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Apple's privacy push cost Meta $10B

economist.com

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Re: Apple's privacy push cost Meta $10B

#541

Post by marco_yolo »

maybelsyrup wrote: post #396
ksec wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I cant upvote you enough. This single comment contains many of the contrarian view against HN. It is nice we have these real world stories on HN to balance the ideological fight against ads, where All Ads are evil.

Ads are evil. To work, they play upon human insecurity. In many cases, they create desires or perceived needs that weren't there before, making them wasteful in addition to scammy/conniving. Because they're successfully evil - the tricks work - they often leave a residue on people: beyond just never being able to forget a jingle from a cereal ad you heard when you were 8, a lifetime of very frequent exposure to adver…

Governments are evil. To gain power, they play upon human insecurity. You can say this about anything providing a service. Its a wild oversimplification of the psychology of human buying decisions.

Re: Apple's privacy push cost Meta $10B

#542

Post by marco_yolo »

FearlessNebula wrote: post #229
paulcole wrote: post #134

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Unpopular opinion on HN, but I’m 100% OK with being tracked because it means: 1. I get to use products and services I like without paying money from my wallet. I have plenty of data to share that’s effectively worthless to me. 2. I get exposed to new products and services (through ads) that I’d like to buy. I like buying things!

You want companies to use your personal information to manipulate you into buying products you don’t need?

how do you know what they need or what ads they seeing?

Re: Apple's privacy push cost Meta $10B

#544

Post by GekkePrutser »

ksec wrote: post #389
user_7832 wrote: post #238

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I disagree. The problem was never about the ads. It was about the fact that ads were forced, privacy-invasive (due to customization) and generally were terrible overall (think malware/crypto mining risks, terrible UX - think annoyingly flashy gifs, or those gigantic banners in the middle of a scenic drive), not to mention poorly regulated, leading to lots of "double your money/phallus in 3 days!" type of scams. There…

>I disagree. I dont think we disagree. Like I wrote in another post, most on HN couldn't understand the difference between placement ad on Google Search Engine and Google Ads Network. And suggested we should ban all "tracking ads". And later all ads. I explicitly ask them and suggest what you just wrote. That there could be good ads, and they, by majority disagree. This isn't just on HN, it is pretty much across the…

I think it's just a reaction to the adtech community's total disinterest in user's objections to tracking. They keep invading our privacy and only really consider our wishes when it starts hurting their bottom line for real.

I'm sure that's what inspired my hard line against ads. I block ads and tracking where I can. And I've become so used to an ad-free web that I don't think I'll go back anymore.

If they'd only listened to us this before things got totally out of hand this could have been avoided.

Re: Apple's privacy push cost Meta $10B

#545

Post by GekkePrutser »

samwillis wrote: post #9

As a rough datapoint, I run a consumer targeted e-commerce site. We ran a campaign before Christmas were we were selling a new product that was only marketed on Facebook, we are certain that (almost) all customers found it though that Facebook campaign. Facebook was only able to attribute about 50% of the sales to the ads, it should have been close to 100%. This then meant that Facebooks estimated CPA was effectively…

If you're so certain, it means you already have reliable data for attribution. Why do you need Facebook's tracking to confirm it to you?

I understand it's nice to have fancy reports etc but it sounds like you already know where your customers are coming from. And tracking is very invasive, in this case it doesn't really seem to add much value.

You could also ask your customers "where did you hear about us" for example. Perhaps you already do and that's the source of that 100%. If not you might even discover a way you didn't know of. Eg word of mouth, some obscure forum where your product was mentioned. As well as that it's a method where you respect your users' privacy.

Re: Apple's privacy push cost Meta $10B

#546

Post by GekkePrutser »

scarface74 wrote: post #230
ksec wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I cant upvote you enough. This single comment contains many of the contrarian view against HN. It is nice we have these real world stories on HN to balance the ideological fight against ads, where All Ads are evil.

I have no problem with targeted ads based on what I specifically told Facebook. It’s when I’m shopping on Amazon and see the same products advertised on FB that there is a problem.

No, this is when you notice there's a problem, that you're being tracked.

The problem is the tracking itself, whether you notice it or not. At least that's my opinion.

Re: Apple's privacy push cost Meta $10B

#547

Post by GekkePrutser »

Brendinooo wrote: post #500
ineedasername wrote: post #322

Earlier quoted context omitted.

78% of homes have a computer in them. [0] I don't know anyone who does not use a PC for personal use, and my non-work social circles are not at all techie dominated. Also I'm not talking about 2021: I'm talking about years ago when Facebook moved away from prioritizing the PC platform. Maybe it wouldn't have mattered, I don't know, but when FB became a primary entry point to the internet for many people, and FB then…

Anecdata, but I'm teaching a coding class for 10-12 year olds and most of them don't know their way around a laptop. Most of their work has been done on tablets or maybe phones. It wouldn't surprise me at all to learn that huge chunks of demographics don't really use desktops or laptops all that much.

Doesn't that make them really inefficient? I couldn't imagine efficiently coding on a phone or even tablet without adding a keyboard, mouse and larger screen (eg Samsung DeX) which will basically make it a laptop or desktop.

Re: Apple's privacy push cost Meta $10B

#548

Post by GekkePrutser »

ipaddr wrote: post #472
scarface74 wrote: post #376

Earlier quoted context omitted.

55% of all web traffic worldwide comes from mobile. https://www.statista.com/statistics/277125/share-of-website-... And considering that most people spend 8 hours a day at work, how much personal usage on the web comes from the desktop? How many younger people are using computers for personal use - especially if it a shared family computer. Heck I am a software developer and my personal computer is just sitting in a…

So you do no personal development on a desktop? Do you use your work's equipment? Are you using your phone? I have three desktops on the go all day. Three keyboards in front of me and three mice. I run Windows 7, 10 and ubuntu and another ubuntu under windows 10. Trading that in for my mobile is very limiting.

Yeah same here. I have big screens around me everywhere. Why poke at a tiny 6.5" even I have 24" 4K glory and support efficient keyboard input?

Re: Apple's privacy push cost Meta $10B

#549

Post by GekkePrutser »

nottorp wrote: post #493
hollowdene wrote: post #39

There's a whole ecosystem of businesses that rely on Facebook that are going to start hurting a lot over the next few years. I used to work at a publisher where 80% of their website traffic came from Facebook. They haven't seen audience growth in years and their audience is skewing older and older, which is bad for their advertising business Businesses like that are going to get steadily squeezed both by Facebook's d…

> their audience is skewing older and older Been reading that facebook is out of fashion for the young uns for several years, way before any privacy changes on part of anyone. Also, question: how do they know their audience's average age? From invasive tracking?

Most people just put their age in their profile right? If not it's usually easily identified from their content using AI.

Re: Apple's privacy push cost Meta $10B

#550

Post by GeekyBear »

ShamelessC wrote: post #192
hotpotamus wrote: post #154

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I see this in the thread but I have to say that I disagree a bit. I'm certainly glad Apple gave users a choice, but you have to consider "the tyranny of the default" which is a great phrase I think. Most people will simply use the default option, so Apple's choice of default says something.

Right and the previous default was to allow all tracking.

The previous default was to use the hardware address of the device and not give the user a choice at all.

Apple blocked access to the hardware address of the device and moved to a random identifier that could be turned completely off back at iOS 10.

Android eventually followed suit.

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