TomTom Sends MapShare Corrections to Tele Atlas
TomTom today announced that they will be doing what a lot of customers assumed they had been doing since the introduction of MapShare– sending the corrections received back to Tele Atlas so they can be checked out and incorporated into the official map.
Until now, you could make changes through MapShare and they would be available on your own TomTom device. You could also elect to share those changes with other TomTom users who were running on the same map. The problem is that unless Tele Atlas happened to find the same map error at the same time, the error would come back again when the next map was released as they start with a “clean slate” so to speak with regards to user submitted corrections.
Now Tele Atlas will receive those reports, and TomTom owners will not have to double-submit the correction to both MapShare and MapInsight, the Tele Atlas tool for submitting map corrections directly to them.
So TomTom is turning over millions of correction suggestions to Tele Atlas, and Tele Atlas says the first changes as a result of MapShare will become available in Q4 of 2008. Therefore it will likely be around the January 2009 timeframe when that map becomes available for TomTom devices.
“As promised, the transfer of this feedback marks the first tangible deliverable following TomTom’s acquisition of Tele Atlas,” said Harold Goddijn, CEO of the new combined entity. “It will ensure that everybody can benefit from this community feedback, and the amount we have received is staggering. On average, by the end of 2008, if you drive anywhere for one hour with a Tele Atlas map enhanced by Map Share feedback, your route will be influenced by more than 20 corrections.”
The last figure is particularly staggering to me, and one of the reasons I’ve been a believer in the MapShare concept. (You can also read MapShare In Action).
