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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

#41
post #35
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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...

Yup. Facebook ads were evil. And now that wiener-dog ramp guy can't spend pennies to buy millions of impressions on cross-app-accessed data, he has to be smarter and work harder to get his ad dollars in the right place. This remains a Facebook privacy story.

Two seperate facts:

1. Apple did use their market power crush small companies. 2. Facebook does have an awful privacy history.

So the question is, do you think improving Facebook's privacy must hurt small companies? Another example, Google is working very closely with UK's Competition and Markets Authority to make sure the plan of replacing third-party cookies won't punch other companies at their faces.

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

#42
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

But Apple is tracking you. They build an advertising profile using your behavior on iOS and your personal information (and at least for me, that included PII that I would never have consented to them using for ad targeting; but they just took it, and hid the opt-out in an obscure settings menu). They then allow targeting of ads based on these fine-grained profiles. Just how is this better than FB?

That they have PII would be a surprise to me.

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

#43
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

But Apple is tracking you. They build an advertising profile using your behavior on iOS and your personal information (and at least for me, that included PII that I would never have consented to them using for ad targeting; but they just took it, and hid the opt-out in an obscure settings menu). They then allow targeting of ads based on these fine-grained profiles. Just how is this better than FB?

Can you give some examples / links for this? it's almost impossible to search for, with everybody talking about Apple's IDFA changes

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

#44
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.

I think this assertion from them is misleading (in the same way that it is when Facebook et al make it). If Apple is allowing micro targeting then they are implicitly sharing data. E.g. let's say they let me buy targeted ads for "dog lovers aged 34-39", and then you show up on my website as a lead via that campaign, then Apple has just implicitly sold me demographic/interest information about you, even if it wasn't done as explicitly as if they sent it over in a spreadsheet. I fundamentally think that microtargeting and privacy are incompatible.

(I'm open to bring shown, however, that Apple's new ad marketplace explicitly eschews microtargeting, but I haven't seen that so far)

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

#45
post #39

Earlier quoted context omitted.

But Apple is tracking you. They build an advertising profile using your behavior on iOS and your personal information (and at least for me, that included PII that I would never have consented to them using for ad targeting; but they just took it, and hid the opt-out in an obscure settings menu). They then allow targeting of ads based on these fine-grained profiles. Just how is this better than FB?

Can you give some examples / links for this? it's almost impossible to search for, with everybody talking about Apple's IDFA changes

Here is Apple's privacy policy on ads:

https://www.apple.com/legal/privacy/data/en/apple-advertisin...

> We create segments, which are groups of people who share similar characteristics, and use these groups for delivering targeted ads.

> We may use information such as the following to assign you to segments:

> ... The music, movies, books, TV shows, and apps you download ...

> ... The topics and categories of the stories you read and the publications you follow, subscribe to, or enable notifications from ...

> ... Your name, address, age, gender, ...

> ... your App Store searches and browsing activity ...

> ... information stored on your device, such as the apps you frequently open ...

There's a lot more, that's just a sample of the data they use. The only thing they promise explicitly either not to have or not to use is:

> No Apple Pay transactions or Health app data is accessible to Apple’s advertising platform, or is used for advertising purposes. Apple does not know or make available to advertisers information about your sexual orientation, religious beliefs, or political affiliations.

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

#46
post #30

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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...

Yeah, I read about Ramon and his wiener dog ramps when this was first submitted to HN months ago and I said the same thing then as I am now. It’s bullshit. If Ramon wants to sell wiener dog ramps, then the system to do that should be “buy adspace when people search for wiener dog,” advertise on wiener dog enthusiast forums, sponsor videos/meetups, etc. Not “create an all knowing digital surveillance system tying toge…

I mean, wether this is a bullshit won't affect "Small business were crushed by Apple" is a fact? It's a statement based on data. How you or apple justifying their behaviour is another story.

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

#48

> 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…

I’m surprised that people still call Apples stance a “story”

All they are saying is that tracking is ok as long as you just ask the end user first.

Here’s Steve Jobs in 2010

https://youtube.com/watch?v=Ij-jlF98SzA

Are they perfect? No. But at least they haven’t changed their stance in 12 years unlike Google et al.

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

#49
post #41
post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yup. Facebook ads were evil. And now that wiener-dog ramp guy can't spend pennies to buy millions of impressions on cross-app-accessed data, he has to be smarter and work harder to get his ad dollars in the right place. This remains a Facebook privacy story.

Two seperate facts: 1. Apple did use their market power crush small companies. 2. Facebook does have an awful privacy history. So the question is, do you think improving Facebook's privacy must hurt small companies? Another example, Google is working very closely with UK's Competition and Markets Authority to make sure the plan of replacing third-party cookies won't punch other companies at their faces.

> to make sure the plan of replacing third-party cookies won't punch other companies at their faces.

Companies using third-party cookies deserve much more than a punch. They deserve corporate euthanasia.

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

#50
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.

I think this assertion from them is misleading (in the same way that it is when Facebook et al make it). If Apple is allowing micro targeting then they are implicitly sharing data. E.g. let's say they let me buy targeted ads for "dog lovers aged 34-39", and then you show up on my website as a lead via that campaign, then Apple has just implicitly sold me demographic/interest information about you, even if it wasn't d…

All tracking is opt in.
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