Cook tried to expand ad business to achieve service revenue growth. It is reported that the idea was strongly opposed by employees since Apple treated product owners as customers, not users. But Cook decided to go for it. Besides, will you worry Apple starting exploit your privacy (iCloud stores almost everything) for ad?
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As Cook tried to grow ad revenue, are you ok with it?
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Why would he do anything other than try to expand the business? He is paid very handsomely to run the company. His job is to make profit.
This is a proof that Apple can't grow very much anymore. Ads are the only way they can do that. At least they think that. It's a totally wrong move though and I absolutely despise it. We pay handsomly for their products and it's one of the reasons I buy those because there are no ads. Well they added them to the App Store, but that doesn't bother me too much because I very rarely download new apps and I only go there to update my apps and in that section there aren't any. It's sad to see that Apple i slowly becoming Google and Microsoft.
Apple has been sitting right in the same ring as those other named companies for many a year now. Exactly how do you think they got there?
Here is a shocker: those of us not living in a small Mac world where most of the others are echoing the same sentiments, much of the world buys what they want, need, are able to or are required. Apple products only matter to us as far as do they work, do they work well and do they work well for me. We aren't part of an "ecosystem" other than it consists of tech we use, need and desire.
I and most of my colleagues only know of and care about who runs a company in context of investments. Cook has done well, although I think Apple is placing a wall around itself with its non-replaceable components.
Ads just warrant adblockers. I don't like it, but I understand the need to answer to stockholders.
Here is a shocker: those of us not living in a small Mac world where most of the others are echoing the same sentiments, much of the world buys what they want, need, are able to or are required. Apple products only matter to us as far as do they work, do they work well and do they work well for me. We aren't part of an "ecosystem" other than it consists of tech we use, need and desire.
I and most of my colleagues only know of and care about who runs a company in context of investments. Cook has done well, although I think Apple is placing a wall around itself with its non-replaceable components.
Ads just warrant adblockers. I don't like it, but I understand the need to answer to stockholders.
Growing revenue through ads, is not visionary. It’s tacky, uncreative, yet profitable.
Cook is not a visionary. He’s piggybacked off the initial success of the iPhone not innovating apart from larger and faster. He’s a numbers guy and he’s made Apple into a trillion dollar company during his tenure. Shareholders love him. And as long as profits are there, Cook will have their support.
Cook is not a visionary. He’s piggybacked off the initial success of the iPhone not innovating apart from larger and faster. He’s a numbers guy and he’s made Apple into a trillion dollar company during his tenure. Shareholders love him. And as long as profits are there, Cook will have their support.
This is all built on the assumption that Apple has cared about user privacy in the past...
Well they can do a lot more like what they plan to do with the iPhone. There's the rumor that they may be going portliest which would mean some people would have to pay for more services. I refuse to pay for anything such as iCloud, Apple Music, Apple TV+. I don't need or want any of that as I have my music synced to my phone through my Mac and I backup to my Mac.
More ads in the App Store? Well, I only download maybe 2-3 apps a year anymore and I've been getting rid of the apps that I downloaded 10 years ago and kept on my phone just to have them.
There's a reason that I bought three 13 Pro Max phones in August instead of waiting for the 14 and that's because the 14 was eSim only. I'll keep using an iPhone but only as long as it continues fitting with how I like using it.
I recommend Synology NAS for your private cloud. And it’s much faster and private. Than anything from Apple.
To me as long as they don't really interfere with day to day life and begin collecting data I am fine with it. I don't use the App Store that much and I honestly can't believe how much backlash everyone has about ads on the App Store. You just search/find the app you want and done. I don't think it is a big deal to see a little small ad, but if they are popping in your face (which I doubt Apple will do) then that is another story. I understand the backlash of Maps getting ads especially with the revamping of the look of maps Apple has been slowly rolling out and it will get rather tacky, like Google Maps is really good I think the majority knows that, but searching for something and the what like top 2 or whatever results are ads much like the search engine portion.
Now if we start opening the app store and there is a little game clip or productivity app clip playing almost immediately then yeah that isn't going to work.
Now if we start opening the app store and there is a little game clip or productivity app clip playing almost immediately then yeah that isn't going to work.
Well considering that Tim Apple probably listens to Eddie Cue more than anyone else there, Apple will increasingly become an evil company that more and more will love to hate.
That is not even a prediction. It is a fact to be.
Corporations are no different than humans in the span of time. They start young, full of vigor, idealism, and assumptions that the future will be even grander than the present. But...
Eventually the original founders move on, and with them the idealism that grew the company into success and sometimes mega-success. Now the company is no longer a swift yacht that can turn and twist its way into close waters. It is a battleship - powerful, awesome, intimidating, but a vessel that cannot start, stop, turn or maneuver either toward or away from opponents with any degree of agility.
And, while the slim yacht might be commanded by the young entrepreneur in jeans and a polo shirt, the hulking behemoth has to have a professional captain.
So, eventually, all (read that as ALL!!) corporations eventually get an MBA in charge - a leader with an entirely different view of the needed company direction. Now, customers are not the key concern, but rather the requirement is in obtaining a goodly bottom line for the next stockholders meeting. And then the next...
