Advertising Groups Ask Apple to 'Rethink' New Cookie Tracking Standards in Safari 11

[redheeler]

I don't always like what Apple does, but they do tend to lead the way on consumer privacy - and that is one of the reasons I use Apple products.

The advertisers just better be glad Safari didn't go in the direction of Opera, and block ads by default with a bundled ad blocker.

 

[mozumder]

One issue is that Apple's technology will likely only remove small advertiser cookies and cause Facebook and Google to remain de-facto advertisers of the internet, because Apple wouldn't dare remove those cookies. Otherwise, everyone would complain that they have to log on every day.

 

[PatriotInvasion]

While I understand advertising funds most of the content we all love on the internet, I think it's time advertisers find better ways to advertise and connect with consumers. If this move contributes to pushing along the status quo than that's a good thing. More sites and advertisers need to advertise more tastefully than they do now. I should never be whacked with a giant pop-up and hidden "X" as soon as I land on a page. Any site that does that to me now I leave immediately on principal and gain a negative view of the advertiser that popped-up. Even if the site tells me who killed JFK, I'm gone.

 

[OldSchoolMacGuy]

I'm concerned about my clients running Adobe Analytics with Google's ad suite. Have you seen anything about how DMPs are potentially working around this?

I haven't reached out to our Adobe guys yet.

I know Kenshoo (total garbage product for managing AdWords) has said they are monitoring things but aren't going to make a change at this point. What they're really saying is that they aren't acting and because of it, we'll lose accurate conversion data after 24 hours because of their inability to come up with a plan since Apple announced this change in June.

It seems many weren't aware of this change or too lazy to find a solution. With iOS 11 coming out next week and Apple devices having a very high rate of updating, it's going to be clear how big the issue is very quickly.

 

[M.PaulCezanne]

Sadly many miss this point. Advertisement is how many of the sites we enjoy (including MacRumors) exist. They can't pay their bills without advertisements. If you want your favorite site to continue operating and providing you with great content, you really should allow advertisements on that site (whitelist them with your ad blocker).

The problem is bad advertisers. Sites that overdo the ads and ad networks with annoying ads. They ruin it for many sites and give ads a bad name. Google works hard to make sure their ad are high quality, relevant, and not annoying.
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Blame the site you're visiting. They're the one putting bad ads on their site. If you're seeing pop-up ads, it's not a Google ad. It's likely a low-quality ad network on a crappy website.

I think the real problem is that waaaaayyyy to much content these days is advertorial in nature or simply drivel designed to get your eyeballs on ads. What's worse, this style or strategy (or whatever you want to call it) has infiltrated trusted sources. Even once-vaunted publications like The Washington Post are crap now - just vapid clickbait to draw you into a page with 80% advertising.

 

[truthertech]

Sadly many miss this point. Advertisement is how many of the sites we enjoy (including MacRumors) exist. They can't pay their bills without advertisements. If you want your favorite site to continue operating and providing you with great content, you really should allow advertisements on that site (whitelist them with your ad blocker).

The problem is bad advertisers. Sites that overdo the ads and ad networks with annoying ads. They ruin it for many sites and give ads a bad name. Google works hard to make sure their ad are high quality, relevant, and not annoying.
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Blame the site you're visiting. They're the one putting bad ads on their site. If you're seeing pop-up ads, it's not a Google ad. It's likely a low-quality ad network on a crappy website.

 

[coolfactor]

Content on the internet costs money to produce. Advertising pays the bills for site hosting and content creation.

I don't know why people revel in blocking the revenue streams that grant them these things.

There's more than one way to fry a fish. Online ads are out of control, and many sites are abusing their privileges to inject ads into sites.

Just look at those sites where the content makes up 10% of the page, and the rest is all ads. Plus, you need to view 10 pages just to finish reading the content.

The online ad industry is ready for an overhaul, and Apple is helping that to happen.

