Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue • Hacker News Board

Re: Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue

#61

Post by sashagim » Wed, Oct 12, 2016, 10:13 AM UTC

rplnt wrote: post #11

rspeer wrote: post #8

This title's grammar is mangled and confusing on HN. The $160000 was for the developer, not for anyone else. The "for those who use Facebook ads" was a separate clause saying who the post is for. I know HN approves of original titles but also disapproves of sensationalism and exclamation points. I would suggest something like: App developer says: "Facebook stole my $160000"

And they didn't steal it either. They just didn't pay it out yet, it says pending. And even if it was canceled or whatever, "steal" is not the right word since they were never his money to begin with.

To me it seems that like with any contract, the money is his once he fulfilled his part of the deal (ad views/clicks). I agree that not payout out is not the same as stealing, but in this case it does seem awfully close since Facebook is acting as a middle man. If someone hires me to do a job for a 3rd party, gets paid for my work, but doesn't pass me my part - I'd call this stealing.

Re: Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue

#62

Post by downandout » Wed, Oct 12, 2016, 10:13 AM UTC

Google, through its Adsense program, has turned this kind of behavior into an art form [1]. Facebook must have decided that their legal team is now strong enough to perform the same scam without legal consequences. The elements of the scam are essentially the same between the two:

1) Pay on a net-30 basis, so that in most cases publishers send two months of traffic before they are paid;

2) Wait until the last minute before a payday to claim a policy violation so that the maximum amount of traffic that the network will refuse to pay for is sent; and

3) Make the description of the policy violation so vague that a successful lawsuit is nearly impossible without significant pre-trial discovery efforts, which will be aggressively fought by the phalanx of attorneys employed by the ad network.

What should be even more concerning to publishers in Google's case is the new "Valuable Inventory" policy [2]. In a nutshell, this essentially says that Google is the sole judge of whether or not your content is good enough to display ads against. If they decide at any time that it isn't, you will be banned and your earnings will be withheld. They've also implemented a policy forbidding ad placement that pushes down the site's content - an impossibility on mobile devices. The aim of all of this is to make all publishers technically in violation of one or more policies, which gives them unilateral discretion as to which publishers they choose to pay.

It's sad, but not altogether surprising, that Google and Facebook are acting in the same underhanded way in the operation of their ad networks. The only way to avoid this kind of behavior is to use lower tier ad networks, which sadly produce lower RPM.

[1] http://www.businessinsider.com/google-search-ad-policies-cos...

[2] https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/1346295?hl=en#Ad_l...

Re: Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue

#63

Post by inevitable2 » Wed, Oct 12, 2016, 10:15 AM UTC

I know this developer's app because I compete in a similar space. His app is actually quite illegal and also violates copyright laws and Google Play policies.

Facebook was correct in withholding payment to him. As far as I'm concerned, AdMob should be withholding payment to him too.

If anyone from Google wants me to describe the very illegal techniques being used by this app, please email me with a (@google.com) at finokioto@gmail.com . I would prefer not to share what this developer is doing in a public forum because of copycats.

Re: Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue

#64

Post by vonklaus » Wed, Oct 12, 2016, 10:17 AM UTC

jondubois wrote: post #54

chii wrote: post #19

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Except that for every fuss kicked up, there's probably countless ones that feel through the front page and never saw the light of day. The process of calling out shitty behaviour should not have to involve popularity.

I think it captures what is happening with society. If you're not famous, then you have effectively no legal rights unless something REALLY REALLY bad happens to you. This is only going to get worse as the total number of violations by corporations increase and the media can no longer keep up with most of them - Only the most vile/blatant breaches will be punished. I can easily imagine that in 20 years, there will be…

Well, to some extent the OP is an edge case-- not every "little guy" gets his grievance any visibilty. However, twitter, reddit, HN, 4chan, and a blogs of all types make it possible to appeal to the public.

20 years ago the same thing occurred, but with less recourse. A company can have its image litigated in public and that can be good

Re: Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue

#65

Post by ChoHag » Wed, Oct 12, 2016, 10:19 AM UTC

TeeWEE wrote: post #37

omarchowdhury wrote: post #2

Posts this like are useless when the app and the ad placements in question are not known to us the readers, since then we can at least detect any real violations of Facebook Audience Network's policies.

