With Maps 6.12 Latitude seems to have vanished? After updating, the Latitude widget seems to have vanished. And from Maps, I can't get to my Latitude friends anymore.

I can't find any notes about this online, in reports or on Google pages.

In the comments in the Play Store, others have mentioned this as well.

Is there a way to get this back, or is it running still in the background? Some sort of release note?
According to the Google Product Forums with Google Maps for Android 6.10 the Latitude widget is no longer available. You can view your friends' locations quickly by touching the Latitude icon, or by turning on the Latitude layer in Google Maps.