 

[OldSchoolMacGuy]

One issue is that Apple's technology will likely only remove small advertiser cookies and cause Facebook and Google to remain de-facto advertisers of the internet, because Apple wouldn't dare remove those cookies. Otherwise, everyone would complain that they have to log on every day.

Incorrect.

Apple's ITP would in fact remove Google's cookies and Facebook also. Google has updated how they track to be within the guidelines set forth by Apple. Facebook has now and because of this, their retargeting cookies will become ineffective after 24 hours once iOS 11 and macOS High Sierra are released next week and the following week. All other advertisers are free to update their tracking to work within the limits of ITP also.

Apple did NOT play any favorites here. In fact, doing so would open them to a class action suit which would likely cost them millions, possibly billions.

 

[Pbrutto]

I think we should petition them to ****

 

[orbital~debris]

Apple's Safari team have got to be doing something right when a group of ad-men start protesting because of a fear of lost sales/revenue

 

[RobinInOR]

What’s truly funny is opening this thread was blocked by my ad blocker (12.9 on ios11)

 

[jkichline]

As someone who works in paid media, this is going to be a pain in the butt. Retargeted marketing is very effective. Plus if you're going to get ads, do you want them to be for stuff you actually like? A lot of the time special deals are offered to people with targeted marketing.

Sure, but it should be up to me whether or not I am tracked, not you.

Personally, I hate ads. I'd rather pay for content outright than be inundated by advertising messages. Oh, and retargeting works? No it doesn't. I already bought the thing that you keep reminding me about all the dang time. It's annoying.

Apple can offer an opt-out option if I want to be tracked. Personally, it doesn't make the whole experience any more enjoyable.

 

[WatchTheThrone]

Ya, we just love ads

 

[berrymetal]

Yeah I’m think they should’ve sent the letter through the feedback app instead. Also hard luck dear advertisers.

 

[ArtOfWarfare]

Who the **** loves ads!?

It didn't say anyone loves ads. It said people love the ad-supported content.

IE, MacRumors is serving me a DirectTV NOW ad right now. I love MacRumors. I don't love the ads on it. I do love DirectTV NOW. But they're three distinct entities. A love for the content provider and a love for the advertised product doesn't mean a love for the ad itself.

I find it unfortunate that there isn't a better way for MacRumors to be paid, but I wouldn't be willing to pay to view it (mostly because of the friction of making that transaction.)

 

[il_teo77]

Sadly many miss this point. Advertisement is how many of the sites we enjoy (including MacRumors) exist. They can't pay their bills without advertisements. If you want your favorite site to continue operating and providing you with great content, you really should allow advertisements on that site (whitelist them with your ad blocker).

The problem is bad advertisers. Sites that overdo the ads and ad networks with annoying ads. They ruin it for many sites and give ads a bad name. Google works hard to make sure their ad are high quality, relevant, and not annoying.
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Blame the site you're visiting. They're the one putting bad ads on their site. If you're seeing pop-up ads, it's not a Google ad. It's likely a low-quality ad network on a crappy website.

 

[Lionel Messi]

I am all for not using ad-blockers but as soon as ads got intrusive as they are today on many websites, I had no choice but to allow content blockers on my Mac, iPad and iPhone.

 

[CarlJ]

Content on the internet costs money to produce. Advertising pays the bills for site hosting and content creation.

I don't know why people revel in blocking the revenue streams that grant them these things.

Advertising and ad-supported programming are in general a good thing. People/companies should be (and are) allowed to have advertisements on their sites as much as they want. You pick the level of advertisements to run on your site, and if I find it objectionable, I'll just go elsewhere.

What I object to is creepy levels of tracking individuals, and companies choosing to run large quantities of unvetted/untrusted 3rd-party javascript on my system. Advertisers in the old days dealt just fine with knowing roughly how many hundreds of thousands of viewers were tuned in to a specific program on which their advertisements ran - now they want to know every single thing about each individual viewer. That's undeniably creepy.

