To everyone with complaints about the new "Shortbread" styling, I agree that it's not perfect but that's kinda missing the point. The real story is that vector tiles have the styling applied client-side so anyone can tweak the look with a little javascript.
The prior raster tiles have the style baked in; if you want a new look, you need to generate a new image. So each map publisher ends up running their own data and server infrastructure just to tweak the style.
The vector tile approach means a single (cacheable) asset can be used in many different maps. Huge win. If you don't like the style, you can make your own without having to literally download the planet.
Comments
To everyone with complaints about the new "Shortbread" styling, I agree that it's not perfect but that's kinda missing the point. The real story is that vector tiles have the styling applied client-side so anyone can tweak the look with a little javascript.
The prior raster tiles have the style baked in; if you want a new look, you need to generate a new image. So each map publisher ends up running their own data and server infrastructure just to tweak the style.
The vector tile approach means a single (cacheable) asset can be used in many different maps. Huge win. If you don't like the style, you can make your own without having to literally download the planet.