When Apple announced its iAd mobile advertising initiative, many of us wondered how this would effect other mobile advertising agencies on the iPhone, and more specifically, Google’s AdMob. Well, now we know: Apple has revised its iOS developer agreement to specifically lock out Google’s AdMod. And then people wonder why Apple is no longer the darling of the geek world.
When iAd was launched, the iPhone OS 4 developer agreement was amended to prohibit application developers from employing analytics within their applications. This move would effectively lock out any competitor to Apple’s own iAd, since without analytics, advertising is pointless. It turned out, however, that this change was made only to block third party analytics firms like Flurry – not ad agencies.
Apple has amended its developer agreement yet again to better reflect this goal of blocking these analytics firms; third-party advertising agencies are now allowed to collect data for the purpose of targeted advertising. However, there’s an additional bit of legalese in there written specifically to block Google – even if Google is mentioned by name.
The legalese states that only “independent” ad firms may collect data, clarifying that “any advertising service provider owned by or affiliated with a developer or distributor of mobile devices, mobile operating systems or development environments other than Apple would not qualify as independent”.
So yeah, this is clear as day. It seems like to me that Google is not going to be particularly happy about this one. The iPhone makes up a pretty large share of mobile internet traffic (half?), so this is a big market when it comes to mobile advertising.
I guess honest competition is below Steve Jobs these days. HTC making too much progress? Sue them. Android growing too fast? Sue it indirectly within the HTC suit. Want to enter a new market where someone else is already really successful? Use legalese to knock them out cold – happy AdMob-using developers be damned. Het doel heiligt de middelen.
I remember a time when Apple used to compete by building better products, distinctive products. The PowerMac G4 Cube – one of the most beautiful computers ever built. The iMac G4, my first Mac – an absolute tour de force of design, a real head turner, and to this day nothing like it has ever been built. The iBook G4 12″, so far ahead of anything else the competition had to offer that I almost started to pity the likes of Dell and HP. The original iPhone, which revolutionised the market by simply being a better product.
Now that Apple has become a force to be reckoned with, they are resorting to tactics that would make ’90s Bill Gates blush. I’m eagerly awaiting how the John Grubers of this world are going to spin this one.
I understand why Apple is doing all this, they are a business and they know how to make money.
That asside, even MS in its dark days of, well, evil wasn’t this controlling and cut throat. Will we remember Jobs as the brilliant visionary? or the evangelical tyrant of “Think Different, but only if it’s like Me.”
…personally, the lines are starting to blur for me.
Woa.. this is just ridiculous…
Apple enter in the Ad business and you expect that they give their key differentiator to their concurrent that are actually bigger (adMob)??
But… wait where are you when Google launch Android?? I didn’t read you complaining that every Android user *Have* to create a google account in order to use it!!! Too bad I already have a Yahoo account…
Sure there is technical impossibility (… well no but let say…) so what about a mail client allowing to use every type of mail account??? yes there is one but limited
And what about synchronization? MobileMe? ActiveSync (ah wait in 2.2 seem that you finally can…)?
Why can’t I use googleMap but with Microsoft service? no? It’s about choice no?
Strange that in the core business services google are not so open!!!
But you expect that other company give access to their own software…
Apple is a big player in the open-source world, and not only for Webkit but also for lot of other software… the condition is that these software are not strategic ones. That simple and that true for every company.
And aside I’m not happy that any company can get some of my data without my authorization… (and that why I don’t really use Google Mail, even if I’m forced to have one… vendor locking… again…)
When (and if) iAd is ported to Android we’ll see how google will react… I’m sure that then, privacy will become an important matter…
But what means the restriction made by Apple? It means that collecting data from apps must be done by a third-party company (not in ad business)… so that probably what adMob will do and then… business as usual… but direct competitors will not have direct access to these data (well we have to believe in that…)
I don’t even see how Google and its adMob are getting out… eventually there will have to spend more money… oh how I’m sad… poor Google… poor Microsoft…
Another apple fanboy… sigh…
All their comment have been in apple related post and only praising the “think like big brother” company…
Edited 2010-06-09 01:12 UTC
Lol, sure the « not think like me, should be banished » is a better attitude… the content of the arguments don’t matter….
And for sure Apple related post are *strangely* the one with the more disinformation, you know like saying something wrong and pretend to be true… like the fact that Apple did block adMob where in fact adMob will just have to get data via a third-party…
Or even pretending that adMob have a legitimate right to access to data of other platform… (so why Google is making a me-too platform??? but sure good people should not ask, google is THE good guy and Apple is big brother…)
So to be clear: in the light of your argument, and as not saying crap on Apple mean be an Apple « fanboy » thus I’m then proud to be such a fanboy… after 10 years of working on Linux, it’s cool to not be only an « open-source Geek ». But I’m being sick of this world… Remind me the story about the 60’s and how it end…
Who is the fanboy indeed…
Well.. true to be tell, admob and iad are the same thing.. only driver by 2 different companies and thats all, i bet google wouldnt/couldnt do anything if any company wants to put their adv plataform on android since its open source… they would just gonna need to make the api available to the devs.
So.. if all you ppl can say if.. oh, i bet google would do the same if apple try to port their adv plataform to android dont know how android works.
and btw.. been a linux user and like how apple manage their plataform.. is kind of a contradiction, apple make microsoft blush how they are managing their plataform and developers.
And about the mail thing when you setup android.. sure you have to get an gmail account.. but other than that, you can just get k9 and use w/e mail you want… so, wow.. vendor lock down.. yeah, like apple not letting their user to choose w/e they want flash or not or making the development locked to their plataform and not using third apps dev tools who could also compile to other plataforms.. yeah, good comparition..
Edited 2010-06-09 03:01 UTC
actually i rather laoth google, and it’s practices (in some areas). if you read my posts you would know that.
you do have some good points though, that aside i am not a hypocrite.
Another post of misinformation. You know the history of Webkit-KHTML? Apple was forced to open the source to Webkit. They didn’t do it on their own. They are not big players in open source world. RedHat is. Novell is. Collabora is. Google is. Intel is.
