10 ms·

Facebook seems not to be paying app developer $160K in ad revenue

317 points by SalahEddine 10y ago

samdung 10y ago
FB has always played mischief with its ad business. Case in point ... https://medium.com/@COOLPHABETS/don-t-be-like-mark-z-29a5eedc83a9 https://medium.com/@COOLPHABETS/don-t-be-like-mark-z-29a5eed...
omarchowdhury 10y ago
Posts this like are useless when the app and the ad placements in question are not known to us the readers, since then we can at least detect any real violations of Facebook Audience Network's policies.
- TeeWEE 10y ago
  Indeed , this. Probably the app is doing some stuff thats really violating the Facebook policy.. And the creater just doesnt agree with google.
  - ChoHag 10y ago
    The developer does not seem so concerned that the app was removed - it can be reinstated - but that the attempts to do so are being stonewalled while a significant amount of cash hangs in the balance. Facebook should not be silent in the face of a $160,000 problem they created.
anondon 10y ago
Can anyone backup those revenue numbers from past experience? Curiously, the application name was not posted. I don't want to call bullsh*t, but if the claims could be verified, the discussion can move on to how to actually deal with the situation. I believe there are Facebook employees on HN, would it be possible to bring this matter to the attention of the concerned people, if the claims turn out to be valid?
- QuantumRoar 10y ago
  And not just bring attention to this case but to make sure that there is actually some support. I can't believe how Facebook can have business relations with someone on the order of magnitude of $100k a month and there isn't a single person at Facebook he can contact.
- johnm1019 10y ago
  I believe the application name appears in this message mentioned in the reddit post? http://i.imgur.com/KHM2KE1.png http://i.imgur.com/KHM2KE1.png It appears in Cyrillic.
  - vsakos 10y ago
    It means "content", I don't think it's the name of the app.
  - atomlib 10y ago
    The developer mentions he/she lives in Ukraine.
  - imtringued 10y ago
    The black bar hides the name.
- zem 10y ago
  as per reddit comments, it's 160k Ukrainian dollars, or a little over 6k usd
  - ivanche 10y ago
    Isn't Ukrainian currency still called hryvnia?
  - zazpowered 10y ago
    no he said it was USD
    - 10y ago
willvarfar 10y ago
Sad that the reddit advice is: [–]guitartrashmaster 45 points 4 hours ago Dude post on hacker news trust me perma-linkembedsavereportgive goldreply [–]VikingIV -2 points 45 minutes ago This. Its the same with google; the only way for devs to get any kind of traction is by kicking up a fuss on HN. Its crazy that it has to be this way.
- deleted 10y ago
  [deleted]
- ohashi 10y ago
  A complete shame, but this isn't new. This is the digital equivalent of call your local paper and kick up a fuss.
  - jondubois 10y ago
    This is quite different because local newspapers are able to bring more issues to the public attention than a single centralized news source can. I think that's the danger of globalization; a lot of people don't read local news anymore.
    - TeMPOraL 10y ago
      Because that's globalization - for better or worse, your "local" neighbourhood is in fact (almost) the whole world.
- chii 10y ago
  Except that for every fuss kicked up, there's probably countless ones that feel through the front page and never saw the light of day. The process of calling out shitty behaviour should not have to involve popularity.
  - jondubois 10y ago
    I think it captures what is happening with society. If you're not famous, then you have effectively no legal rights unless something REALLY REALLY bad happens to you. This is only going to get worse as the total number of violations by corporations increase and the media can no longer keep up with most of them - Only the most vile/blatant breaches will be punished. I can easily imagine that in 20 years, there will be so many breaches of the law by corporations that they will get away with it most of the time... Or if we're lucky and the legal system still works, large corporations will be forced to hire huge numbers of lawyers to be able to defend themselves from the constant stream of claims. I think that's because the economy has become so competitive that it's difficult for a company to turn a profit without committing lots of minor transgressions (their competitors are doing it). So the most profitable company ends up being the one which commits the most breaches and has the highest rate of success at getting cases against it thrown out of court.
jrockway 10y ago
Sounds like a script that went awry, misclassifying the app? If so, I have a feeling that when some engineer at Facebook wakes up and sees this tomorrow, the problem will go away ;)
- vonklaus 10y ago
  Unless you work at FB or have other info, I would definitely doubt that. Assuming this claim is legit, FB has not done a lot to instill any degree of confidence(for me) that they are a user-centric organization willing to compromise & work with customers. FB, much like apple, is a closed off "our way or the highway" type company. It is utterly massive which not only gives it huge power, but makes it difficult to even find a human to rectify an issue. So I hope you are correct...but i doubt it.
vonklaus 10y ago
