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Apple's Unwillingness to Share User Info Said to Hinder iAd Sales
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Results beg to differ. Though I personally agree with you, I don't click on banner ads-but literally millions do.
You can be Apple's customer if you want to and buy Apple's products.
You can't be Google's customer. You can't buy their products. You are their product.
I completely agree with you on this point.
However, I disagree with your choice to classify GOOG as outperforming AAPL by cherry picking trends. There was nothing in the original point that limited the scope to the last two years.
Why are any of those trends more significant than the ones that I pointed out?
This is not about selling private data - nobody does that
The ad agencies' complaints have nothing to do with sharing private data. Neither Apple nor Google do that.
It's about the agencies not being able to make informed purchases of ad space for targeted audiences, nor being able to tell if they reached that audience. As the article puts it:
"Instead, (the agencies) have to go to Apple, ask to reach a given audience and, well, trust Apple that it will deliver it."
In short, Apple treats iAds as more of a hobby than a ad business, and its customers (the ad agencies) are left without some common and very helpful metrics.
The ad agencies' complaints have nothing to do with sharing private data. Neither Apple nor Google do that.
It's about the agencies not being able to make informed purchases of ad space for targeted audiences, nor being able to tell if they reached that audience. As the article puts it:
"Instead, (the agencies) have to go to Apple, ask to reach a given audience and, well, trust Apple that it will deliver it."
In short, Apple treats iAds as more of a hobby than a ad business, and its customers (the ad agencies) are left without some common and very helpful metrics.
If Apple had an option to select what info (individually) about me I shared (ie. gender, city, state, past purchases, etc) and the advertiser paid me a fraction through iTunes store credit, I'd be more than inclined to share my information as long as they can't identify me by name, email, year of birth, or actual street address.
For example - I play a game for 60 minutes with advertisements appearing all through the gameplay. Apple would pay the user (me) something like 5% of the revenue they earned which may only be $0.01 or $0.05 for the hour. Apple would get 30% of that revenue I earned back when I purchased a song or movie. So for Apple, this would be a big win! The percentage you earn is based on the amount of info you share and how targeted the ad is.
For example - I play a game for 60 minutes with advertisements appearing all through the gameplay. Apple would pay the user (me) something like 5% of the revenue they earned which may only be $0.01 or $0.05 for the hour. Apple would get 30% of that revenue I earned back when I purchased a song or movie. So for Apple, this would be a big win! The percentage you earn is based on the amount of info you share and how targeted the ad is.
I click on banner ads all the time. By accident.
It is possible that "millions" want to be spammed in every direction they look. I mean, I guess for some, its not enough to get junk mail every day, and viagra emails, and phone calls from telemarketers, they also want the content they want to read in the internet to be surrounded by ads.
Very glad Apple takes this approach!
Although I would not mind if they asked if I wanted to share data, such as apps asks to know my location. Information such as sex/age/location (State) would not bother me. They could ask for any type data if we could checkbox what we would allow or not.
But as a default, Apple is making the right decision.
Although I would not mind if they asked if I wanted to share data, such as apps asks to know my location. Information such as sex/age/location (State) would not bother me. They could ask for any type data if we could checkbox what we would allow or not.
But as a default, Apple is making the right decision.
A fair point. I did cherry pick for emphasis, but recent stock trends favor Google. Would anyone dispute that? For what it's worth, I invested more in Apple than any other single company (and have owned almost no Google). If anything, I'm biased the other way. I fondly remember buying Apple at 80-90 in 2008. Unfortunately, I sold in 2010 (before the 2012 bubble).
A comparison of price/earnings (P/E) ratios would tell yet another story. Google's price is where it is because the market is more optimistic about its future. At the moment, Google's P/E is 31.82 ($1211.51/share), Apple's is 13.6 ($548/share). If Apple was selling at a P/E of 31.82, its share price would be $1,289.
Apple's P/E has barely budged since the iPhone was introduced - just chugging along in the 11-14 range (except for a few brief months in 2012). The P/E was actually higher in the years prior to iPhone. At its "irrational" 2012 historic high, Apple's P/E was around 18-19, still way lower than today's valuation for Google. Based on Apple's earnings today? If Apple was selling at a P/E of 19, it would be at over $765/share.
Contrary to all the talk, based on P/E ratio (which measures investors' willingness to pay a higher price now because they expect greater results later) Apple has not been a "growth stock" since 2007, or even before. Growth stocks trade at much higher P/E ratios than the 11-14 range.
Google is most definitely a growth stock. It's not a growth stock solely because it has grown, but because investors expect it to keep growing at an above-average rate. Yes, Apple certainly has grown prodigiously since the introduction of the iPhone. Those who invested earlier in Apple have seen huge growth in the value of their stock. But the market? The market has been expecting the iPhone "fad" to evaporate since the day it was introduced. Essentially, they expect a return to the days when Apple was, in their estimation, a Quixotic salmon swimming upstream against the WinTel flood.