Secondly, these days Google invests more resources in Webkit development. The commits to webkit is the highest of all.
Isn’t it anonymous data? Or they specifically track you? Anonymous data is not termed *your* data. Next, you will cry that website foo has it’s website traffic stats available and also tells what % of users came by which browser. You can also cry on that since it’s your data made available to everyone? HYPOCRISY!
Google won’t react. This is the prime difference. I am not a Google supporter, but I know they won’t and can’t since Android is an open platform. Plus, since you can sideload apps, iAd can be made available for many Apps stores and not just Android Marketplace.
It simply means locking out competitors ruthlessly. Specifically Google.
You are an Apple apologist. I think one day google will add a clause that independent firms cannot hand over data to competitors to fully lock out competitors.
Apple motto – “Think different, as long as you agree with me”
I beg to differ. Aside from webkit, there is also LLVM which is a *massive* improvement on gcc. There are also several minor projects such as libdispatch, launchd, darwin and so on that they have released as open source, even though they didn’t have to.
They may be more evil than Microsoft in some respects (i.e. they’re control freaks), but they tend to be very good on the developer side of things.
Agree that they are good on development side. Except they should treat their 3rd party devs in a better way.
You just don’t get it… The difference between the two companies and their actions is night and day.
First, the Android platform is Open, and it creates competition between mobile manufacturers (HTC vs Motorola for example).
And now we have an open alliance of hardware manufacturers working on the hardware driver stack of the android platform. In other words, anyone is welcome to modify how Android works, provide a software stack on top of ie: an email client, a sync service, an interface to MobileMe or any other services, etc. It shouldn’t be too difficult either, I mean the barrier of entering this market for any major manufacturer is pretty low. HTC writes it’s own UI on top of Android, and so can Samsung, Motorola, LG, etc..
This alone is a major difference between the two companies and their offerings, I’m just stunned that you don’t see it.
Second, Google also went out of its way to make it easy to switch from their online services if you can find something better. It made it ridiculously easy to export your data into a portable format that can be imported to any other service provider that offers better solutions. Are there any? Well, that’s another issue, but the point is, they don’t prevent competition, in fact, they welcome it.
Sadly no. Google created Android in order to sell Advertisement and provide a platform for Admob. Mobile advertising. Don’t be so naive. That’s the Google’s business. Because of that, and because they have piles of money they do not care at all about opensource, helping the industry or open aynthing.
Google cares about money.
Well, I wouldn’t paint the picture quite like that. Android has existed well before Google acquired AdMob, so let’s not rewrite history here.
What is clear, however, is that Google isn’t going to lay down and allow their industry to be defined by other companies.
They are interested in getting more eyeballs on their ads, for sure – so they’re competing in the markets that are limiting them.
If they can’t make it easier for people to browse the web on Windows or OS X, make an OS to replace them.
If they can’t make it easier to view ads on iPhone or Blackberries, make a phone where people can.
Ultimately, Google provides value to those who use their services and products, and that is what gains them the ad revenue. Once Google provides no value, people will no longer use their services, and Google will lose their market position.
So yes, it’s about money – but they’re doing what they need to do. They’re competing in the vertical markets that affect them, and they’re doing it handily IMO.
Since I don’t own a cell phone, I could really care less about all of this, but it does drive me nuts when people claim that one company is evil while another is good and starts presenting their religious reasoning
Also, don’t forget – Apple had plenty of opportunity to snatch up AdMob as well, but they allowed Google to outbid them. I know Apple has plenty deep pockets, and could have easily won that bid if they needed to, but they clearly planned to ensure AdMob would be useless on their platform in the near future, and have finally unleashed that plan upon the developers.
1) That’s pure speculation, you don’t have any more ideas of Google’s motivation than I do 2) is completely besides the point anyway. Who cares what their motivation was? I don’t. I only care about having fierce competition in the market on an open platform that ultimately drives down prices and leads to innovation. You have an idea for a completely new interface? Thanks to google, now you have an open and quite capable (Android 2.2 is on par with iOS4 when it comes to capabilities) platform to deliver it.
Android does NOT require a Google account, AT&T has stripped Google off of some Androids they offer. It will work with any email account you have, with Exchange/LDAP servers in place of Google for contact/calendar/email syncing, or anyone can write a plugin with the Android SDK to create their own datasources to sync any and all of the data that Google syncs with the phone. No Google account is required, and, infact, while the phone obviously is designed for users who like syncing with the web, its still not a requirement for it, you can use the phone with no accounts added to it whatsoever.
No MS just modified the OS to break 3rd party apps and pushed their own apps instead. “DOS isn’t done till Lotus won’t run”
Or they start joint development of an OS, encourage all their ISV and 3rd party developers to switch to it, only to pull out at the last minute and push a completing platform. Oh and they’re the only developer providing apps. Kill a lot of ISV and putting the rest several years behind.
Or best of all enter into an agreement to develop office applications for a brand new GUI based computer, insist they need source level access to the new system and then take not just the concepts but the actual API and develop a completing GUI system. That runs all their applications.
Or, or, or…
Apple is still a long way from being MS. I can’t really think of a new product MS has launched that they then released as an open standard.
You mention some interesting tidbits I’ve never heard or read before.
I would love to read more about this specific DOS/Lotus sabotage.
You’re referring to OS/2, right? would love some in-depth material about these tactics too.
Didn’t know they demanded Source Code and ‘borrowed’ the API. Again, any articles on these specifics?
TIA
Edited 2010-06-09 18:09 UTC
Exactly. Even cancer isn’t evil as such – it just does what it’s supposed to do, i.e. grow. The DNA that pushes Apple to do whatever it does is money and shareholders.
What it does to the rest of organism is another matter, and what the rest of the organism should do to limit it (if anything) yet another.
They didn’t dare – they were being constantly watched for anti-competitive behavior.
Apple, it seems, can get away with anything they want to do. Both in terms of law and PR – it’s only a small subset of their customer base that cares about this stuff.
