
Facebook says Apple’s new iPhone update will disrupt online advertising - burnaboy
https://www.wsj.com/articles/facebook-says-apples-new-iphone-update-will-disrupt-online-advertising-11598458715
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curiousllama
Initially, I was skeptical of the "good!" reactions. It's worrying/annoying
when one company alone has the clout to massively impede a potential
competitor (or legitimate service they simply dislike) in arbitrary ways.

And then I read the subheadline of the article: > The social-media company
says Apple’s privacy changes will affect its Audience Network business, which
connects users’ Facebook identities with their off-platform activities

Holy sh*t - GOOD! Go Apple

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fwiwm2c
I hope you realize what this means is that ads as a monetization model for
apps is getting decimated. These apps will now have to explore alternate
monetization models such as either making themselves paid or subscriptions.
And guess what, Apple takes a 30% cut of it. If you are thinking Apple is a
benevolent savior of privacy, you are absolutely wrong. All they are doing
here is to hurt advertising so that more apps move to other models which lets
Apple extract more value.

Get ready, as a user, to pay for these apps which were once free.

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biddit
Don’t be silly this doesn’t take away advertising-supported apps whatsoever.
They’re just taking away the ability to target users based on activity outside
of the app, perhaps reducing the effectiveness of the targeting.

Plenty of industries survived for centuries without these kinds of ads.

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fwiwm2c
Facebook is literally saying that their Audience Network product will see 50%
reduction in revenue. That means apps will see less revenue from using AN.
This is likely a pattern across apps.

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anthony_d
That reduction is based entirely on their prediction of how many users will
not give consent to be tracked.

FB is going to use less accurate forms of tracking, so they simply won't be
able to charge as much. I'm not going to feel bad for a company that has to
work harder to circumvent the users wishes.

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supernova87a
Everyone hates when their stable business model is disrupted.

But in general, I don't think it should be the role of regulation (or
lawsuits, or retaliatory business strategies) to protect people's business
models -- unless there are compelling public interest/national security/etc
reasons to do so.

 _Someone_ will figure out how to thrive when conditions change. You're just
mad because it's not you any more.

~~~
soneil
It doesn't help that adtech have been pretty consistent about being as abusive
as they can until they get pushed back.

This is the industry that invented the popup/pop-under, until browsers were
forced to adopt technological solutions to prevent them. And third-party
toolbars - good lord. The over-reach of tracking is just the same thing all
over again.

Perhaps if they weren't actively attacking us, we wouldn't be so eager to
defend ourselves.

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_fat_santa
My speculation here is Facebook made this announcement very strategically. Now
that Apple under pressure for it's handling of app store reviews, this would
be the perfect time to criticize Apple in other areas.

Facebook is hoping people read the headline, don't read too much into it, and
that would fuel anti-Apple sentiment that they are acting as a monopoly.

Because if you read just below the surface on this topic, you'll quickly
realize this is a huge win for consumers and privacy advocates.

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Havoc
That’s why I’m on an iPhone. Unlike google they don’t have a powerful
incentive to make the devices leaky like a sieve due to ad biz side. FB can
say it but I’m sure google is thinking the same thing

Besides - it’s not like ads are going to go away. It’ll just be less focused

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makecheck
I see nothing wrong with returning to older models of advertising: you buy
simple ads (like pictures or text on web sites, or audio during podcasts),
with zero scripting attached, and no video. And you track them in obvious ways
(e.g. special codes at checkout, or you simply ask “how did you find out about
us?”), which still gives a clue which ads were effective.

The entitlement of these ad companies to their obscene revenues and invasive
methods is insane. Facebook’s “disruption” is hardly a problem I care about.
Maybe the Internet will finally be usable again if we have a little more
disruption.

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samat
Audio in podcasts could be and are targeted now. Scared the shit out of me, so
I did some digging and arrived at
[https://www.acast.com/en](https://www.acast.com/en)

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propogandist
While Apple is trying to double down on privacy improvements, Google's aiming
to build a bigger moat for their ad business with Android OS (>80% mobile OS
marketshare) and Chrome (>70% browser marketshare) changes.

Google deserves the same amount of criticism, but the addiction to their free
services keep users silent.

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christiansakai
Good. Let's burn Facebook to the ground.

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actusual
This change seems like it will have the unintended consequence of transferring
more power into the hands of large advertisers.

For one, this breaks company's (advertiser's and 3rd party data aggregator's)
ability to link customers to campaigns, which effectively pushes measurement
back to the advertising platform who have an inherent conflict of interest.
They are selling the ads, and telling you how efficient the ads are.

Additionally, the only companies that can do battle with Apple to find
loopholes/engineering solutions to this change are the companies that are (a)
very large, (b) have the resources and talent to throw at the problem. There
are several third party data providers that are basically toast now.

Edit: I don't work for FB, but I do build ML lifetime values models, which
will get much harder after this change is made.

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spaced-out
It seems like that logic could apply to any change that would improve the
users' privacy. The best thing for small ad companies would probably be if
everyone's data was completely public, that would surely minimize the barrier
to entry!

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egypturnash
Good.