This happened to someone using stripe; a similar case where the account was suspended and the user was upset about the inability to capture revenue. I trust stripe a lot more than FB, that said, PC showed up in the thread as well as numerous suppory staff. The claim was similar, big money rev processing suspended but limited details. It turned out that the user was violating the terms and had been notified well in advance. The user stopped responding to other posters asking for details and it was immeadiately evident that it was a pretty shady & onesided story. Now, FB is quite restrictive-- but until the user substantiates the nature of their application & facebook's violations & correspondence; I can't really cry foul. The user said they didn't want to mention the app because it would be "promoting it". Idk, it does feel a bit off. Take Dash/kapeli, they blamed apple for kicking them out of the app store, and while they are well known, they stood behind their name and identity which is all the reputation one has on the internet. So, i hope this is rectified but mire evidemce is surely needed
- has2k1 10y ago
  When you are getting the types of numbers mentioned by the app creator and you mention the name of the app, you invite unoriginal competition and Denial-of-Service attacks if possible.
  - mysterypie 10y ago
    I'm very suspicious of the fact that he doesn't give the name of the app or explain what it does, but you make a very good point. If he is making this kind of money--and he mentions that it wasn't much effort to write the app--he'd kill the golden goose if he reveals what it does.
rspeer 10y ago
This title's grammar is mangled and confusing on HN. The $160000 was for the developer, not for anyone else. The "for those who use Facebook ads" was a separate clause saying who the post is for. I know HN approves of original titles but also disapproves of sensationalism and exclamation points. I would suggest something like: App developer says: "Facebook stole my $160000"
- rplnt 10y ago
  And they didn't steal it either. They just didn't pay it out yet, it says pending. And even if it was canceled or whatever, "steal" is not the right word since they were never his money to begin with.
  - sashagim 10y ago
    To me it seems that like with any contract, the money is his once he fulfilled his part of the deal (ad views/clicks). I agree that not payout out is not the same as stealing, but in this case it does seem awfully close since Facebook is acting as a middle man. If someone hires me to do a job for a 3rd party, gets paid for my work, but doesn't pass me my part - I'd call this stealing.
    - st3v3r 10y ago
      But if it was determined that the part you did was done fraudulently? That's essentially FB's position here. And their contract states that the remedy for that is account termination and forfeiture of the balance.
  - akhatri_aus 10y ago
    This is an interesting interpretation of (possible) theft. What if Facebook has no intention of paying it out?
    - rplnt 10y ago
      I'm pretty sure Facebook would be covered if they decided not to pay, I doubt the developer even read the ToS, let alone understood it. But to the point, "steal" is to take something. If you didn't ever own it, I don't think it can be called stealing.
DanielBMarkham 10y ago
After that I appealed to them many times but never got the answer. I must be missing something somewhere. This story doesn't sound right to me, but I don't know the systems involved. Can somebody tell me how over 100K can be at stake and this guy can't even get a real person to talk to? Ok, I understand the old "push popular stuff on the web and let the robots handle support" routine. But 160K? Really?
- gambiting 10y ago
  It happens with all big companies- once your app/account gets marked for fraud(and it looks like this one might have been, possibly incorrectly), absolutely no one will talk to you. The standard line of action with fraudsters is to cut of all contact, say that you can't provide information, etc etc. Obviously there is a lot of money involved, to Facebook should step up and talk to the guy, but the cold treatment doesn't surprise me in the slightest.
  - DanielBMarkham 10y ago
    What's difficult here is as an outsider trying to determine the validity of the complaint. Facebook is a public company. As such -- and even more so than traditional public companies -- it interacts with a lot of people. Many of these people are scammers, sure. (I have no idea about this person.) But there are also a lot of people who just get screwed over by the algorithms. All rules-based systems have false positives, and with the kind of numbers they deal with, there has to be a lot of people being identified as bad and kicked out that aren't. So I understand your point about businesses. But most businesses that have a 160K dispute aren't peddling it on reddit and HN. I think we can also agree that in many cases we've seen, people have been treated wrongly by these companies and only got it fixed after publishing things in forums like this. So what the hell? Have HN and reddit become impromptu civil courts, where the "award" is having a real, live human look at somebody's records? I know I'm not qualified to have any kind of opinion, not with just one side of the story presented and not without the records. I would feel better about stories like this if they included some kind of conversation between the two parties. "And then I spoke with the manager on the phone...." It's not just that they cut this guy off, and it's not just that so many things are automated. It's that for all intents and purposes, FB doesn't exist as a legal entity doing business. There's no office, there's no telephone number, they just don't interact with folks like this. It makes for a hell of a time trying to make heads or tails out of stories like this. (And I understand the philosophy of not giving out too much information to potential future fraudsters, but that doesn't make my complaint go away.)