It’s not that blurred to me, but then I’ve never seen Steve nor Apple as any more visionaries than say:
* Bill Gates and Microsoft + IBM: a computer in every home was a radical idea at the time.
* Or some of the guys at Xerox: the GUI was revolutionary – it’s just a pity they weren’t the ones that pushed it.
* Or Audio Highway – the first guys to release an MP3/digital audio player – years ahead of Apple and their iPod
* Or Google with the way how they’ve revolutionised online search and advertising
* Or Borland with the way how they’ve pioneered development environments
…and that’s not to mention the old buys of IT like Turing and co, but you get the general idea I’m driving towards.
People talk about Steve Jobs as if he was a hero among men, but he wasn’t. He was just one of countless visionaries in a very busy industry. He just had higher standards than most. However even that isn’t always ideal as sometimes standards can get in the way of usability (eg price tag, closed ecosystem, people want functions outside of the original spec, etc).
Edited 2010-06-09 07:43 UTC
What apple leads in (and has for years) is industrial design. Geeks never fully appreciate just how important that is, but taking something that nobody wants because it is such a pain to use and making it something everybody feels like they need because of how awesome they find it is an incredible thing. Apple has been able to do that better, and more consistently, then pretty much any other company in the industry.
Oh I appreciate how important that is. I just don’t class “taking a product and making it prettier and/or easier to use” as innovation.
Innovation is leaps-forward in technology, not taking existing technology and re-designing the front-end.
Obviously I’m not tarnishing all of Apple’s developments as being like this. but when you listen to the marketing speal, the innovation to re-design ratio is bent completely backwards to what Steve Jobs brainwashes the masses into thinking.
Actually most of what Apple does is exactly what you describe. But it is not tarnishing anything by admitting that, because it is still innovation.
The benefits of good user interface design are sometimes difficult to quantify, but you must admit there is a big difference between simply incorporating a technology like touch-screens, and finding a way to make them natural, fluid, and fun to use. There is a great deal of ingenuity involved in designing a product that–purely from a user experience perspective–is able to make a user want to use it rather than feel obligated to use it. How is that not innovation?
Edited 2010-06-09 21:34 UTC
Agreed. There is a line in Jurassic Park where Malcolm is talking with John that always makes me think of Steve Jobs:
“I’ll tell you the problem with the scientific power that you’re using here: it didn’t require any discipline to attain it. You read what others had done and you took the next step. You didn’t earn the knowledge for yourselves, so you don’t take any responsibility… for it. You stood on the shoulders of geniuses to accomplish something as fast as you could and before you even knew what you had you patented it and packaged it and slapped it on a plastic lunchbox, and now your selling it…”
I think of Jobs here because while he marketed his products brilliantly, few of his “inovations” are truely new or revolutionary. They are simply the next evolutionary step for things or ideas that already existed. Don’t get me wrong, Apple has done a great job, most people won’t argue that. But to treat each product like it was this genius inovation that Jobs came up with is getting a bit old. There are few truly “new” ideas in the tech wold, and the ones that are are coming in the form of lasers, quantum mechanics, holographic storage, etc… All (yes all, and i will back up each product 1 at a time if I am really disputed here), all of apple’s products are the evolution of existing ideas or concepts. They are good, but Jobs is not a god, he is a man, a man that can help give life to the next step of great ideas, but he is still just a man…
I don’t recall where I was originally going with all this, so I will leave it at that.
Nicely put and exactly what I was trying to express before.
Though very little of Apple’s stuff is technically revolutionary, they did revolutionize the market and they did change midsets.
Not to take away from your argument about Apple, but you make it sound like Microsoft´s days of evil are long gone and we now have a softer kindler Microsoft.
You can´t be serious, can you?
See what Microsoft has done to the possibility of a real standard for Office documents (ODT), how half-baked and non-conformant to what it promised to do for its own “XML-standard”, how it continues to support patented crap for video distribution and how it continues to spread FUD about competitors day in and day out.
So Microsoft is still the same old wine in new bottles, I am afraid to say.
Don’t expect me to open the door for you.
I’m pretty sure it will be justified because apple is a business and the iphone is there product and they don’t have to let anyone else play in their little sandbox.
Doesn’t mean anyone has to like it, and even though its their sandbox, I’m free to take my business elsewhere for their management of their sandbox. Apple was great when they were the underdog and couldn’t afford to pull crap like this, now that they are in the lead, they are letting their ugly side show.
“I’m pretty sure it will be justified because apple is a business and the iphone is there product and they don’t have to let anyone else play in their little sandbox.”
ya but here is the messed up part. Remember the EU (using most recent examples) making forcing MS to provide choices? to make sure vendor lock in was dialed back a bit? Where the hell are they for this kind of stuff?! I don’t really have an issue with it, it’s apples product and they can do what they want with it. Sadly, it will likely do great and further allow Jobs to lock anything and everything out he doesn’t want. BUT i would love to see it all back fire and the computing industry say “If apple doesnt want to work with us, then we don’t want to work with apple.” BUT INSTEAD! we get this “Apple doesn’t want to work with us, so we are going to conforom to apple in order to be usable by their products” and i get why they are doing it, apples portable products are sure market successes, but…. ugggg, i am not gonna get into it because it legitimately bothers me.
I will say this. If they reject the .NET stuff that is powering Unity for the iPhone I swear to god I will put in so much effrot into the WinCE 7, WebOS and (yes i am saying it)Andoid market that the massive project I have been working on forever will NOT and NEVER WILL be tuned to fit what Apple wants.
You want to win people over, build a prduct for the people. You want to control the industry, talk to Jobs…
Apple’s still not quite big enough to be considered a monopoly yet, and underhanded business practices aren’t illegal so long as your not a monopoly, there’re just underhanded. If enough competition can form against Apple then they may be forced to back off a bit without the government doing anything. And until Apple does something illegal then the government shouldn’t do anything.
Governments frequently do what they shouldn’t.
Just saying… :p
The EU didn’t get involved with the Microsoft case until about 10 years after it actually mattered and alternative browsers were gaining ground on their own, proving that their interference was never needed to begin with.