Indeed , this. Probably the app is doing some stuff thats really violating the Facebook policy.. And the creater just doesnt agree with google.

The developer does not seem so concerned that the app was removed - it can be reinstated - but that the attempts to do so are being stonewalled while a significant amount of cash hangs in the balance.

Facebook should not be silent in the face of a $160,000 problem they created.

Re: Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue

#66

Post by bartread » Wed, Oct 12, 2016, 10:19 AM UTC

elorant wrote: post #47

skrebbel wrote: post #25

Earlier quoted context omitted.

I am not American. I read this sort of advice a lot here on HN and it always puzzles me. If I were to believe HN, the only way people ever do business in the US is through their lawyers. Or, at least, the moment there's some sort of misunderstanding or screwup there's always someone on HN who says "lawyer up!" and it's usually the top comment. Somehow, apparently, trying to sort things out the oldschool "hey we're bo…

That’s the cost of doing business with large corporations. They’re faceless. My guess is that Facebook could have thousands of claims for any kind of imaginable dispute on any given day. How on earth could they provide support for that? That’s what a legal department is for. To reverse your argument, I don’t understand why so many developers are reluctant to speak to a lawyer. We don’t like speaking to lawyers, we do…

FWIW I agree. I live in the UK and don't think we have a particularly litigious culture but, and I mean no disrespect to facebook in saying this, you're on a hiding to nothing trying to deal with their support department. Nobody in there has any authority to make anything happen.

With $160k on the line (and, by the way, well done: with ~$80k monthly revenue you are living what many of us would consider to be the dream) you need to lawyer up. This isn't about taking facebook to court: it's about making your case to a group of people that can actually get something done for you (facebook's legal department) in a language that they understand.

Re: Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue

#67

Post by jondubois » Wed, Oct 12, 2016, 10:21 AM UTC

ohashi wrote: post #9

willvarfar wrote: post #4

Sad that the reddit advice is: [–]guitartrashmaster 45 points 4 hours ago Dude post on hacker news trust me perma-linkembedsavereportgive goldreply [–]VikingIV -2 points 45 minutes ago This. Its the same with google; the only way for devs to get any kind of traction is by kicking up a fuss on HN. Its crazy that it has to be this way.

A complete shame, but this isn't new. This is the digital equivalent of call your local paper and kick up a fuss.

This is quite different because local newspapers are able to bring more issues to the public attention than a single centralized news source can.

I think that's the danger of globalization; a lot of people don't read local news anymore.

Re: Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue

#68

Post by ChoHag » Wed, Oct 12, 2016, 10:24 AM UTC

ap22213 wrote: post #42

The spike in ad clicks (or some other metric) probably triggered an automated fraud detection system. Apparently FB sent him a separate email that contains the details (see the email's top paragraph). Also, the email from FB has simple grammar errors and typos. I would expect a company of FB's size to have QA for this type of automated content. So, it leaves some doubt in my mind that the email wasn't edited before h…

I've worked for companies of FB's size.

I wouldn't.

Re: Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue

#69

Post by spyder » Wed, Oct 12, 2016, 10:25 AM UTC

huhtenberg wrote: post #36

In http://imgur.com/B86pJHi.png , what are the columns exactly, does anyone know? The 7th column in particular, with the %-ages. If that's a click-through rate, then the numbers look inflated.

Here is the header of the table from a random screenshot found with an image search:

http://forums.makingmoneywithandroid.com/attachments/adverti...

Re: Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue

#70

Post by roryisok » Wed, Oct 12, 2016, 10:30 AM UTC

this might seem silly or off topic, but one of the many things I love about HN is that the mods (I assume) rename thread titles to be a little clearer and less cryptic.

This morning the title of this post was "Facebook stole my $160000 For those who use Facebook ads in their Android apps" - incorrect grammar, and stripped punctuation made this a pain to process in my sleep-deprived brain. I'm delighted to see it's now much clearer. Thank you, mods!