gubby 10y ago
I am not a lawyer. I think a mistake many people make in ongoing situations like these is contacting (and thereby deferring to) a companies 'support' channel. By asking them to reconsider, you almost subject yourself to their authority. If you believe you have a legal dispute, you should write to them officially, cc your legal advisor if you have one. Given the sums involved I would personally take professional legal advice right now.
- skrebbel 10y ago
  I am not American. I read this sort of advice a lot here on HN and it always puzzles me. If I were to believe HN, the only way people ever do business in the US is through their lawyers. Or, at least, the moment there's some sort of misunderstanding or screwup there's always someone on HN who says "lawyer up!" and it's usually the top comment. Somehow, apparently, trying to sort things out the oldschool "hey we're both businesspeople, let's talk" way is considered a dangerous approach, and I don't understand why. While I agree that this is probably the best approach for dealing with a company like Facebook that's notoriously difficult to get in touch with, shouldn't it really just be a "last resort" sort of thing? Why is it always recommended to start with legal threats? Isn't that the business version of "shoot first, ask questions later"? I ask not just to criticize. My company is slowly starting to do dealings with American companies (small amounts, nothing like the stuff in this post) and if half our business communication is going to be in legalese we have some serious preparation to do.
  - TillE 10y ago
    > hey we're both businesspeople But you're not. Facebook is about a billion times more powerful than you. You're not peers. They literally won't even talk to you.
    - skrebbel 10y ago
      My question was more general. Immediately after the line you quoted, I agreed that for such a powerful and closed company like Facebook it might be the only option, because your last resort is your only option.
ktamiola 10y ago
What's the name of the app? I am also curious to see how does the revenue figure stack up against independently verified download and usage stats?
huhtenberg 10y ago
In http://imgur.com/B86pJHi.png http://imgur.com/B86pJHi.png, what are the columns exactly, does anyone know? The 7th column in particular, with the %-ages. If that's a click-through rate, then the numbers look inflated.
- afghanPower 10y ago
  Pretty sure that's CTR. It's really not that hight considering we're talking about a mobile app. People tend to tap at ads when they're trying to do something else, and that often leads to insanely high CTRs. Pretty sure this dude is paying someone to click on his ads and generate impressions so that the CTR is average.
  - mpeg 10y ago
    80% CTR would be stupidly high, mobile app or not, anything over 5% would already be incredibly good. The 80% figure is fill rate (AKA the percentage of impressions to requested placements), the 1.80-2.00% figure is the CTR, which matches the third column being impressions and fourth clicks.
- spyder 10y ago
  Here is the header of the table from a random screenshot found with an image search: http://forums.makingmoneywithandroid.com/attachments/advertising-networks/6153d1430748325-facebook-audience-network-any-one-using-facebook-ad-stats-1.jpg http://forums.makingmoneywithandroid.com/attachments/adverti...
- kumarm 10y ago
  It appears its Fill Rate. (Click Through rate is around 2%). It appears to me that dev is involved in shady stuff (The fact that dev posted this in several forums without ever posting link to his app should be noted).
ap22213 10y ago
The spike in ad clicks (or some other metric) probably triggered an automated fraud detection system. Apparently FB sent him a separate email that contains the details (see the email's top paragraph). Also, the email from FB has simple grammar errors and typos. I would expect a company of FB's size to have QA for this type of automated content. So, it leaves some doubt in my mind that the email wasn't edited before he posted to Reddit. It's not 'stealing' if there's a violation in a contract (terms of service) and a payment is withheld. He could get a lawyer at this point. Or, maybe there is an arbitration clause in the contract. Who knows. But, there are legal remedies to these types of disputes. The dude should calm down, stop posting to the internet, be professional about it, and search for legit legal advice.
- ChoHag 10y ago
  I've worked for companies of FB's size. I wouldn't.
zazpowered 10y ago
I feel like something must be wrong here. It's in Facebook's best interest to keep high performing publishers because thats how they make their money. I don't think they would try to harm that relationship just to prevent paying out publishers because they would just bounce and use a different network.
- pbhjpbhj 10y ago
  >"because they would just bounce and use a different network." // Yeah, just switch to the other network that everyone and their granny uses ...?
deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
downandout 10y ago
