Today is a new day in France.
According to French law, it is now strictly forbidden to use a navigation system that give the exact position of police and radars.
The Penalty is : 1500 € and 6 points deduct from licence driver (among 12 points). :shock:
Due to this very uggly law, we will have to take care of the use of waze.
Would it be possible to have a button or equivalent that permits to close the apps in one touch ?
Actually, we need to press twice on the screen… And in case of police, this is too long and can be seen by policemen.
A “one click close apps button” would be greatly appreciated.
The law says :
During 4 km long, there is an alert on freeways to say there is a danger inside
During 2 km long, there is an alert on off-town roads to say there is a danger inside
During 300 m long, there is an alert on city-roads to say there is a danger inside
A danger could be a speedlimit change, a speedtrap, a big turn… But, the words “speedtrap” and “police” are now forbidden in a navigation system; and the position can’t be mentionned, it should be an interval, a distance where the “danger” inside (4km, 2km or 300m in function of the road type)
Now the problem is that waze seem to be forbiden in France.
In a first time, I think that a “Quick Shutdown button” is a temporary solution… And then we will need a software modification…
I know it is probably the ability to, that they are legislating…
But maybe as a stopgap, you turn off the display of the human based reports (hazards, police, chit chat). Yes you can still access them, but it can show that you at least attempted to not take advantage of it.
I think this needs to be addressed on the submitting reports end. If country of Waze use = France, do not allow Police and speed camera alerts to be submitted.
Agreed. Might need to email Waze HQ as they’re probably not aware of the new legislation. Last thing French Wazers need is their licence revoked. Can’t imagine what would happen here!
I’m french, and don’t want waze restricted… Maybe we can have more settings to define witch alerts we wants or not.
i.e. All GPS systems like TOMTOM can be used, but alerts for police must be removed from the TOMTOM.
If waze lost its functionnalities bec. I’m in France, I uninstall Waze and use another software.
That would be sad if that were to happen. However, Waze may have no choice if faced with being removed completely from the App Store if it retains “user-selectable functionality.”
It seems that the trend with this is for Apple to remove the app first, and ask questions later. If they get a formal request from the government of France, Apple is likely going to remove Waze since it is not in compliance with this law.
So Waze can try to get ahead of this by making the App compliant, wait to see what happens, or have updates ready just in case.
It seems to me that France is an important market to Waze and they won’t want their application deemed illegal there.
Sure, but similar situation. Although I am not a familiar with how Google deals with these types of requests to remove applications from the Android Marketplace.
I totally agree, as this not only effects French residents but also anyone traveling through France. This needs to be done quickly to prevent unnecessary problems with the French police.
Unless the Euro version of Google Maps is different than the US version, GM doesn’t give voice navigation. The interface to get text based navigation isn’t very user friendly either. It’s great to use as a map, but terrible for navigation. I’ve also found that GM in the US, whether on the iPhone or on the computer, is the least reliable for correct street names.
That’s the Waze advantage…if there are good editors in the area, they’re the most accurate and up-to-date maps you can get.