~~~
l1ghthouse
Finally!

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risyachka
You won't get less ads, they just won't be targeted.

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spideymans
That's perfectly fine by me.

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ozzyoli
Same! Yay Apple.

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breakfastduck
Only hatred of Facebooks appalling business model could bring such unanimous
approval of a move by Apple!

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wmeredith
The enemy of my enemy is my friend.

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sizzle
After being an Android fanboy since the G1 was announced, then all through the
nexus line of phones which turned into the pixel line, I say without
hesitation that my next phone is going to be iphone.

I'm sick of the tracking and lack of fine grained control to limit app
permissions and background data.

Goodbye Google, thanks but no thanks. I can't trust your subsidized spyware
tracking tech in my pocket anymore.

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nakagin
So you are upset that now other people can stop you from exploiting me when I
am not using your service? Hmmmmmmmm

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bonaldi
Looks like they're going to refuse to comply with it, in fact:
[https://twitter.com/rjonesy/status/1298662658934222848](https://twitter.com/rjonesy/status/1298662658934222848)

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ianferrel
Can someone more familiar with what's going on here explain that statement?
It's not at all clear to me what they're saying.

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alleyshack
If I'm reading both the Apple prompt details and the Twitter statement
correctly, what that tweet is saying is that Facebook will not request access
to the IDFA at all, and will also not allow developers using Facebook's SDK to
request it. This means they won't trigger ("adopt" per the tweet) the prompt
notifying the user of tracking, since they aren't using the IDFA to track
anymore.

The rest of the tweet goes on to describe how to comply with that policy from
Facebook, and to suggest alternate methods for developers to track users on
iOS, including Facebook Login or Advanced Matching.

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Yetanfou
I've been fairly critical of many things Apple does and stands for but in this
case I can but give them a pat on the back and say "good Apple". I still won't
buy in to their walled world since I consider my freedom to valuable but if
this can help put a dent in the scourge called ad tech I'm all for it. It
won't affect me personally since I use free software on a Google-free AOSP-
derived Android distribution and as such am already immune to the ad tech
monster but that doesn't diminish the value of cracking down on the
aberration, the pustule, the diseased malignancy called ad tech. Be gone, foul
creature, your days are done.

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Grustaf
I highly doubt that facebook ads could become “less relevant”. I mostly get
ads from Wish for weird contraptions that I can’t even tell what they’re for,
and some very specific heavy machinery for thousands of dollars that i also
have no idea what it’s for. Pneumatic drills? Miniature combine harvesters?
Lately it’s been supplemented with ads for romantic Indian movies and wedding
dresses. And I’m a married Scandinavian male.

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ra7
[https://archive.is/jzFJu](https://archive.is/jzFJu)

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EGreg
So maybe we will stop being put into echo chambers and radicalized to hate our
neighbors?

Maybe we will stop having so many clickbait articles written by journalists?

Other business models for the win!

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dageshi
People like echo chambers, they go out of their way to self select into them.

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Zach_the_Lizard
Indeed.

We have had message boards, subreddits, newspapers, TV news shows, radio
shows, etc. dedicated to (or at least slanted towards) specific policial views
for quite some time.

Possibly centuries in the case of pamphlets and newspapers, often printed with
an explicitly partisan point of view in ye olde times.

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lostmsu
Can somebody tell what changes are they talking specifically?

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aloknnikhil
Based on [https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/26/facebook-apple-
ios-14-could-...](https://www.cnbc.com/2020/08/26/facebook-apple-ios-14-could-
cut-audience-network-revenue-in-half.html)

It seems to be the unique ID used for targeted advertising. iOS 14 requires
user opt-in before the IDFA can be used by third-party apps for advertising.
This, I believe, is what Facebook is crying foul about.

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neonate
[https://archive.is/jzFJu](https://archive.is/jzFJu)

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master_yoda_1
I upvoted an article first time on hackernews. Well done Apple

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traveler01
I might get myself an iPhone then...

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saos
Wonderful news!!

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torgian
Good.

I’m so tired of ads.

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Despegar
This is why it'll be both correct and just when Apple wins their antitrust
cases.

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northisup
Good. There is no product-market fit with 99% of online ads.