Google, through its Adsense program, has turned this kind of behavior into an art form [1]. Facebook must have decided that their legal team is now strong enough to perform the same scam without legal consequences. The elements of the scam are essentially the same between the two: 1) Pay on a net-30 basis, so that in most cases publishers send two months of traffic before they are paid; 2) Wait until the last minute before a payday to claim a policy violation so that the maximum amount of traffic that the network will refuse to pay for is sent; and 3) Make the description of the policy violation so vague that a successful lawsuit is nearly impossible without significant pre-trial discovery efforts, which will be aggressively fought by the phalanx of attorneys employed by the ad network. What should be even more concerning to publishers in Google's case is the new "Valuable Inventory" policy [2]. In a nutshell, this essentially says that Google is the sole judge of whether or not your content is good enough to display ads against. If they decide at any time that it isn't, you will be banned and your earnings will be withheld. They've also implemented a policy forbidding ad placement that pushes down the site's content - an impossibility on mobile devices. The aim of all of this is to make all publishers technically in violation of one or more policies, which gives them unilateral discretion as to which publishers they choose to pay. It's sad, but not altogether surprising, that Google and Facebook are acting in the same underhanded way in the operation of their ad networks. The only way to avoid this kind of behavior is to use lower tier ad networks, which sadly produce lower RPM. [1] http://www.businessinsider.com/google-search-ad-policies-cost-this-company-1-million-2014-12 http://www.businessinsider.com/google-search-ad-policies-cos... [2] https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/1346295?hl=en#Ad_limit_per_page https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/1346295?hl=en#Ad_l...
- annnnd 10y ago
  I worked for online advertising platform for a while and I must say it's difficult here to decide who to trust. In case of Google I would way G, but with Facebook... who knows. It is simply incredible what scammers do to get the money from advertisers (except delivering any value, that is) and what lengths they will go to to get "their" money. Of course G and FB can't reveal their countermeasures, so we must trust them blindly... But I believe Google has no problem distinguishing between legitimate ad shows/clicks (not that I approve of this invasion of privacy, but that's the way it is). I do understand the risk publishers are taking (it might be someone else making fraudulent clicks which could get them banned), but I don't think there is a better way.
inevitable2 10y ago
I know this developer's app because I compete in a similar space. His app is actually quite illegal and also violates copyright laws and Google Play policies. Facebook was correct in withholding payment to him. As far as I'm concerned, AdMob should be withholding payment to him too. If anyone from Google wants me to describe the very illegal techniques being used by this app, please email me with a (@google.com) at finokioto@gmail.com . I would prefer not to share what this developer is doing in a public forum because of copycats.
roryisok 10y ago
this might seem silly or off topic, but one of the many things I love about HN is that the mods (I assume) rename thread titles to be a little clearer and less cryptic. This morning the title of this post was "Facebook stole my $160000 For those who use Facebook ads in their Android apps" - incorrect grammar, and stripped punctuation made this a pain to process in my sleep-deprived brain. I'm delighted to see it's now much clearer. Thank you, mods!
- codelike 10y ago
  Yes, in this case it was a good change. On the other hand, some of the mods' title changes significantly reduce the information content, as for example the title that was changed for that other thread today: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12690853 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12690853 Originally that title was something like "Microsoft SQL Server 2016 in Docker", which gave some helpful context. But they replaced that with: "Microsoft SQL Server 2016 Express", a change that was not helpful at all, since it sounds like a product announcement of SQL Server 2016 now.
  - pbhjpbhj 10y ago
    Which is why I advocate for a subtitle, so that mods can alter the local title but the original can still be given. Another problem with retitling is knowing if you've seen the story already.
achow 10y ago
Comment from one of the redditor: I know this developer's app because I compete in a similar space. His app violates copyright laws and a bunch of other Google Play policies. Facebook was correct in withholding payment to him. As far as I'm concerned, AdMob should be withholding payment to him too. If anyone from Google wants me to describe the very illegal techniques being used by this app, please email me with a (@google.com) at finokioto@gmail.com . I would prefer not to share what this developer is doing in a public forum because of copycats. I'm an admin at https://www.reddit.com/r/badapps https://www.reddit.com/r/badapps https://www.reddit.com/r/androiddev/comments/570gco/facebook_stole_my_160000_for_those_who_use/d8olom5 https://www.reddit.com/r/androiddev/comments/570gco/facebook...
zandroid 10y ago
I think he is lying to promote his subredit.
- afghanPower 10y ago
  Why did you react so badly to that comment?
- inevitable2 10y ago
  This is the first comment you've ever made on Hacker News. Are you sure you're not the developer of the app in question?
- dang 10y ago
  On HN, we try to give others the benefit of the doubt, so please don't post comments that are unsubstantive and uncharitable. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12691967 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12691967 and marked it off-topic.