The laws of chance say that if you repeat the same incorrect prediction long enough, eventually you'll be right. Someday, the conservative valuation of Apple will indeed come true. Nobody knows when that will happen. Maybe Chicken Little will be right this year, or it could be in 2037 (Happy 30th Birthday, iPhone!).
What does this have to do with Apple's advertising policies (to bring things back on topic)? Once more, Apple is perceived to be swimming against the tide, and that, to the business community, is a bad thing. Those are the people who firmly believe "Think Different" is "Think Wrong." Apple's not running its business the way they would, if they were in charge (Apple believes a long-term customer relationship is more valuable than a quick bump-up in the share price). And for so long as their beliefs depress the value of Apple stock? I'm getting Apple at a bargain price.
My DATA IS NOT FOR SALE - PERIOD.
I could give a dam about what a Madison Ave. salesman wants. I bought Apple because my data isn't being sold. This isn't a Google Android, where everything about the person, the contacts they have, every search they do, and every phone call you make is for sale. That's complete and utter BS. The second my data is for sale, I'm gone.
I am so incensed that some people feel that privacy is no longer a privilege. That entire belief system is now being challenged. It isn't for sale - period.
I could give a dam about what a Madison Ave. salesman wants. I bought Apple because my data isn't being sold. This isn't a Google Android, where everything about the person, the contacts they have, every search they do, and every phone call you make is for sale. That's complete and utter BS. The second my data is for sale, I'm gone.
I am so incensed that some people feel that privacy is no longer a privilege. That entire belief system is now being challenged. It isn't for sale - period.
To be honest, I'm going to say that I don't really care. I know it's your job and that you're doing the best that you can and I sympathise, but I find the increasingly intrusive practices of the advertising industry to be creepy and invasive. Advertisers used to function just fine without knowing all of this extra crap, they just want more and more as our lives get more technology oriented.
Again, nothing personal, and I know advertising makes a lot of the world go round, I just think that they don't need to know as much as they want to.
please this is why apple makes the most money on products because they don't care about pleasing other companies or making money as the end goal.
Google and Facebook have a totally different approach to business, i.e. undermine traditional companies and force free with adverts as the option. This then gets rid of jobs from the economy.
I prefer the model of you get what you pay for and it pays everyone who creates it without too many or any advertisers selling you stuff they already have drilled into your mind already through other media.
Google and Facebook have a totally different approach to business, i.e. undermine traditional companies and force free with adverts as the option. This then gets rid of jobs from the economy.
I prefer the model of you get what you pay for and it pays everyone who creates it without too many or any advertisers selling you stuff they already have drilled into your mind already through other media.
You're in denial. Apple simply hides the fact that they're no better than the rest. They've done a terrific job of getting the masses to believe they're safe with Apple.
Those who honestly believe Apple is better than Google are those who haven't done their homework. Apple has a grip on the mainstream press, it's very clever indeed.
No one has the courage to reveal it, but years of calculated manipulation by Steve Jobs has paid off handsomely. In bed with Uncle Walt, David Pogue and the Wall St Journal was a brilliant move on Jobs part. Now in his absence the myth is stronger than ever.
Apple is nothing if not a world class marketing machine. In this area, they put Google to shame.
It doesn't matter which platform your on. Those days are long gone. A myth from the past.
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Take it personally if it makes you uneasy. But denial is no easy out.
It's easy to claim a conspiracy and label those who don't believe you as in denial. Conspiracy theorists don't need proof so it's an easy gig.
Much like the people who rant about how evil Google is. You guys all act like they're selling your name and social security number to Satan himself.
As a long time Google user (of a LOT of their services), I never feel unsafe or compromised while online. I never have problems with ads or marketing, and have never felt like I was being made a product, as so many seem to think.
Plus, what sort of information are they sharing? My name? The area I live in? The fact I browse for MTG cards online frequently? Who cares? This is all information that is available publicly if you know where to look.
You need to realize that what advertisers are after are a broad generalization of user habits. They have no interest in your specific name or address, they more want categorised data (eg. I'm a white male, 20-24, plays video games, interested in IT industry). THAT is more useful to them than what my dog's name is, or what time I get up every morning.
Google is much more intrusive in the way they want to track people. They want to link everything together - phone-email-browser-search history-youtube-docs-google plus and basically own our internet experience, and track everything that we do.
Yes, Apple does track our data and use it for advertising, but they are focused on hardware and in my experience they are not nearly as intrusive, nor as focused on owning 'all' of my data the way that Google is. I don't get why people don't see the difference. The forced migration from Youtube to Google + is a good example of why people distrust Google, along with their obsession that we all use our real names *everywhere* on the internet.
The market is moving away from generalised data whether or not people are aware of it, though. Companies would love to be able to track people and go 'oh, it's so and so, he was just here (based on location data), let's offer this to him', etc, as you walk past stores. It's already something that companies are working on rolling it out in various cities. It's the slow shift towards sharing more and more data that bothers me and even if it doesn't bother you, that doesn't mean that it's any less reasonable for the rest of us to be concerned.
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