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Apple surpassed $3.5B in annual revenue from its ad network

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Re: Apple surpassed $3.5B in annual revenue from its ad network

#23
post #11

They put everywhere “we do not track or share data with third-parties” maybe that’s the key difference with other ad networks? It’s not like they follow you around over the web which FB or Google does. I actually don’t even see those ads, as they are only in few apps and App Store.

They're in the "kill competition" mode right now, so are obviously doing different than what others are doing. But what are the guarantee that they won't start selling user's data to advertisers when they're big enough?

Didn't Steve Jobs say that the 30% cut was just to keep the AppStore running?

Re: Apple surpassed $3.5B in annual revenue from its ad network

#24
> But it crushed FB, Snap, and 1000s of small businesses in the process.

Ironically, this is far more of a narrative than this guy’s idea of Apple’s “narrative.” The idea that banning user tracking hurts small businesses was FB’s narrative to try and get backlash against Apple for its tracking crackdown. That genuinely is a narrative because from Apple’s decision we have seen that consumers (1) prefer not to be tracked (go figure!) but also (2) are spending more than ever.

What he calls Apple’s “narrative” is actually their substantiated history of privacy-protecting technologies. Not just tracking, but iCloud Private Relay, Hide my Email, iMessage E2E encryption, keeping many things on-device only. Even the example he gave as a gotcha - personalized ads - has an opt out button right there! Try opting out of FB’s tracking and ads network and see the difference.

Re: Apple surpassed $3.5B in annual revenue from its ad network

#26
post #12

I'm looking forward to the discussion on how Apple's ad business is more ethical and good for us.

I look at all advertising as obnoxious. If it is unbidden it is little different from a door to door salesman knocking at my door trying to sell me solar.

With regard to Apple not tracking us with PII, that is good however.

Re: Apple surpassed $3.5B in annual revenue from its ad network

#27

> On a long enough time horizon, every large company becomes an ad network. The Paperclip Maximizer Theory certainly seems to be coming true.

And a real estate company, and a hedge fund, and a bank, and (this is more recent) a data center company.

Big companies have the scale to efficiently internalize activities that smaller companies have to outsource. As time passes, they try to turn these internal service companies into profit centers.

Re: Apple surpassed $3.5B in annual revenue from its ad network

#28
post #12

I'm looking forward to the discussion on how Apple's ad business is more ethical and good for us.

Why is the assumption that it isn’t? Apple has been a lot better at privacy than places like google. Not betting on this being the one exception. They absolutely are better if it’s true they don’t do any tracking

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Re: Apple surpassed $3.5B in annual revenue from its ad network

#30

> But it crushed FB, Snap, and 1000s of small businesses in the process. Ironically, this is far more of a narrative than this guy’s idea of Apple’s “narrative.” The idea that banning user tracking hurts small businesses was FB’s narrative to try and get backlash against Apple for its tracking crackdown. That genuinely is a narrative because from Apple’s decision we have seen that consumers (1) prefer not to be track…

While this is a "narrative", there is quite a lot data back that this is a fact. You can argue that you trust and fell comfortable to give apple the power of crushing any other small businesses they don't care based on Apple's own company decision.

BTW, you can here the same story from small businesses' narrative: https://www.npr.org/2022/03/17/1087425495/tech-giants-and-ti...

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