EU didn’t get involved because up to that point EU structures were being set-up. When they finally had the “balls” and the power, they immediately went after the offenders.
Well are the mobile ad company complaining? No because, iOS 4 is not even released… When released, then eventually some ad company will complain, then the EU will look at the case and… well what marked share?? less than 40% are you kidding???
Eventually when Apple get 70% of the ad market (!!!) then EU will have to be serious about that…
So your issue in fact is that the developer relation policy of Apple doesn’t suit you? Just go with Microsoft… oh wait they change their policy too?
HP… oh wait the WebOS apps market is not here yet… and you don’t know the HP policy about developers…
Google… oh wait their client are not your client and the Android market is not their priority… the Android platform many of little blocking issues… all of these will probably be fixed (when?) so… go ahead…
The biggest problem with platform as successful as the iOS one is that individual product are not important anymore… If you develop a product on other platforms but not on iOS one… then someone will just copy you project and in the end you just lost this market share… and people still enjoy the feature of your product on every platforms… (and you can really trust the power of some china dev to duplicate your product in no time…)
Then may be you will understand the
that some not so rich company must adopt… Competition it not what you want???
Please let people out of your personal concern… lot of bad things happen in the name of people…
Your « behave like I want or I will not work with you » don’t please me either… it’s not professional
As a user how do I get to pick the ad network feeding me banner ads?
Gotta love the power of 75 million users. The industry will back the biggest horse in the race until either the horse dies or a bigger horse comes along.
Jobs builds products for the people. He doesn’t build products for nerds, geeks, developers, or techies. Industry control comes from the consumers who buy the products.
Yes they do! They’re Apple. What’s wrong with you people?! They should rename their sandbox to iBeach and let everyone frolic there for free! And of course it should be a Unicorn friendly iBeach. And Google should be allowed to stand at the entrance and collect the intimate details of everyone who comes to play so they can let them know about all the cool carnival rides they have on their own gBeach. Apple shouldn’t be worrying about ROI or such things, they already have enough resources to keep iBeach free and open for ever, so it should all be for the betterment of humanity! And other companies of course – there’s no reason why other’s shouldn’t be allowed to profit from stuff Apple build on iBeach, just not Apple themselves…
Edited 2010-06-08 23:59 UTC
Can we say Anti-Competitive? Im an all Apple Shop.. but this is getting ridiculous…
IANAL, but I do agree that this seems anti competitive.
Apple keeps 30% of what consumers pay for apps, now they make the developers jump through hoops if they choose to use any other ad sites except for iAd.
I do agree the aggregation of data should be opt in, but I don’t think that what this is all about. If Apple were serious about protecting consumer info wouldn’t they also remove Facebook and other apps? Also how do we know Apple isn’t aggregating data on their own and blocking the competition.
I love the fact that as a developer don’t have to pay for hosting my app, managing the distribution channel, the payment processing, or any of the other stuff needed to sell into a mobile market. That is easily worth 30% to me.
Adding other ad networks isn’t really any harder then using iAd. The hardest part is creating the account and getting all the payment information setup. This is where iAds wins, I don’t have to setup and manage multiple accounts.
Remove Facebook and other apps? First the privacy issues of Facebook are Facebooks problems not Apple’s and those problems are still fairly subjective. Second Apple is protecting their market more then the consumer here. Don’t get me wrong the consume is protected but more important, for Apple, is Google or other mobile company can’t use Apple’s devices to collect competitive information. Google can do the same thing when Apple release iAds for Android.
Whats anticompetitive is having Google glean all the information about your latest and greatest platform in-order to compete with their own product. Just like Flurry let everyone know that Apple was testing the iPad way before Apple intended to announce their product. What’s to stop Google from getting information about Apple’s hardware and user stats and letting their hardware partners and advertisers know to prop up their own Android platform? Apple’s own solution is limited to their hardware at the moment, thats an unfair advantage to Google since they have a mobile platform and an ad service as well. Their is a conflict of interest their. Apple took the initiative and removed the conflict.
Besides the more competition in the ad space, the better. Google has gotten too big, imo, and I don’t trust them. At least with Apple I know what I’m getting because they are very upfront on what they are about, marketing speak notwithstanding. Google does things and only divulge what they are doing when they get caught. The devil I know and all of that.
Wow, your definition of “anti-competitive” is prett much completely backwards there…
Had you read my post fully, you would know what I was getting at. Basically letting AdMob on the iphone is tantamount to someone putting a hidden camera in your retail store to see what your customers are buying so that I can sell it cheaper at my store down the street.
You are basically saying its okay for Google to learn about Apple’s hardware, and track their customers, even though Google itself is a competitor? And you don’t think that’s anti-competitive or at least an unfair advantage to Google?
Fanboi much? I know people think Google shits gold sometimes, just like most Apple fanboys think Apple shits platinum, but at the end of the day they are both businesses and they have to protect their profits. Giving one of your biggest competitor access to your platform isn’t very smart. Its like the Airforce opening up its doors saying hey guys you can take a look at how we build our jets and how to use them and then being surprised when China builds one just like it.
AdMob gives Google too much power in the mobile space as a platform maker themselves. If Android didn’t exist, there wouldn’t be an issue. Apple is not blocking other ad services from the platform, just those that have their own mobile OS. As large as the user base of the iPhone is compared to Android, I find it hard to believe that Google wouldn’t use the stats form AdMob to try to steal customers from Apple or glean information about Apple’ hardware and divulge it to their hardware partners to beat them to market.
It doesn’t matter what you meant to say – you still have an incorrect definition of “anti-competitive”.
Well, that’s certainly a competitive action. It’s not like Google “infiltrated” the iPhone platform through some backdoor. They did it through perfectly legitimate, competitive means, with iPhone developers supporting them. By definition, what Apple is doing *after the fact* is anti-competitive because Apple doesn’t want Google to compete with them on their platform, even if the developers would rather use AdMob then iAd, Apple has made the choice for them.
Seriously…I only pointed out that your definition of anti-competitive was pretty much backwards, and you still insist that it’s not.
