Waze

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
Jump to: navigation, search
Waze
Waze logo.png
Developer(s) Waze Mobile
Stable release 3.6 (iOS and Android); 2.1 (other platforms) / February 27, 2013
Operating system Android, BlackBerry OS (beta), iOS, Symbian, Maemo, Windows Mobile
Type GPS navigation software
License Software and Maps: Proprietary
Website http://waze.com

Waze is a free social GPS application featuring turn-by-turn navigation, developed by the Israeli start-up Waze Mobile for GPS-enabled smartphones with a data plan. Waze supports Android, iPhone, Symbian, Windows Mobile (but not Windows Phone), and J2ME (RIM).[1]

Waze won the Best Overall Mobile App award at the 2013 Mobile World Congress, beating Dropbox, Flipboard and others.[2]

Contents

History [edit]

Waze Ltd. was founded in 2008 in Israel by Uri Levine, software engineer Ehud Shabtai, and Amir Shinar. The company was originally called Linqmap. In December 2011 Waze employed 80 people, 70 at Ra'anana, Israel and 10 in Palo Alto, California.[3][4][5][6]

In 2010 the company raised $25 million in the second round of funding.[7] In 2011, the company, which plans to monetize through location based advertising and to expand into Asia, raised an additional $30 million in financing.[8]

Facebook is reportedly in discussions to spend over US$ 1 billion dollars to purchase Waze.[9]

Overview [edit]

The Waze app with visible users, traffic volume, and noted red-light cameras

Waze differs from traditional GPS navigation software as it is a community-driven application and learns from users' driving times to provide routing and real-time traffic updates.[10] It is also free to download and use, as it gathers map data and other information from users who use the service. Additionally, people can report accidents, traffic jams, speed traps, police and can update roads, landmarks, house numbers, etc. Waze also helps users find the cheapest, closest gas station around them or along their route. As of January 2012, the app has been downloaded 12 million times worldwide.[11][8] In July 2012, Waze announced that it had reached 20 million users, half of those gained over the previous six months.[12]

Waze is available for download and use anywhere in the world, but while some countries have a full basemap, other countries still require users to record the roads and edit the maps. Currently Waze has a complete base map in the United States, Canada, United Kingdom, France, Germany, Italy, Netherlands, Belgium, Israel (claimed to be the best map for that country[13]), South Africa,[14] Ecuador, (parts of) Argentina, Chile and Panama, but the company has plans to make it available in other countries in Europe and elsewhere.[15][16]

In addition to turn-by-turn voice navigation, real-time traffic, and other location-specific alerts, Waze simultaneously sends anonymous information, including users' speed and location, back to its database to improve the service as a whole. This crowdsourcing allows the Waze community to report navigation and mapping errors and traffic accidents simply by running the app while driving. Waze uses cupcakes and other gaming conventions to further engage users, allowing users to drive over icons of cupcakes and other road goodies located in certain locations to earn points. The mini-games encourage more user involvement and competition, and that means more valuable road information for the users and the database where those details are otherwise slim or lacking. In addition to mini games, Waze offers points every time a user reports traffic or road hazards. These points can be used to change the users avatar, and to "level up" one's status in the community.[17]

In 2011, Waze Mobile updated the software to display real-time, community-curated points of interest, including local events such as street fairs and protests.[18]

In June 2012, Waze launched an update to provide real-time fuel prices. As with any other Waze real-time updates, prices are submitted by their users.[19]

According to Waze, there were 20 million users in June 2012, having doubled in 6 months. Over 3.2 billion miles had been driven by Waze users.[20]

Patents [edit]

  • US Patent 7,936,284. System and method for parking time estimations. Issued May 3, 2011.

