Tech Giants Comply with Trump's Lake Renaming Order Amid Trade War
US President Trump signed an executive order last week to rename Lake Ontario to Lake America in response to the escalating US-Canada trade war. The move was seen as a way for Trump to exert his influence over maps and geographies, particularly those used by tech companies.
Silicon Valley tech giants Apple and Google complied with the order, renaming Lake Ontario for their US users. Canadian users of these map services still see the original name, Lake Ontario, while the rest of the world sees both names displayed on the map.
However, not all map apps followed suit: MapQuest decided to stick with the original name and has seen a surge in downloads since Thursday, when Trump announced the renaming. In fact, there have been over 1.5 million installs to date, according to Doug Berger, general manager of MapQuest.