It doesn’t matter who is big and who is little, who is more powerful and who is less powerful, who respects privacy and who doesn’t – you can’t just change the definition of the word to suit your needs.
Why hasn’t google blocked iPhone from gmail yet, then?
mail.live.com
I suppose google could afford this.
So letting your competition have access to all your customers is a good thing and should be encouraged? Business is general is anticompetitive, Apple isn’t in business to promote competition.
The other thing to remember here is the new rule doesn’t apply to independent ad networks. It only applies to ad networks owned by mobile hardware or OS manufactures.
Why is everyone so tied up in “good” or “bad” when discussing whether something is anti-competitive or not. What I’m claiming is that Google scoping out the competition is not anti-competitive by definition (gathering statistics does not preventing Apple from doing something)… whereas Apple blocking Google’s ad software on their phone is anti-competitive (They’re actively preventing Google from doing something).
If Google prevented iPhone from accessing YouTube while allowing other mobile devices, that would be another example of anti-competitive behavior.
It’s that simple folks…
It’s similar to the difference between a feature and an anti-feature (look it up).
If Apple wants to put iAd on ANdroid, I don’t think Google will stop them. They can’t They don’t control the platform like with an Iron Fist like Apple. iAd will succeed in Android, if it’s good.
You seem to promote anti-competitive behavior saying that “It was always the same”. Apple says “It is different”. Why can’t they be different this time when there is a chance?
Are you in your own world? We are talking about Apple specially blocking out Google. Everyone who doesn’t live under a rock knows that “independent ad networks” are allowed. Don’t say the same shit million times.
You’re the first poster (including the link poster, Thom) to see that this is the real reason: Apple (rightfully) doesn’t want device IDs tracked (which is where Flurry caused the real ruckus) because that gives away potentially valuable information to competitors (which is only really Google at this time) that intersect both with doing mobile ads AND developing mobile hardware/software that competes. If Google hadn’t bought AdMob OR Google hadn’t moved into the mobile OS/phone space, Apple would have no reason to do this. After all, Google has certainly been caught red-handed several times keeping more data than they’ve had a right to keep: this ends up being a clash of the Titans, time to get out the popcorn!
Precisely. And, at least in their previous wording (I haven’t seen this new one fully yet), legitimate information surrounding an ad would still be available. The sort of analytics prohibited shouldn’t have been collected in the first place.
I don’t hear you complaining that Apple themselves are allowed to collect and use such information (according to the new developer agreement, please read Thoms article again!)
Nothing wrong in collecting anonymous data. Heck, it should be promoted. It is a good way to learn which features your users use and which not. Requirement: It should not collect any personally identifying information.
This is a good point. They allow independent tracking, just not from Apple’s mobile competitors like Google and Microsoft.
Google should just stop displaying links to Apple registered trademarks such as IPhone and IPad. Afterall, the Google search results page is their sandbox and they can do what they want in it!
Or they could show a single link – to a “Suggestions box” page on the Apple website. No big deal – a simple filter.
Best,
Peter.
Edited 2010-06-08 23:07 UTC
No problem on my end. In fact, Apple should buy Cuil and gie Google a massive middle finger with a new Maps.cuil.com answer.
++ Hysterical – one question, one answer. What in the heck is “Cuil?”
Thats Apple’s tactic nicely turned around on itself… don’t you think?
I tried Ciul search engine. The exact result which i wanted is not on the first page.
FYI, search engines are not hardware. You need years to build them and tweak the algorithm so that it performs best.
If apple did that, they would be fingering themselves. Nothing matches Google search results as of now. Bing is closer, since they already had a huge index of web pages.
My God, never seen anything as awful as cuil. Just tried it. Seems to be a search engine. Tried “dmc tz10 review” (without quotation marks) – gave me shitty sites trying to sell the thing. Google gives me the 3 best reviews (every single aspect with test samples) in the first 5 links. And what’s worse, you can’t middle click a link to open in a new tab (in Chrome at least) – it just won’t do it, every link you have to open in the same damn window! Now if there’s a thing that would surely drive away customers (and there aren’t many seeing the fanaticism of some) from Apple, this is it. Ditch google and use cuil!
I gave up on apple a number of years ago, the locked iPhone was the start and end of my interest in their mobile device space. Its a hack system limiting too much to the end user and developer particularly. Apple is the darling to WS and we all know what those bastards got into with sub prime loans. Apple is speculative, with earnings to share value 10 times riskier than ‘stable’ companies on the edge of valuation risk. Apple should not be rewarded for limiting technology, and yet the masses are lining up, sadly.
But, “Limitations” are what the masses understand and are comfortable with.
When someone then comes along and tells them: “Now you can do X *and* Z!”, they feel they’re somehow being rewarded, even if they should have been allowed to do “Z” all along… Often times they don’t realize that “Y” has been taken away when they received the gift of “Z”.
Pretty slimy marketing tactics, in my book.
And that is why wall street loves them. What other company has a fan base that stands in line all day for a product refresh? Or how about the people that were camping for the iphone?
Other tech companies have to get out and sell their products while Apple just has to announce them.
Well, apple had always has this cool thing going around them.. they used to be the underdogs, the fight da power… now, they make RIAA, Microsoft and anybody else BLUSH with the things they are doing lately..
Yeah, they have cool products, i give you that but it will cost you your soul.
. Nah, it will cost you your freedom to choose, i dont want to give apple more power, they already manage the music industry and it will be a really sad day if they manage the smarthphone industry too… because we will have to do as they say, not as we want to.
+1
But the bottom line is we’re free to take our business elseware. I suggest, to everyone who cares, that they do this and encourage others to do the same. That’s the only statement Apple will understand. They can do what ever the hell they want, but so can we. I don’t get everyone bitching about it. If you don’t like it, don’t buy or develop for it. Eventually their tactics will turn against them and developers as well as users will leave. Simple as that when you cut right to it.
People involved here are:
– End users: do you really think that end user will be pissed that Apple limit Google to gather data about how they use their device? I don’t think so… but I’m for freedom….
