<i>>Facebook couldn’t explain in detail why ATT will harm consumers because, in doing so, it would need to reveal just how it personalizes ads — through observing conversions on third-party websites and apps.</i><p>This is one important factor that very few FB users realize. The secret sauce is aggregating data captured outside of FB, which is hard to visualize and grasp for most people.<p>More than once friends/family have asked me if FB really can hear via your microphone, and my response is usually met with blank stares: <i>no, they aren't listening to your microphone, they know much more about you from the sites you've visited.</i>
Yet people have been paying for groceries with checks in grocery stores for decades. I did some work for one of the companies that mine data from checks (20 yrs ago), it was amazing how much they could get from scanning the front of a piece of paper. This data was then used by the chain, as well as being sold to all sorts of other companies. No one gave them permission, but you can't stop scanning a check if you want to use it. It's still done today, but of course now we have credit/debit and loyalty cards, and you think that's not used by the grocery chains to track your purchases? Unless you refuse to use a loyal card and use a more anonymous system like Apple Pay the store can't really track you, but the issuer knows who you are (but can't connect you to what you bought that I know of). None of this is new. Unless you pay with cash and wear a disguise, you are giving something to them.<p>I wish Apple did not sell ads of any kind (the don't need even more money), but using knowledge you gain just from a transaction to make money, simply because you have to exchange some information to get what you want, is as old as selling anything (Omar in the market sees you bought two sets of flowers, assumes you are an adulterer, turns you in for a reward to the Czar).
Great quote:<p>>Apple has taken money from a party that is so unsympathetic that it can’t appeal to a greater authority for redress. Apple has brazenly, in broad daylight, stormed into the Bank of Facebook, looted its most precious resource, and, camouflaged under the noble cause of giving privacy controls to the consumer, fled the scene.
I find it hard to believe that people can complain about the _concept_ of ATT with a straight face. All that is being asked of you is that you ask the user for permission to track them. If you genuinely have an issue with that you need to reevaluate your business + your ethics.
Another win for Apple is convincing people that it’s somewhat obvious that Apple should have a ton of data about me so I guess best to limit it to one place rather than allowing “anybody” to get access to it. But put that into the context of buying a laptop from say HP and saying to somebody, do you think HP should know virtually everything about your usage of that laptop? So I hope for the day where we end up with hardware that we truly own rather than them owning us..
Is this an article trying to generate sympathy for Facebook, claiming Apple is just as bad in this case and that they dont really care about privacy? Seems kinda suspect to me. Maybe I misinterpreted the tone here. I dont think Apple is all good and Facebook is all bad, but in the aggregate Apple <i>does</i> do more for privacy than Facebook and Facebook does want to know as much as possible about your life to push that into selling ads.
This is disingenuous. Using appstore buying behavior to target search ads in the appstore is not something many people would find creepy.<p>Facebook advertisers being able to target people for being sick, pregnant, poor and similar, based on photos you liked on instagram or even browsing non-facebook sites, is an entirely different level of privacy breech.
It is the same playbook as they did with Google. The $10B/ year placement fees for being default search engine on Apple devices, all while squeezing out most of the Data going to Google in the name of privacy.<p>A fairly large potion of Facebook Ads are actually Ads for Apps or specifically Games. Previously the Ad network ( in this case Facebook ) would know what sort of Games you have installed, and show you some relevant ( or similar ) games that you may like. There is no point showing you FPS games if you dont play FPS games at all. With ATT no ad network, including but not limited to Facebook will not have any "newer" data. And they cant target those ads for you. This is what the whole "tracking" argument is all about. ( At least from Apple perspective )<p>But since Apple has all those Data, they can now sell those Ads themselves. Of course the argument is the definition of Tracking. And may be the vast majority understanding of what tracking really mean, portrayed by Apple differs greatly to the actual technical definition. Benedict Evans [1] has quite a few words on it.<p>On the PR and media side it is the same playbook as they did with Qualcomm. Facebook and Qualcomm are evil, Apple are righteous. But when the trial did happen every single accusation Apple made against Qualcomm turns out to false before they were quickly settled.<p>The amount of hypocrisy from Modern Day Apple is even worst than Google in early 2000s.<p>[1] <a href="https://twitter.com/benedictevans/status/1387130787510751239?s=20" rel="nofollow">https://twitter.com/benedictevans/status/1387130787510751239...</a>
Apple’s empire grows. I wonder what they would have to do to generate anti trust concerns.<p>They just sherlocked Tile and Facebook Ads in the last month alone.
How often does an individual actually use the App Store? I’ve already figured out my app load out and since apps can’t exactly share data the way desktop apps do, that’s not likely to change - I can’t get a package that handles data better than the original, using the original files.<p>Let them advertise there for now. It’s not like I’ll see it much.
> it is that Apple’s PR department deserves a pay raise.<p>I think the author confused the PR department with the business strategy department. They are the ones that really deserves the pay raise.
because this wasn't on here earlier?<p>previous discussion yesterday:<p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27126501" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27126501</a><p><a href="https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27120693" rel="nofollow">https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=27120693</a>
I don't understand why FB didn't instead try to appeal to people's desire for freedom. Instead of talking about ads they could have built a whole campaign around how Apple doesn't let people control their own devices.<p>They could have helped us get real sideloading on iOS.
Apple is acting the same way they did when they kicked out Steve Jobs the first time doing everything they can to extract dollars with very little innovation.