317 points by SalahEddine 10y ago

FB has always played mischief with its ad business. Case in point ... https://medium.com/@COOLPHABETS/don-t-be-like-mark-z-29a5eedc83a9 https://medium.com/@COOLPHABETS/don-t-be-like-mark-z-29a5eed...

omarchowdhury 10y ago

Posts this like are useless when the app and the ad placements in question are not known to us the readers, since then we can at least detect any real violations of Facebook Audience Network's policies.

TeeWEE 10y ago
Indeed , this. Probably the app is doing some stuff thats really violating the Facebook policy.. And the creater just doesnt agree with google.
- ChoHag 10y ago
  The developer does not seem so concerned that the app was removed - it can be reinstated - but that the attempts to do so are being stonewalled while a significant amount of cash hangs in the balance. Facebook should not be silent in the face of a $160,000 problem they created.

anondon 10y ago

Can anyone backup those revenue numbers from past experience? Curiously, the application name was not posted. I don't want to call bullsh*t, but if the claims could be verified, the discussion can move on to how to actually deal with the situation. I believe there are Facebook employees on HN, would it be possible to bring this matter to the attention of the concerned people, if the claims turn out to be valid?

QuantumRoar 10y ago
And not just bring attention to this case but to make sure that there is actually some support. I can't believe how Facebook can have business relations with someone on the order of magnitude of $100k a month and there isn't a single person at Facebook he can contact.
johnm1019 10y ago
I believe the application name appears in this message mentioned in the reddit post? http://i.imgur.com/KHM2KE1.png http://i.imgur.com/KHM2KE1.png It appears in Cyrillic.
- vsakos 10y ago
  It means "content", I don't think it's the name of the app.
- atomlib 10y ago
  The developer mentions he/she lives in Ukraine.
- imtringued 10y ago
  The black bar hides the name.
zem 10y ago
as per reddit comments, it's 160k Ukrainian dollars, or a little over 6k usd
- ivanche 10y ago
  Isn't Ukrainian currency still called hryvnia?
- zazpowered 10y ago
  no he said it was USD
  - 10y ago

willvarfar 10y ago

Sad that the reddit advice is: [–]guitartrashmaster 45 points 4 hours ago Dude post on hacker news trust me perma-linkembedsavereportgive goldreply [–]VikingIV -2 points 45 minutes ago This. Its the same with google; the only way for devs to get any kind of traction is by kicking up a fuss on HN. Its crazy that it has to be this way.

deleted 10y ago
[deleted]
ohashi 10y ago
A complete shame, but this isn't new. This is the digital equivalent of call your local paper and kick up a fuss.
- jondubois 10y ago
  This is quite different because local newspapers are able to bring more issues to the public attention than a single centralized news source can. I think that's the danger of globalization; a lot of people don't read local news anymore.
  - TeMPOraL 10y ago
    Because that's globalization - for better or worse, your "local" neighbourhood is in fact (almost) the whole world.
chii 10y ago
Except that for every fuss kicked up, there's probably countless ones that feel through the front page and never saw the light of day. The process of calling out shitty behaviour should not have to involve popularity.
- jondubois 10y ago
  I think it captures what is happening with society. If you're not famous, then you have effectively no legal rights unless something REALLY REALLY bad happens to you. This is only going to get worse as the total number of violations by corporations increase and the media can no longer keep up with most of them - Only the most vile/blatant breaches will be punished. I can easily imagine that in 20 years, there will be so many breaches of the law by corporations that they will get away with it most of the time... Or if we're lucky and the legal system still works, large corporations will be forced to hire huge numbers of lawyers to be able to defend themselves from the constant stream of claims. I think that's because the economy has become so competitive that it's difficult for a company to turn a profit without committing lots of minor transgressions (their competitors are doing it). So the most profitable company ends up being the one which commits the most breaches and has the highest rate of success at getting cases against it thrown out of court.

