What’s Mappening 🗺️🇺🇸

👀 TLDR

In this week’s What’s Appening, we cover the usually-calm-but-now-tumultuous world of map apps. From Apple launching its first adverts inside Maps (to some criticism) to the fallout over the naming of Lake Ontario/America, we’re all about maps this week. We also have news on TIME’s list of the most influential people in AI, which has some very big omissions and weird inclusions. We cover a new AI tool helping fight heart disease, an app that brings over 40,000 books to kids, Meta’s huge settlement, and lots more!

🎬 Our Top Take

📱📵 Map Apps – Apple Launches Ads and MapQuest Gets Great Lake Boost

Back in the spring, Apple launched Apple Business, which, among other things, was its way of telling you it’s going to put adverts into everything – Siri, Mail, Wallet and Maps. Ads in the latter launched this week, and while not completely annoying or intrusive, it does feel un-Apple-like, while also drawing criticism about user privacy. Some users have called for opt-outs for paid iCloud account holders. Others are simply disappointed that the adage, “Every Big Tech Company Becomes an Ad Tech Company,” now applies to Apple. In other ‘maps news’, there is the renaming of Lake Ontario to Lake America. Now, we usually don’t hold any truck with the political side of things, but we have been keen to see the reaction, and the winners and losers. So far, Google Maps has acquiesced to the White House’s demands, marking the Great Lake as Lake America on its app. Apple has yet to budge, but media reports claim that the Trump Administration is leaning on Apple to make the change in Maps. But there was a big winner, as MapQuest surged to the top of the app charts in the navigation category after refusing to budge on the executive order. #MappedOff Read more here.

📲 App of the Week: Epic!

You know, at 3Advance, we were all saddened to hear of the passing of the great Dolly Parton. Music lost one of its shining stars, of course, but her greatest legacy might be her free books-for-kids initiative, Dolly Parton’s Imagination Library. In light of that – and the fact that many kids are going back to school – it seems fitting to highlight Epic! this week, an app that gives kids access to the world’s largest repository of digital books. The app isn’t free – it works out at about 5 bucks per month – but it is top of its class, with everything from Disney to classic novels to modern non-fiction covered. There is also a free version available to educators. Find it on iOS here and Android here.

🧐 Stat of the Week: > 2 Seconds

📈📉 AI – “Superhuman” Tool Can Pick Up Heart Disease In An Instant

This is the kind of news we want to see about AI, and we are sure it will happen more often. An AI tool, trained on millions of patient ECGs, can spot heart disease in under 2 seconds. The tool could act to fast-track people into further treatment and, ultimately, save a lot of lives.  #LifeSaver Read more here.

🗞️ Other Stories

📍 Meanwhile at 3Advance

August (and the entire summer, really) flew by in a blink. So consider this your official permission slip: enjoy the long weekend. Sleep in, fire up the grill, do absolutely nothing productive if that's the move. From all of us at 3Advance, happy Labor Day – and here's to a well-earned break before we get back at it.