– Developer: You think that developer will cut an important source of money because… Google can’t make money?? Does money from adMob such bigger than what iAd promise? I know some dev than don’t even care… they just want the easier and lesser intrusive way to put ad in their apps.
By the way in fact adMob is not blocked, they just have to buy data from third-party…
If you want to make your own rules, just built your own company… but warning, its not that easy, and then you will not appreciate comments like yours… think about that.
Wait for next revision of ToS. You might find this
“Independent ad vendors cannot sell their analytics or any sort of collected data to any non-independent ad agencies except for Apple.”
have started to come off. So have the masks. Apple is starting to show us the rotten side, full of worms. It will be a good battle since it is all about survival. One of these two is going to come out with some very deep scars (financial). I am sure that had it not been for the fear of backlash, Apple would completely eliminate google from search providers.
And that’s the problem for Apple.
Apple needs Google, because users want Google (search, YouTube). Google does not need Apple. Not even in the slightest.
This battle can only be lost by one player. And it isn’t Google.
Well… actually google have the choice between Apple and Microsoft for their desktop computer (chromeOS nor android are ready for that yet, Linux is here but can’t replace completely yet).
And here the one who don’t need other is… Microsoft
Thus Google still need Apple for one thing… oh and for WebKit (Google do work for chromium but what about webkit itself??? Apple engineer have to made WebKit 2 in order to have the tab isolation of chromium…)
The user need goggle essentially for the search part… for other services well Apple, Microsoft and lot of other company provide them too (yes for map also
)
Thus I think Google are happy that Apple still use Google Map, provide easy access to Google Mail, etc
Sure everyone understand that the Google policy is to become the Apple+Microsoft of tomorrow… we’ll see…
** Why does google need Apple or Microsoft for desktop? They are a search provider. They only need to make sure there stuff WORKS on OSX and Windows… they don’t need it. They already dropped Windows as an option in their organization anyways. Google can and does do business running Linux. Apple (like Linux) is solely an employee choice.
++ Webkit is open source through and through. Apple develops a lot of it but it was open source before Apple and would be open source without Apple.
++ As Stephen Colbert (roughly) put it last night. “Whats Bing? Its a search engine! How do I know? I googled it!”
Enough said.
Lol, and you think that an IT company work with pen and paper on their desktop… yes in some ways… but they NEEDS computer… and in the case of Google it’s a strategic choice…
Well, I think your wrong (again
) WebKit is an Apple project, they create it as a fork of the KHTML sources (a very good Web engine I used on daily basis), but they made it a *serious* Web engine (well after some years of efforts).
About WebKit be open-source without Apple… well not with that name… and sure not a lot of company are ready to spend that much money (lot of people involved mostly fix part that are related to their port or are reviewer). Thus actually google need apple to work on the core engine.
(But when the 3D part done by google will become mainstream, then we can thanks google for this major contribution)
What means the verb « gloogled » ? I search on bing… (no I just kidding)… thus what the point aside some funny words?
Say more…
The fact that google is so much present is a big concern… that why I just use google when I need using… everything else chrome
and the fact is that search engine aside, every other service have a equivalent or even better counter part by other company that don’t sell me to the ad business (or I hope…).
Thus in order to still reach people like me (i’m not the only one) they need company like Apple (and even microsoft) while they still have some market share…
1. WebKit is open source
2. WebKit is a fork of KTHML from KDE
3. Apple just hosts and administrates the project, WebKit is actually “developed” by multiple parties
4. If people get tired of Apple policies, they can fork WebKit or back-port all changes to KHTML and continue that path
You are giving way to much credit to Apple and not enough to other participants in Webkit. I guess this is typical for a fanboy … forgeting to give credit where credit is due
That’s right. Apple protects privacy rights, while Google spies on you and you love Google.
Pucker up.
Ahh, you see Google doesn’t just spy on me, they let any third party spy on me, regardless of mobile offerings.
Completely different.
Now enlighten me, how Google lets others spy on me? Do they sell the statistics in their raw form? Do they sell statistics at all?
Mostly a tongue in cheek answer, but not that far off in reality. Google has had some major security flaws in its products that have allowed people to do all sorts of spying on others. One really cynical, reality disassociated person might say that fixing the holes amounted to an unfair anticompetitive action.
Past Examples include:
Google Buzz showing everyone your contact list
Google Docs, allowing anyone to access your docs
Google Desktop, allowing anyone to access your files remotely.
I guess you missed the part in the developer agreement where Apple and only Apple was given the right to collect such “sensitive” data.
Furthermore, the Google ads where perfectly fine [and encouraged since they attracted more developers] for Apple right until Apple introduced its own competing solution.
The other way to look at this. Google is driving Apple to be more competitive. Apple has to produce a better product focus more on what consumers want, open the AppStore more, fight a little dirtier. Business is not warm and fuzzy. It’s cold, ruthless, and I for one want both Google and Apple to keep this up. It will drive both to be better.
I mean just look at MS, they didn’t have any competition for most of the 2000’s and their products suffered because of it. It wasn’t until Apple, Linux, Google, came along that they started improving their products.
Why would I be angry for this? I say thank you apple, less ads for me.
When I do a google search and check my gmail what third party advertising platforms does Google allow? Do you think they’ll let Apple get in on that space?
The proper comparison would have been: Will Google allow iAd to exist on Android-based devices?
As an example, Google doesn’t get the luxury of providing Ads on Hotmail, or in any of the applications written by Apple for the iPhone…
My understanding is that AdMob is an optional service offered to mobile app *developers* for inclusion in their own software when that software is run by the user. Now those developers must use iAd instead.
That is a better comparison. What does Google allow in that vein? The way the language reads to me is thus: Apple isn’t going to let competitors collect free data on iPhone user demographics.
Does Google forbid web browsers from collecting information about what user’s browsing habits are when they’re using Google services? Could they do this even if they wanted to? Would users like that feature or hate it?
The ads. Can’t they both lose?