jrockway 10y ago

Sounds like a script that went awry, misclassifying the app? If so, I have a feeling that when some engineer at Facebook wakes up and sees this tomorrow, the problem will go away ;)

vonklaus 10y ago
Unless you work at FB or have other info, I would definitely doubt that. Assuming this claim is legit, FB has not done a lot to instill any degree of confidence(for me) that they are a user-centric organization willing to compromise & work with customers. FB, much like apple, is a closed off "our way or the highway" type company. It is utterly massive which not only gives it huge power, but makes it difficult to even find a human to rectify an issue. So I hope you are correct...but i doubt it.

vonklaus 10y ago

This happened to someone using stripe; a similar case where the account was suspended and the user was upset about the inability to capture revenue. I trust stripe a lot more than FB, that said, PC showed up in the thread as well as numerous suppory staff. The claim was similar, big money rev processing suspended but limited details. It turned out that the user was violating the terms and had been notified well in advance. The user stopped responding to other posters asking for details and it was immeadiately evident that it was a pretty shady & onesided story. Now, FB is quite restrictive-- but until the user substantiates the nature of their application & facebook's violations & correspondence; I can't really cry foul. The user said they didn't want to mention the app because it would be "promoting it". Idk, it does feel a bit off. Take Dash/kapeli, they blamed apple for kicking them out of the app store, and while they are well known, they stood behind their name and identity which is all the reputation one has on the internet. So, i hope this is rectified but mire evidemce is surely needed

has2k1 10y ago
When you are getting the types of numbers mentioned by the app creator and you mention the name of the app, you invite unoriginal competition and Denial-of-Service attacks if possible.
- mysterypie 10y ago
  I'm very suspicious of the fact that he doesn't give the name of the app or explain what it does, but you make a very good point. If he is making this kind of money--and he mentions that it wasn't much effort to write the app--he'd kill the golden goose if he reveals what it does.

rspeer 10y ago

This title's grammar is mangled and confusing on HN. The $160000 was for the developer, not for anyone else. The "for those who use Facebook ads" was a separate clause saying who the post is for. I know HN approves of original titles but also disapproves of sensationalism and exclamation points. I would suggest something like: App developer says: "Facebook stole my $160000"

rplnt 10y ago
And they didn't steal it either. They just didn't pay it out yet, it says pending. And even if it was canceled or whatever, "steal" is not the right word since they were never his money to begin with.
- sashagim 10y ago
  To me it seems that like with any contract, the money is his once he fulfilled his part of the deal (ad views/clicks). I agree that not payout out is not the same as stealing, but in this case it does seem awfully close since Facebook is acting as a middle man. If someone hires me to do a job for a 3rd party, gets paid for my work, but doesn't pass me my part - I'd call this stealing.
  - st3v3r 10y ago
    But if it was determined that the part you did was done fraudulently? That's essentially FB's position here. And their contract states that the remedy for that is account termination and forfeiture of the balance.
- akhatri_aus 10y ago
  This is an interesting interpretation of (possible) theft. What if Facebook has no intention of paying it out?
  - rplnt 10y ago
    I'm pretty sure Facebook would be covered if they decided not to pay, I doubt the developer even read the ToS, let alone understood it. But to the point, "steal" is to take something. If you didn't ever own it, I don't think it can be called stealing.

