RIP iGuidance: Onward With Disruption

by Paul Greenberg

I received the following email this morning:

Dear iGuidance Customers:

It is with great sadness that we have come to the decision that iGuidance will no longer be developed. We want to thank you for your support in the past 10 years as we certainly couldn’t have done it without you. Special appreciation and thanks go to customers who purchased iGuidance since the beginning and continued to encourage us and supported us all the way.

iGuidance was the first GPS system I ever used with a smartphone. In 2005, I had a Samsung i730 smartphone that ran the Pocket PC OS (the precursor to Windows Mobile 5); using the iGuidance software required a separate bluetooth GPS receiver, since those receivers weren’t built in to phones yet. Maps were loaded on to an SD card and not changed for years at a time. Even so, getting spoken driving directions from my phone at that time was pure magic. Here’s that powerful baby:

samsung_i730_verizon_z1

Today this archaic system becomes more roadkill on the path the current smartphone has taken, along with many other stand-alone products: digital camera, stopwatch, alarm clock, credit/loyalty cards (soon), radio (?), book (?), TV (?), etc.

However, as disappointing as this is for many current business owners, as a consumer I’m thrilled to have everything contained in one device. Having a single collection of apps that serve so many functions is superbly convenient, and new concepts like iOS’s Passbook — where I can keep all my loyalty cards and boarding passes; Square — where I can store my credit cards; and Dropbox — where I can store all my files — can’t mature fast enough for me. I’d love not to have to carry my wallet everywhere and still have access to all of that information available on my phone from the cloud. Similarly, I can’t wait until I can easily access every file I want or need (text, photo, audio, video, etc.) on a second’s notice. We’re getting there, but there are still hurdles that we need to overcome.

So onward with disruption. As quickly as possible.