I would list the companies that turned from fit and trim industry leaders to overstuffed mega has-beens, but that would just take up a ton of space on this server. Rather, I will list those mega-corporations that in the last 75 years have managed to stay young and productive from their founding.
List begins---
---List Ends
Sadly, it will happen to Apple just as surely as the sun rises in the morning. The only question is when and how fast. They will eventually get an MBA (if I seem to use that term as a pejorative, it is because I do) that will question all the expensive aluminum and fancy packaging and blue shirts running around the stores. Plastic, foam, and minimum wage hires from the local homeless population will really give our bottom line a boost, and (sotto voce) my bonus packages for the year.
Fortunately for the world, the skippers of all battleships eventually notice, suddenly, that a very fast and trim speedboat is passing on the port beam, for some unknown destination ahead. The old and stoogy officer cannot even begin to fathom why such a flimsy boat is heading for a island with apparently nothing of importance to be seen. He has never even heard of Bubaru, and could care less if someone told him - not with the important stockholder meeting tomorrow, starring... Himself.
So, there will certainly be a new and younger Apple, Microsoft, IBM, Compaq, etc, etc suddenly arrive to fill in the vacuum.
*** I agree with the above absolutely, but most of the words are not mine. They come from a Business Practices 102 text from long ago. I have cut the length massively, changed some text to fit the times, and replaced some of the names and places to match the current year, as the original document had companies that no longer exist - i.e. RCA, Sylvania, Westinghouse, etc.
Apple probably needs to expand their ads business in order to grow but there are places where people are used to (and accepting of) ads: namely in web search – so long as it's no more intrusive than what's on Google.com. It's worth the inevitable learning curve and decade+ investment in order to add a potentially Google sized chunk of revenue to its books. Apple users would also get better search integration with Siri, QuickLook, native Apps (Pages, Numbers, Keynote), Maps, Music, News, etc.
There is the risk that, by pursuing ads as a revenue stream, they could endanger their other revenue streams. If people feel that their premium product that protects their privacy no longer does protect their privacy and feels no more premium than any other product full of ads, will customers still be willing to pay more for Apple products? What does this do to brand loyalty and to the perception of Apple’s products?
MacWorld has a story discussing how tech industries have changed and need to shift focus in order to endure. Not a fan of advertising, but don't understand the complete context (ads vs cost, diversity of products, etc.) in order to have an opinion.
"Though this decision [to add advertising] might seem out of character for Apple, the reasoning behind it is straightforward: The company saw what happened to some of its biggest rivals. Just because you’re on top right now doesn’t mean you’ll be on top forever; better to control your own evolution than have it forced on you."
apple.news
"Though this decision [to add advertising] might seem out of character for Apple, the reasoning behind it is straightforward: The company saw what happened to some of its biggest rivals. Just because you’re on top right now doesn’t mean you’ll be on top forever; better to control your own evolution than have it forced on you."
Apple is quietly preparing for a future without the iPhone—or another big thing — Macworld
Apple’s services and ad push is a long-term hedge. Apple’s at the top of the world—and from this standpoint, it’s hard to see how the company could be anything other than the market leader and taste maker it’s been in recent memories. I’m not about to suggest that its decline and fall are...
No. I will not pay for any service to deliver advertising to any device I own. If the service is provided free of charge, fine, but I must have the option to remove the service or pay for an ad free version of the service. If that is not available I will either do without the service or if there is no option on the device I am using, then I will sell the device.
+1
Why anyone thinks Apple is this virtuous company that you should trust while not trusting any of the other companies is beyond me. Apple is no different then Facebook, Google, Amazon or anyone else, they are in it to make a buck, lots of them. We the consumer are nothing but ways to increase their revenue.
It's nothing to do with virtuous or non-virtuous. These are all organizations run by humans so you will always have a mix of motivations and values. These are not comic book good guys or bad guys.
What we have previously seen is that Apple's motivations were to sell us hardware at a premium price and one of the differentiators was that they make their money on the purchase and do not need to resort to ads, tracking or other things that lead to compromises in privacy. That aligned their goals with our desire for privacy. For many of us that was a reasonable tradeoff to justify the higher price.
More recently, we have seen that just selling premium hardware is not enough for Apple and they are looking into many more ways to make money from us and that has led them into areas where they may be tempted to compromise our privacy to get some additional revenue. I'm not convinced that that tradeoff is worthwhile for either Apple or its customers. Will this erode customer's trust in Apple and their willingness to pay a higher price? Or will this cause customers to see Apple as just another generic vendor with motivations that are antagonistic to its customers?
I don't think that Apple has fully embraced that dark side but they have been dipping their toes into the waters of advertising and tracking and it may be hard for them to restrain themselves just jumping all the way in in pursuit of incremental revenue. This is dangerous ground for them to walk.
To those not on board with this: what are you going to do about it? Answer: nothing. You either endure the ads or pay to have them blocked. Win/win for Apple, lose/lose for you. Capitalism 101.