Licensing [edit]

Although the Waze v2.x software was distributed under GNU General Public License v2, this license does not extend to map data.[21] Free map data published under open content licenses was available before the Waze project began, but Waze CEO Noam Bardin felt that Waze was fundamentally different from projects like OpenStreetMap and was wary of map data licensing that would restrict commercialization of the Waze service.[22] Starting with Waze v3.х the program switched to a proprietary license.[23]

Source [edit]

The last open source client version for the Android Operating System is 2.4.[24]

References [edit]

  1. ^ Waze FAQs
  2. ^ Hoffman, Tzahi (February 27, 2013). "Waze wins Best Mobile App award in Barcelona". Globes. Retrieved February 28, 2013. 
  3. ^ Blum, Brian (19 December 2011). "Waze steers you clear of traffic". Israel21c. Retrieved 22 March 2012. 
  4. ^ Hoge, Patrick (18 October 2011). "Waze raises $30 million". San Francisco Business Times. Retrieved 22 March 2012. 
  5. ^ "Company Overview of Waze Ltd.". Bloomberg Businessweek. Retrieved 22 March 2012. 
  6. ^ Singh, Sukasha (16 March 2012). "Social network paves the Waze". TechCentral. Mail & Guardian. Retrieved 22 March 2012. 
  7. ^ Waze revs up crowdsourced driving app with $25M. Venturebeat. December 7, 2010
  8. ^ a b Devindra Hardawar. Waze raises $30M for its crowdsourced driving app, hits 7M users. Forbes, October 18, 2011
  9. ^ Facebook to purchase Waze
  10. ^ Terdiman, Daniel (2009-08-06). "CNET News - Waze iPhone app provides real-time, crowdsourced traffic data". News.cnet.com. Retrieved 2012-09-25. 
  11. ^ Gilbert, Jason (9 Feb 2012). "Waze, A Free GPS Driving App, Features Spoken Turn-By-Turn Directions And User Input". The Huffington Post. 
  12. ^ Lardinois, Frederic. July 5, 2012. "Waze Doubles Its User Base To 20 Million In 6 Months." http://techcrunch.com/2012/07/05/waze-20-million/
  13. ^ "Community car GPS navigation - WAZE - at DEMOfall09". YouTube. 2009-09-27. Retrieved 2012-09-25. 
  14. ^ "Waze Blog - Waze launches in South Africa". Waze.com. 2012-03-14. Retrieved 2012-09-25. 
  15. ^ "Waze Blog - Waze now available internationally – put your country on the map!". Waze.com. 2009-11-10. Retrieved 2012-09-25. 
  16. ^ "Waze Forum - European Maps Schedule Update". Waze.com. Retrieved 2012-09-25. 
  17. ^ Furchgott, Roy (2010-05-06). "Waze in a New York Times blog". Wheels.blogs.nytimes.com. Retrieved 2012-09-25. 
  18. ^ "Waze Introduces Redesigned App for iPad, iPhone & iPod touch, Steering Drivers from Local Search to Local Discovery". Sfgate.com. 2011-10-13. Retrieved 2012-09-25. 
  19. ^ Ha, Anthony. June 20, 2012. "Navigation App Waze Adds Real-Time Fuel Prices." http://techcrunch.com/2012/06/20/waze-fuel/
  20. ^ waze.com, July 5, 2012 "Waze Hits 20 Million Users!" http://www.waze.com/blog/waze-hits-20-million-users/
  21. ^ "Waze Terms of Use". Waze.com. 2012-05-31. Retrieved 2012-09-25. 
  22. ^ Brady Forrest (2009-08-14). "O'Reilly Radar - Waze: Make Your Own Maps in Realtime". Radar.oreilly.com. Retrieved 2012-09-25. 
  23. ^ "Waze вече няма да е под GPL. Затваря си сорс кода. » Корабен дневник на MiCRoPhoBIC". Tonev.net. 2012-06-30. Retrieved 2012-09-25. 
  24. ^ "Waze Wiki Source code". Waze.com. 2012-04-29. Retrieved 2012-09-25. 

External links [edit]

Retrieved from "http://en.wikipedia.org/w/index.php?title=Waze&oldid=555413517"