Plus a billion, but really unlikely. I liked Google’s ads because they were more targeted, and less intrusive than any others search ads. I additionally like them now, because they are easy to block, for the wise, yet help subsidize the creation of useful programs.
When you think about it, Google is really just like the lottery, a tax on people that don’t know any better which still benefits those who do.
I happen to be a iphone/android developer who gets paid by these ads. Without the ads, I cannot develop _free_ apps for your pleasure.
Can one really make more than $3/month through ads ?
There are some apps people simply would not download unless they were free. Ads allow you to make an extra buck on such apps.
You cannot live a playboy life on ad-money, but your $3/month estimation is a few zeros short from the actual figures.
Interesting. I always heard that it was about making a fraction of cent per view as a maximum, and that only massively viewed apps and websites could make serious benefits from them.
Edited 2010-06-09 09:48 UTC
You seem to assume much, believing that I enjoy your app. I don’t even know what your app is.
This also applies to MS, although their advertising business is somewhat smaller than google’s..
Note that Apple doesn’t specifically block Google. It blocks Competition.
They could simplify all the terms by just stating that “iPhone ecosystem may not be used in any form that could be beneficial to competition as well. Apple can be a lucrative host, but know your limits”.
I’m crying inside. Really. Trust in the Google.
Google has a “do no evil” reputation to defend, so I imagine they at least attempt to maintain appearances of ethical behavior. Apple has no such “hassles”, so they can “do evil” with vigour; for some reason I’d rather trust google.
So don’t buy an iPhone, get a Android phone where the whole purpose of the OS is to feed data through the Google advertising machine.
Its time to get a little perspective on this.
As I recall it was Google a couple of weeks ago at their IO that explicitly and aggressively attacked Apple and its products at every opportunity. Apple didn’t do that to Google at the WWDC. It was Google that entered the phone business to compete with Apple (while sitting on Apple’s Board) and not Apple that entered the search business to compete with Google. If you decide to aggressively target a competitor be prepared for a response. This is called normal business practice.
The readers of this forum should be champions of online privacy and the biggest threat to that privacy is Google and one of the biggest defenders of privacy in the mobile arena is Apple. They should be applauded for doing what they are doing. Google has developed Android so it can gather data on Android users – does that make readers here comfortable?
It should be noted that individual ad placers are not blocked from using reasonable analytics under the new Apple rules, whilst respecting user privacy, it is only monopoly intermediaries (ie Google) that are blocked.
I think people here should at least understand and accept Apple’s actions here as reasonable and applaud and support Apple’s position on privacy.
Haha.
Funny how nobody, including Apple zealots like you, gave a crap about AdMob & co. when Apple did not yet have its own competing solution. Now that they do, suddenly AdMob is a problem? While at the same time, Apple gets to collect all the data it wants?
Advertisers compile tracking data. TV does it. Newspapers do it. Radio does it. Magazines do it. And heck, websites do it. It is a service – I don’t want sexy perfume ads in children’s magazines, and I don’t want Treehugger Inc. ads in my car magazines.
As long as the government keeps a close eye on what data is collected, and as long as the companies in question are open about it, I’m okay with it. This goes for both Google and Apple.
I, for one, hated AdMob ads with a passion even before iAds or the Google acquisition were news.
I give a crap about it and always have. And honestly from my perspective, if I were an iDevice owner, Apple’s decision would almost make me happy, knowing that a greater percentage of my ads won’t be tailored to my habits. That crap creeps me out.
Where are you getting this stuff from? Where does it say anywhere that they won’t be able to tailor the category of ad to the application? You don’t need to collect user data in order to be able to do that.
Fact is, AdMob can still be used on the iPhone, and everyone still gets their cut of the pie. So I don’t know that this move will really make that many advertisers switch platforms. Yes, it is anticompetitive, but from my perspective it could have positive side effects, so I’m not complaining.
What made the iPhone and many Apple products successful are the techies. Many people seems to think its the mass of “sheep” (as in, they don’t know exactly what they’re buying and take what everyone buys) which are responsible for that. But in fact, they buy what the geek friends advise. It builds up fast and sheep A tells sheep B that device ZXY is not the hype and best anymore.
Now that the tendency is reversed, certainly, Apple will stay mostly on top for a while, but at the end of they day if they do not change, every time someone is going to buy an iPhone, he’s going to ask his tech friend if it’s the right choice and be pointed to android/meego. (mostly android nowadays).
If you don’t believe this, watch Chrome the browser, even vs Firefox. Firefox is a good browser, but the techies tendency is towards Chrome. Result, while Firefox is big, Chrome climbs rapidly. And hey again.. Firefox is a good browser made by a good company!
Now.. the iPhone is not even very good, and Apple is not a very good company (morally speaking). however they multiply lock-ins (like if you pay $100 of apps, you’re going to want another iPhone, not a new product) to slow the process down. But we’ll see.
I think you laughable over estimate your importance and the importance of what you call techies/geeks (but what you actually mean are anti-Apple paranoids).
Apple will continue to sell increasing numbers of iPhones. The iOS will continue to grow very fast and will remain the dominant mobile OS by far. Get used to to it, calm down and start looking at what Google is up to with slightlty more critical eyes (here is a hint – Google is a private enterprise just like all the rest – and its business model depends on collecting information about what you do on the internet – how cool is that?).
sure they will. Android will just increase faster.
The iOS development pace is already outpaced like crazy by Android.
“Remain”? Both Symbian and BlackBerry are FAR more dominant than iOS. RDF much?
I doubt it – it hasn’t so far.
No it hasn’t – each OS takes decisions to add or emphasise different features but Android has not pulled ahead and it won’t. Because Android is fragmented and because it cannot integrate with the hardware as deeply or predictably as iOS the latter is a more attractive platform for developers.
iOS has an installed base of 100 million and unlike the Symbian and BlackBerry it offers a far more cohesive and accessible target for developers – hence the vast preponderance of iOS apps. iOS is the dominant mobile platform in the central and strategic metric of developer support.
What counts now is not dumbed down systems like Symbian but the smart mobile platform – that’s the game to play and its the game iOS is clearly winning.
