Google? Really???

B.

February 15, 2012

BRING BACK GOOGLE MAPS!

That's not going to happen, so why yell?

Because the Chief in me likes to yell sometimes.

February 15, 2012

Aeriel doesn't work at all for me!!!!

1.9k · February 16, 2012

I just wanted to say a big thank you to whoever has been working on the maps. Maps seem to be loading better and faster today. I can scroll in closer than I could yesterday with the aerial views. Thank You! Thank You! Thank You! The quality of maps here at GC.Com was always a favorite feature of mine. Didn't realize it until it all went away. I hope the improvements will continue.

they're getting faster because people are getting frustrated and quitting geocaching or going to other listing sites so traffic to those servers is lower.

I for one won't be renewing unless the google maps come back[fat chance]

4.2k · February 16, 2012

Aeriel doesn't work at all for me!!!!

Well, she is a princess...

February 16, 2012

Mapquest is still running very slow and is still useless. Like others, I too will NOT be renewing my subscription and will probably move to Opencaching.com.

February 16, 2012

Fortunately geocaching is more about being in the field somewhere with GPSr in hand solving puzzles and signing logs than looking at maps online. Maps are secondary...they don't fulfill the sense of adventure or put a smile on my kids' faces when they find the cache. This will blow over...eventually. And then we can all get back to the real purpose of the greatest pastime.

2.6k · February 16, 2012

Wow, everybody's jumping ship pretty quick, aren't they? It has already been explained that the problem lies with Google, not Groundspeak. They jacked up their fees for map views to a point that was unreasonable.

I think patience is called for here...I don't believe the Google maps are coming back, so everybody just needs to drop that issue. As the OP stated, the maps started out crappy the first day but they do seem to be getting better. I'm sure it will take them a little time to improve the product.

If everyone wants to go over to Opencaching, by all means go ahead. I don't know about your areas, but there are like 5 OC caches in all of Louisiana. Personally, I'd like to do a little more caching than that.

February 16, 2012

Fortunately geocaching is more about being in the field somewhere with GPSr in hand solving puzzles and signing logs than looking at maps online. Maps are secondary...they don't fulfill the sense of adventure or put a smile on my kids' faces when they find the cache. This will blow over...eventually. And then we can all get back to the real purpose of the greatest pastime.

Well done!

Bravo!

Hear hear!

Kia ora!

Geocaching isn't about the quality of maps when you are day dreaming in front of the PC. It's about using a GPS to find the cache.

February 16, 2012

Having satellite imagery does help when planning the trip, though. I fractured my ankle on New Years Eve (geocaching, of course). I have kept my streak alive by scrutinizing the sat imagery so that I don't put myself into an area where I would risk making it worse. I have well over 200 finds since that happened (including 83 in one day!) because I carefully plan my finds based on terrain. Cache owners generally put accurate terrain ratings on their caches, but not always.

19k · February 16, 2012

Groundspeak is not the only one that has had to make this change. Nestoria, a property search engine has ditched them because of the cost, and also switched to OpenStreet Maps and Mapquest: http://blog.nestoria.co.uk/why-and-how-weve-switched-away-from-google-ma

The New York City real estate site, StreetEasy also switched:

I'm sure there are others that have had to make the same decision.

14k · February 17, 2012

Groundspeak is not the only one that has had to make this change. Nestoria, a property search engine has ditched them because of the cost, and also switched to OpenStreet Maps and Mapquest: http://blog.nestoria.co.uk/why-and-how-weve-switched-away-from-google-ma

The New York City real estate site, StreetEasy also switched:

I'm sure there are others that have had to make the same decision.

I had to check and see if zillow.com (another real estate site that is somewhat eye opening from the amount if information it provides) but they're using Bing maps (I assume that they always did).

6k · February 17, 2012

Mapquest is still running very slow and is still useless. Like others, I too will NOT be renewing my subscription and will probably move to Opencaching.com.

What are you going to do after you get both caches they have in your area.

8.3k · February 17, 2012

Mapquest is still running very slow and is still useless. Like others, I too will NOT be renewing my subscription and will probably move to Opencaching.com.

What are you going to do after you get both caches they have in your area.

make a bunch of new names and steal listings off of geocaching.com and list them over there. Then you have more to find. Been happening around here. But it still amazes me that some how folks still think maps were part of the subscription. Guess they bothered to see what they were getting for their money.

2.4k · February 17, 2012

Mapquest is still running very slow and is still useless. Like others, I too will NOT be renewing my subscription and will probably move to Opencaching.com.

I'm sorry, but this is really funny.

So you expect better there?

:laughing: :laughing:

2.4k · February 17, 2012

I haven't had a problem with the maps.

They are working fine for me.

Are they perfect? No. They never were and never will be, here or at any other site.