And companies electing to run piles of random unvetted javascript on their viewer's machines just because the advertisers want to do so... on the privacy/security spectrum that reminds me of government agencies wanting backdoors into smartphones and encryption standards so they can peek in whenever they want (sorry, "need") to, but they swear they'll only use it for good. There have already been numerous cases of bad guys using ad networks to run malware in people's browsers, just by submitting said malware to ad networks.

So, creepy levels of user tracking, and allowing large amounts of javascript from unvetted sources, are both things I object to and will have no hesitation to block if/when they become a problem. Apple is doing something about the former, and the advertisers are basically complaining that Apple is interfering with their ability to peer into other people's bedroom windows at night. I'm not going to shed a tear for the advertisers in this situation.

 

[neuropsychguy]

Who the **** loves ads!?

It's not the ads, it's ad-supported ("free") content.

 

[IJ Reilly]

These targeted advertising algorithms aren't as smart as the advertisers seem to believe. You buy some lightbulbs, the algorithm targets you as a lightbulb buyer, and you see lightbulb ads for months afterwards. How much are the advertisers paying for that service, I wonder?

 

[CaTOAGU]

Sadly many miss this point. Advertisement is how many of the sites we enjoy (including MacRumors) exist. They can't pay their bills without advertisements. If you want your favorite site to continue operating and providing you with great content, you really should allow advertisements on that site (whitelist them with your ad blocker).

The problem is bad advertisers. Sites that overdo the ads and ad networks with annoying ads. They ruin it for many sites and give ads a bad name. Google works hard to make sure their ad are high quality, relevant, and not annoying.
[doublepost=1505487547][/doublepost]

Blame the site you're visiting. They're the one putting bad ads on their site. If you're seeing pop-up ads, it's not a Google ad. It's likely a low-quality ad network on a crappy website.

It's a dilemma, you're right sites need to make money and the only way to do that, that we've found, is through advertising. But ads are not just annoying, they've become away of tracking and profiling users lives to an extent that would have been unthinkable a decade ago. As if that were not bad enough they are used as attack vectors for malware. Advertisers were given numerous opportunities to act, the "do not track cookie" being the most obvious, they ignored them. Google even found a way round Safari's private browsing mode. The crux of the problem is that advertisers treat our personal information like its their property, they have become entitled.

If ads stopped at being only annoying there would be no real problem. At some point I'm sure it will all work out and we'll find a way to make the advertising model work without being so intrusive and we'll all be happy again, but it will have to be based on mutual respect.

 

[marty11]

This is the modern day opposition to 'Do Not Call Lists'.

Dear Agencies, Find another way to advertise. You are not entitled to these technologies.

 

[albebaubles]

As someone who works in paid media, this is going to be a pain in the butt. Retargeted marketing is very effective. Plus if you're going to get ads, do you want them to be for stuff you actually like? A lot of the time special deals are offered to people with targeted marketing.

I very much dislike seeing the same ad on all the various news sites I visit. including this one. Targeted advertising is annoying.

 

[thisisnotmyname]

If they're upset about this then it's a good thing for us.

(also ironically on this article if you have certain content filtering devices within your browser it seems the comment field broke, hmmm... )

 

[applesith]

Sure, but it should be up to me whether or not I am tracked, not you.

Personally, I hate ads. I'd rather pay for content outright than be inundated by advertising messages. Oh, and retargeting works? No it doesn't. I already bought the thing that you keep reminding me about all the dang time. It's annoying.

Apple can offer an opt-out option if I want to be tracked. Personally, it doesn't make the whole experience any more enjoyable.

Re-targeting does work. The conversion rates at ROI are very high compared to regular display marketing. Part of that is due to ad suppression for those who already purchased or likely lost interest. That's poor campaign management.

Very few people want to pay for content instead of getting ads. I'd prefer to pay for some content instead of getting ads but it depends.