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Apple is becoming an ad company despite privacy claims

proton.me

51–60 of 76 posts

Re: Apple is becoming an ad company despite privacy claims

#51

Lovely free advertising for Proton. Very smart blog post, since numerous employees and fans of Apple competitors, as well as anyone who dislikes Apple for whatever reason, has plenty motivation to upvote this post. Also: Calling someone an ad company when approximately 1% of revenue seems to be generated by ads would seem quite a stretch. Also: Being tracked while on someone’s property isn’t exactly the same as track…

> Also: Being tracked while on someone’s property isn’t exactly the same as tracking someone across unrelated properties.

Do you consider Apple-made devices property of their buyers or do they forever remain property of Apple?

Re: Apple is becoming an ad company despite privacy claims

#52
post #9

Please no. There is no refuge from the ads. Not for all the money in the world, apparently. This is the worst timeline. Can I pay 2x to get an ad-free iPhone? 3x? Surely there is some point where it makes sense to sell an ad free phone for those who _need_ to not see ads. They won't even take my money ;_;

Sir, have some self respect. If you're willing to pay several thousands USD for a phone, I don't believe the ads are the actual issue here.

lol what.

I don't want to see ads. I will pay to not see ads. I earn well and can afford to spend a lot of money on making my life less bad/more good. Due to the way the world is, my phone is one of the most used items I own. I view ads as one of the biggest uncontrollable annoyances in my life. Yet I have no option to pay to not see ads.

In my humblest of opinions, those who accept ads are the ones without self respect. Please share what you think the problem is though.

Re: Apple is becoming an ad company despite privacy claims

#53
post #9

Please no. There is no refuge from the ads. Not for all the money in the world, apparently. This is the worst timeline. Can I pay 2x to get an ad-free iPhone? 3x? Surely there is some point where it makes sense to sell an ad free phone for those who _need_ to not see ads. They won't even take my money ;_;

The only way out is buying devices on which you can flash and use OS/software that was built without profit as a goal (e.g., free software). Anything short of that and you're just sitting under the Sword of Damocles of value extraction, ripe to be used and abused (within personal tolerance or otherwise).

I know you are right, but I've tried doing the de-googled Android thing (when I was an Android user even). It sucks, hard. Android is a pretty bad UX platform to begin with, and trying to make it work with free software is just... awful.

I can't contribute because I only have so many hours in a day. I'd rather pay. I'd pay a boatload for an operating system that replaces Android with something that has a good user experience and has no ads.

Re: Apple is becoming an ad company despite privacy claims

#55

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Sir, have some self respect. If you're willing to pay several thousands USD for a phone, I don't believe the ads are the actual issue here.

lol what. I don't want to see ads. I will pay to not see ads. I earn well and can afford to spend a lot of money on making my life less bad/more good. Due to the way the world is, my phone is one of the most used items I own. I view ads as one of the biggest uncontrollable annoyances in my life. Yet I have no option to pay to not see ads. In my humblest of opinions, those who accept ads are the ones without self resp…

In your comment you were begging one of the worlds most valuable companies to "allow you" to pay more for their already exaggeratedly expensive products, for the purpose of not seeing ads. And if that wasn't already submissive enough, you also voluntary become complicit in this ill-behaving industry by suggesting that ads are fine for the vast majority of people that could not or would not want to afford paying a premium on the already premium, for not seeing adds.

Re: Apple is becoming an ad company despite privacy claims

#56
post #10

You can be an ad company and respect your users privacy. They’re not mutually exclusive as the headline seems to suggest.

Are there any examples of this being done?

https://www.ethicalads.io

I mean, I haven't audited their systems and haven't seen any reports from independent auditors, but at least they are making direct statements about privacy that the other ad networks aren't.

Re: Apple is becoming an ad company despite privacy claims

#57

Earlier quoted context omitted.

lol what. I don't want to see ads. I will pay to not see ads. I earn well and can afford to spend a lot of money on making my life less bad/more good. Due to the way the world is, my phone is one of the most used items I own. I view ads as one of the biggest uncontrollable annoyances in my life. Yet I have no option to pay to not see ads. In my humblest of opinions, those who accept ads are the ones without self resp…

In your comment you were begging one of the worlds most valuable companies to "allow you" to pay more for their already exaggeratedly expensive products, for the purpose of not seeing ads. And if that wasn't already submissive enough, you also voluntary become complicit in this ill-behaving industry by suggesting that ads are fine for the vast majority of people that could not or would not want to afford paying a pre…

Look I can't change the world. I certainly can't change the practices of trillion dollar companies. I just don't want ads.

Re: Apple is becoming an ad company despite privacy claims

#58

With an accountant at the head of the company, what would you expect? They also have too much power, too much money, not enough competition and a deteriorating company culture. But aside from their dominance, they also have a few gems, their bet on ARM is paying off big time.

> a deteriorating company culture Could you elaborate on this? Genuine question, because how Apple is so successful is a complete mystery to me. I worked there during the pandemic and my experience was that there is no company culture, it's just a bunch of totally siloed small teams. Culture grows as a result of people speaking to each other, which I didn't really see happening. Could be that I was in a particularly…

Silo'd teams that don't talk to each other? That sounds like a sign the culture is already deteriorating, or the lack of communication is inherently part of the culture.

I'd be curious as to how the iOS team would be independent of the hardware team or the app dev experience teams. I suspect your team experience was a corner case.

Re: Apple is becoming an ad company despite privacy claims

#60
post #24

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Adding advertising likely will cost them hardware sales. if so, their hardware branch might have enough clout to keep their advertising branch under control. Phrased another way: adding a few billions of advertising revenue wouldn’t make Apple an advertising company, just as selling smartphones hasn’t made Google a hardware company

They already have advertising, at least in MacOS. Every time I put on my headphones I get a pop-up ad for Apple Music, and I can't hide iCloud or Safari's constant nagging to get me to use them. Everyone has their own limits, but I left the ecosystem after Mojave (with this being one reason).

I don’t know, is that really advertisement? These seems more akin to a program’s popup of its new features or that you can also go pro. Sure, nitpickingly these are ads, but they are related to the context, not intrusive, and not coming from a third party.

If anything, it is more analogous to my friend telling me about that vacuum cleaner he bought that he finds a great buy when I bring up the topic of vacuum cleaners. Surely, it is still an ad, but you get the difference.

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