They work just great for me playing the game I love, which is finding tupperware in the woods with multi-million dollar satellites. It's a good game.

I use it every time I get stressed out.

It's really helped with a lot of stress in my life.

I get stressed, I go caching.

You might want to try it.

Get stressed about maps? Go out and go caching. You'll feel much better and realize it's not really a big deal if they are not perfect. Nothing is.

6k · February 18, 2012

Mapquest is still running very slow and is still useless. Like others, I too will NOT be renewing my subscription and will probably move to Opencaching.com.

I'm sorry, but this is really funny.

So you expect better there?

:laughing: :laughing:

The expression that comes to mind is "cut off your nose to spite your face"

February 18, 2012

Faster??? I just checked it out:

MapQuest X

CloudMade V

MapQuest Areal X

OpenStreetMaps V (However that not all the streets are on the maps here. Not even streets of 30 years ago <_< )

OpenCycleMaps V

My Topo X

X: no fast loading, not even building the map good

V: Good maploading and mapbuilding

Personal I liked the Google generated maps better, but with this ones it works just fine. For making the maploading time better, I think there will be a good teamwork needed between the people of geocaching.com and the people of the map-sites.

February 18, 2012

The new maps are a big step down from the old maps. The google based maps had better detail. When I go caching in a new area I like to print a map of the area to take with me. The new maps have no street names until you get to a level that is too close to be useful for navigation. The old maps had street names at a zoom level that was farther out, making it easy to navigate while I was caching in an unknown area.

I really liked the old Google maps. The new maps are a short step above useless. I hope there will be enhancements to make the new maps more useful.

February 18, 2012

The new maps are a big step down from the old maps. The google based maps had better detail. When I go caching in a new area I like to print a map of the area to take with me. The new maps have no street names until you get to a level that is too close to be useful for navigation. The old maps had street names at a zoom level that was farther out, making it easy to navigate while I was caching in an unknown area.

I really liked the old Google maps. The new maps are a short step above useless. I hope there will be enhancements to make the new maps more useful.

AMEN :anitongue:

February 18, 2012

I sure seem to be in the minority here, but I love the new maps. I primarily use the maps to view pocket queries, and when done with the previous maps, my results would get lost due to the map showing every cache. It works perfectly for me with the new maps. If I want some more detail for whatever reason, I find it easy enough to click on the Google Earth viewer.

2.7k · February 19, 2012

All the "new" maps seem to load slower than Google Maps. I've noticed that the time of day is a also a factor. Once GS has it's own OpenStreetMaps Tile Server the OpenStreetMaps should load a lot faster.

February 19, 2012

it takes time to tweak things, I'm sure it will all get sorted out. Give them a week or two.

February 19, 2012

I gave the new maps a few days to work out. I like the road map and can zoom in on that nicely. The Cloud Made and Mapquest Aerial are still completely useless if you try to zoom in. (Im using an iMac with Safari, Firefox and Chrome) To think that Groundspeak would be satisfied with this would be un expectable for me as a customer. The Mapquest satellite images seem to be working fine on their site.

So some sort of server problem is the issue here, correct? Sure Google Maps are great as that is what 90% of us are used to., and use every day for for important things that are not geocaching related. Paying more on the consumers part is not acceptable to me . The price point and valu is completely different to every single person who pays the fee to use the site. I believe that Groundspeak is trying to fix the issue here. Yes it sucks and yes I and im sure thousands more are very disappointed. We pay to play and have the right to complain or switch to another site. There is only one other listing site that has any worth and it is NOT the Garmin .com site thats for sure. IMO

Lets hope they get the issue resolved soon

February 19, 2012

For the Firefox users there are scripts of greasemonkey that will take away this problem of the new maps. It gives us back the Google maps. I'm mobile now so can't post the link, but I'll come back at this or search for the new topic that eerste 'bout this.

February 19, 2012

For the Firefox users there are scripts of greasemonkey that will take away this problem of the new maps. It gives us back the Google maps. I'm mobile now so can't post the link, but I'll come back at this or search for the new topic that goes 'bout this.

Edited February 19, 2012 by RHCV

1.5k · February 19, 2012

For the Firefox users there are scripts of greasemonkey that will take away this problem of the new maps. It gives us back the Google maps. I'm mobile now so can't post the link, but I'll come back at this or search for the new topic that goes 'bout this.

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showtopic=290741

February 19, 2012

For the Firefox users there are scripts of greasemonkey that will take away this problem of the new maps. It gives us back the Google maps. I'm mobile now so can't post the link, but I'll come back at this or search for the new topic that goes 'bout this.

http://forums.Groundspeak.com/GC/index.php?showtopic=290741

Thanks for the link! ;-)

New maps seem better today.

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