With 10 million plus iPhones, a lot of iPod Touches and a million (2 million?) iPads likely being sold per month the installed iOS base is growing very rapidly and will thus continue to be the most attractive platform for developers (plus of course the App Store which is hugely popular with developers).
Please tell me how an OS whose home screen displays a dumb wall of application launchers instead of something useful like incoming agenda entries is a “smarter” mobile platform.
Are you a simpleton?
No, but I’m genuinely waiting for an in-depth depiction of your point of view.
You said this :
As a Symbian phone owner and a casual iOS user, if I were to depict one OS as “dumbed down” and one as “smart”, I’d rather say that Symbian is the smart one and iOS the dumb one. If you want, I can explain why in details.
You seem to think the opposite. So I ask you to say why, in your opinion, Symbian is a dumbed down OS and iOS is a smart OS. Because since I don’t use iOS on a daily basis, I may be misunderstood and not see what makes this OS a “smart mobile platform” instead of a rich guy’s toy which is not good at doing anything useful.
It’s quite simple, actually.
Edited 2010-06-09 19:31 UTC
You probably live in the US, because where I live the hot selling mobile phones are Android based(HTC Desire – truly lived up to it’s name…)
Please…. The biggest number of “complaints” of fragmentation come from iPhone app developers that started to do Android. I develop for Android and all it takes to alleviate the fragmentation is an open mind.(Yes, a lot of iPhone devs I’ve met are closed minded)
You may want to twist the numbers however you like, but the fact remains that Symbian still is king in the world. And please stop sticking to that stupid premise that if it’s not in the shape and form of an iphone it’s not a smartphone. All BalckBerries are smartphones. Nokia’s smartphones are cheaper than cheapest iPod touch, so no wonder they sell more(See C5, 5230, E52, E63).
And with those good growth numbers, iOS may probably overtake Symbian, but it’s not a fact at the moment.
“80% of all statistical studies are incorrect, a statistical study concludes” – Dilbert
lolwut? Citations or it didn’t happen.
Also, when did we start calling the iPhoneOS iOS? I find it terribly disconcerting (and won’t Cisco be mad?)
Complain to Apple. They decided to change the name in order to celebrate iPhone4’s release. And knowing some Apple trolls around, anyone which now uses the iPhoneOS term will be flagged as a passeist which does not see how GREAT iOS has become
Edited 2010-06-10 11:57 UTC
Do you live in a bunker?
Steve Jobs announced the name change at Apple’s World Wide Developers Conference on Monday and also announced the sale of the 100 millionth device running the OS.
The event was carried on just about every news site and tech blog on the planet – what were you doing – dozing?
http://events.apple.com.edgesuite.net/1006ad9g4hjk/event/index.html
Sorry, I don’t rabidly follow apple news when it has nothing to do with things I care about (like gcc, cups, etc). Steve Jobs talking about new apple products ranks very low on my must-see scale, so I don’t read further than the headlines.
Now that I know why I am only more irritated. Why confuse things? It’s the iPhoneOS and didn’t need a name change.
Well I can see the reason behind this myself : it’s now iPhoneOS, iTouchOS, AND iPadOS. So iOS makes more sense, somewhat…
Among all of the discussion about Apple’s eclipsing Microsoft in market capitalization (a kind of stupid metric, as far as I’m concerned) and how brilliant Steve Jobs is (I think he’s one of the few CEO’s in the world who actually delivers real value to his company rather than just being pointy-haired), it was striking how Microsoft has failed in many ways during the past decade, yet makes insane amounts of profits. They’re in this position at least partially because they didn’t play “fair”; they’re entrenched and people will bitch about their crappy products and then hand over their first born child to purchase them. One of the things Steve Jobs has learned is that making a better product doesn’t protect you from being marginalized. We’ll see if these efforts succeed in preventing marginalization (Android being free makes it a very, very different beast from Windoze).
[quote]And then people wonder why Apple is no longer the darling of the geek world.[/quote]
Yeah, I am soooo angry against Apple not to be able to see Google ads…. bwahahahahahahaha!
What a piece of crap. I don’t care about ads. Ads is Ads, I hate them whatever it comes from Apple or Google.
I just can’t imagine this being legal. Apple has gone off the deep end. They are worse then Microsoft ever thought of being. I remember the days when Apple criticized Microsoft for being a bully, wow that is calling the kettle black. I will not be buying any apple products. I have always wanted a iPod touch. I will never get one now. All these years of bad PR is catching up with Microsoft, Apple keep digging, you may be successful now but the first signs of trouble people will abandon you and feel no remorse as they remember how you treated others in the past. They may even stick a few knifes in your back as you go down.
Sure it’s legal until someone files a lawsuit against them and wins
Antitrust law and competition law in general is somewhat finicky. First there has to be proof that Apple has monopolistic control over the market involved before anyone is going to seriously consider their anti-competitive behavior to be illegal.
I seriously doubt it’s at that level yet, the smart phone market has plenty of competition in it still.
As for the license agreement terms – I’m not familiar with the agreement – but I’m sure Apple has placed some verbiage in there from the start that allows them to retroactively remove rights from the developers – probably something along the lines of “these terms can change without notice at any time” or something.
To quote another more eloquent commentator:
Bullshit. Google started this. It was Google that turned its sights on the iPhone. If AdMob had remained independent, they could still sell in-app ads on iOS. If AdMob had sold itself to Apple instead of Google, they could still sell in-app ads on iOS. If Google hadn’t declared war against the iPhone, AdMob could still see in-app ads on iOS. They made their bed, now they have to sleep in it.
There’s no question it’s a dick move on Apple’s part. But what’s the argument against it? That Google gets a pass for being dicks to Apple, and Apple ought to just sit there and take it?
I think anything that encourages advertising in iPhone apps is a bad thing. Ads negatively impact user experience when inside programs. I don’t care who the provider is, whether it’s Apple or Google or someone else; keep ads out of apps.
Just look up a screenshot of Videora Video Converter if you want to see where the slippery slope leads.
I feel old )-:
Macs were Macs when they had 128k of memory.