Cloud APIs are like fair-weather friends. They work as long as it is convenient to do so, and they get to set the terms of the friendship. Today I received a notice from Google that the “free” maps API would no longer be free, but would instead require you to provide a credit card, in return for which they would give you a “free” tier of usage. I guess if you go over your limit, then you will pay for the usage. Fair enough, but it requires you to do your own rate limiting. As an alternative they could stop serving your clients and send a warning when you go over your limit, but that might allow you to escape the first month of over-charges.
I find it easier to just reduce my dependencies, so I removed the maps from iacr.org. They weren’t necessary anyway.