It’s strange that the lead engineer from Google would be so badly mistaken, but I wonder if that isn’t the case here. After I saw the location services icon after firing up the app, I decided to put my little disclaimer on that section, because I wasn’t completely sure how accurate the information was. Anyway, thank you for letting us know the results of your testing.

As for GPS: I actually took it on a bike ride to and from school (Saddleback College) today. And of course, every single time I had to get off my bike at a red light, I took the iPhone out of my pocket, fired up the Google search app, loaded the Google Now cards, and then killed the app. And every single time, the Traffic card updated to track me to within 5 feet of my exact location, even while disconnected from Wi-Fi the whole time. That doesn’t just happen without GPS playing a part.

Speaking of bike ride: Yes, that’s able to be specified in the Traffic card settings as well. Does that also signify an update to the Maps app? Only time will tell.

As for the missing cards: Many of them (notably Fandango, Concerts, and the airline boarding pass cards) already have Passbook pass counterparts to begin with, so I guess Google just didn’t see a need for them.

So for me, the ONLY thing that makes no sense is the lack of push notifications. Which as we all know are as easy to implement as popping up a dialog requesting permission from the user to send them…

Yes, I’ve tried turning off Location Services, but I can’t use Google Now without Location Services. Here’s a screenshot of the Location Services under the Privacy settings. The purple GPS indicator icon is visible beside the Google app, even though I’ve quit Google Now from the multitasking tray.

Have you tried turning off Location Services for the Google Search app in Settings? This could help you verify that it is Google Now that is causing the problem.

I’ll be interested to see if yours is an isolated case, or if we see a lot of similar reports from iOS users.