
Apple Poised To Unveil 'iAd,' New Mobile Ad Platform - mjfern
http://www.mediapost.com/publications/?fa=Articles.showArticle&art_aid=125076
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orangecat
Not surprising, Apple can't be pleased that much of the revenue from ad-
supported iPhone apps goes to Google via AdMob. I expect shortly after its
introduction iAd will be the only permitted advertising mechanism in the app
store.

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mahmud
And google execs will personally lead the fed anti-trust lawyers to the mobile
ad department of 1 Infinite Loop St, Cupertino, CA 95014.

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c1sc0
What's really interesting in this move is that an Apple-based ad platform
would simplify things a lot for mobile developers: one partner, one financial
statement, one source of revenue. Every time you add an external partner (e.g.
Apple, AdMob, Urbain Airship) to your app its (bureaucratic) complexity
increases.

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ggruschow
Does anyone, and I mean _anyone_ , intentionally click on mobile ads?

I pay attention to and click on _way_ more web ads than average, but only when
I'm "browsing" -- just scanning and reading information. I don't think I've
ever intentionally clicked on an ad in any app (mail, game, whatever), mobile
or not. I don't think I look at them much either, and that's horrible
considering I've got ADHD.

However, ad-supported apps still work on me as trialware. I'll get a feel for
the software, and if I'm going to keep using it, I want to buy a copy that
doesn't waste my space.

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sliverstorm
Enough with the iThis, iThat already! It doesn't even work here.

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groaner
As far as I'm concerned, this is the iAd:

<http://www.gizmodo.com/gadgets/images/iProduct.gif>

Joking aside, I wonder if Apple will ban ad-blocking apps from the app store.
I definitely don't want my mobile bandwidth bill to get artificially inflated
because I was forced to download ads.

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blasdel
Apps that block their own ads? I'm sure Apple wouldn't give a shit. App Store
apps are sandboxed, and can't fuck with each other or with the built-in apps.

Apple doesn't sell the iPhone through carriers anywhere without an unlimited
data plan. They'll only be changing that with the iPad in a month or so.

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Maktab
For what it's worth, that bit about unlimited data plans isn't entirely true.
The standard iPhone voice and data plans from Vodacom in South Africa bundle
only 250Mb of data, while I'm fairly sure that Rogers in Canada and Vodafone
in Australia don't sell the iPhone with unlimited data plans, at least not on
all contracts.

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wmeredith
Wow, and I thought they couldn't get any worse than iPad with their branding.
Is Jobs going George Lucas? Can no one tell him no? I'm sure the UX will be
great as with most Apple things, but iAd is going to have a hard time
spreading virally. If you say something out loud to someone and their response
is, "What?" then move on.

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thwarted
_I'm sure the UX will be great as with most Apple things, but iAd is going to
have a hard time spreading virally._

Because that's what people have been complaining about ads missing: great UX.

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olefoo
Actually people complain about the lack of decent User eXperience in ads.
Decent UX fades into the background, great UX is invisible.

This is a direct challenge to google.

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thwarted
No one complains about UX in ads, people complain about relevancy. And that
complaint is only heard about ads that are supposed to be highly targeted. No
one complains that billboards on the side of highways are not relevant to them
-- mainly because the cost of the billboard is entirely on the creator of the
ad, users pay (in network bandwidth and slower page load times) to have ads
shown to them on web pages, so _wanting_ to see higher relevant ads, if they
have to see ads at all, makes sense.

No one says "I'd buy the product this ad is advertising, but the experience of
using the ad is terrible." That doesn't even make any sense. Ads don't have
"users" like software does. And ads that don't end up resulting in sales are
ads you won't see long, no matter how engaging they are.

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olefoo
What about the various whines about unskippable pre-roll ads on dvds? That is
User experience, sucky user experience, no matter how relevant the ads
involved.

