A new application from AT&T brings voice activated, turn-by-turn navigation to the iPhone. That’s right, AT&T. Now you know that, take a guess as to how you might be paying for this application. A free “thank you” download to iPhone owners? No. An expensive but one-time payment of around $50? Nope.
AT&T, greedy-guts that it is, will charge you $10 per month for a rather pedestrian (ahem) GPS application, which makes it, along with Sirius Radio, one of the first apps to make use of the new in-application payments allowed in iPhone OS 3.
So what, exactly, do you get if you pay AT&T yet another $10 a month for your iPhone? First, the app is kind of voice activated: You can set a destination by talking to the unit, which is arguably the time you need voice control the least — at the beginning of a journey. The maps scroll by in 3D, as you’d expect, and there are voice instructions which issue from the iPhone. You also get routing around traffic problems and can search for nearby ATMs and the like.
Is it worth it? Well, you can buy a $40 (2 x $20) pair of apps that cover the whole of North America and do essentially the same thing without the monthly fee. But the up-to date maps and info it might make it worth $10 per month for many people. The problem, though, is that it’s AT&T, so this just looks like more money grabbing from the telco overlord.
Product page [iTunes]
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