Google Maps can now show you the price of petrol and diesel at nearby forecourts. The data comes from the government’s Fuel Finder scheme, which is a sensible thing for a government to publish and a sensible thing for a map to display. Nobody asked a navigation app to become a mood ring for your wallet, but here we are.
The feature is being sold as a convenience. You search for a petrol station, and a number appears beside it, the way a weather app tells you it will rain on your wedding. The number is the same number you could get by driving there and looking at the sign, except now you can feel it from your sofa, in advance, with the dread already loaded.
What does a mapping company actually contribute here? It contributes a pin on a screen next to a figure that was already public. The pump has always been the most honest piece of technology in Britain, and it has always made people wince without any help.
The real achievement is the framing. Fuel prices are no longer a thing you endure at the forecourt. They are a feature, something to browse, something to compare while you lie in bed deciding whether the commute is worth it. Somewhere a product manager has written the phrase ‘empowering drivers’, and nobody in the room laughed.
The pump is now a notification you can open on purpose.