DanielBMarkham 10y ago

After that I appealed to them many times but never got the answer. I must be missing something somewhere. This story doesn't sound right to me, but I don't know the systems involved. Can somebody tell me how over 100K can be at stake and this guy can't even get a real person to talk to? Ok, I understand the old "push popular stuff on the web and let the robots handle support" routine. But 160K? Really?

gambiting 10y ago
It happens with all big companies- once your app/account gets marked for fraud(and it looks like this one might have been, possibly incorrectly), absolutely no one will talk to you. The standard line of action with fraudsters is to cut of all contact, say that you can't provide information, etc etc. Obviously there is a lot of money involved, to Facebook should step up and talk to the guy, but the cold treatment doesn't surprise me in the slightest.
- DanielBMarkham 10y ago
  What's difficult here is as an outsider trying to determine the validity of the complaint. Facebook is a public company. As such -- and even more so than traditional public companies -- it interacts with a lot of people. Many of these people are scammers, sure. (I have no idea about this person.) But there are also a lot of people who just get screwed over by the algorithms. All rules-based systems have false positives, and with the kind of numbers they deal with, there has to be a lot of people being identified as bad and kicked out that aren't. So I understand your point about businesses. But most businesses that have a 160K dispute aren't peddling it on reddit and HN. I think we can also agree that in many cases we've seen, people have been treated wrongly by these companies and only got it fixed after publishing things in forums like this. So what the hell? Have HN and reddit become impromptu civil courts, where the "award" is having a real, live human look at somebody's records? I know I'm not qualified to have any kind of opinion, not with just one side of the story presented and not without the records. I would feel better about stories like this if they included some kind of conversation between the two parties. "And then I spoke with the manager on the phone...." It's not just that they cut this guy off, and it's not just that so many things are automated. It's that for all intents and purposes, FB doesn't exist as a legal entity doing business. There's no office, there's no telephone number, they just don't interact with folks like this. It makes for a hell of a time trying to make heads or tails out of stories like this. (And I understand the philosophy of not giving out too much information to potential future fraudsters, but that doesn't make my complaint go away.)

gubby 10y ago

I am not a lawyer. I think a mistake many people make in ongoing situations like these is contacting (and thereby deferring to) a companies 'support' channel. By asking them to reconsider, you almost subject yourself to their authority. If you believe you have a legal dispute, you should write to them officially, cc your legal advisor if you have one. Given the sums involved I would personally take professional legal advice right now.

skrebbel 10y ago
I am not American. I read this sort of advice a lot here on HN and it always puzzles me. If I were to believe HN, the only way people ever do business in the US is through their lawyers. Or, at least, the moment there's some sort of misunderstanding or screwup there's always someone on HN who says "lawyer up!" and it's usually the top comment. Somehow, apparently, trying to sort things out the oldschool "hey we're both businesspeople, let's talk" way is considered a dangerous approach, and I don't understand why. While I agree that this is probably the best approach for dealing with a company like Facebook that's notoriously difficult to get in touch with, shouldn't it really just be a "last resort" sort of thing? Why is it always recommended to start with legal threats? Isn't that the business version of "shoot first, ask questions later"? I ask not just to criticize. My company is slowly starting to do dealings with American companies (small amounts, nothing like the stuff in this post) and if half our business communication is going to be in legalese we have some serious preparation to do.
- TillE 10y ago
  > hey we're both businesspeople But you're not. Facebook is about a billion times more powerful than you. You're not peers. They literally won't even talk to you.
  - skrebbel 10y ago
    My question was more general. Immediately after the line you quoted, I agreed that for such a powerful and closed company like Facebook it might be the only option, because your last resort is your only option.

ktamiola 10y ago

What's the name of the app? I am also curious to see how does the revenue figure stack up against independently verified download and usage stats?

huhtenberg 10y ago

In http://imgur.com/B86pJHi.png http://imgur.com/B86pJHi.png, what are the columns exactly, does anyone know? The 7th column in particular, with the %-ages. If that's a click-through rate, then the numbers look inflated.

afghanPower 10y ago
Pretty sure that's CTR. It's really not that hight considering we're talking about a mobile app. People tend to tap at ads when they're trying to do something else, and that often leads to insanely high CTRs. Pretty sure this dude is paying someone to click on his ads and generate impressions so that the CTR is average.
- mpeg 10y ago
  80% CTR would be stupidly high, mobile app or not, anything over 5% would already be incredibly good. The 80% figure is fill rate (AKA the percentage of impressions to requested placements), the 1.80-2.00% figure is the CTR, which matches the third column being impressions and fourth clicks.
spyder 10y ago
Here is the header of the table from a random screenshot found with an image search: http://forums.makingmoneywithandroid.com/attachments/advertising-networks/6153d1430748325-facebook-audience-network-any-one-using-facebook-ad-stats-1.jpg http://forums.makingmoneywithandroid.com/attachments/adverti...
kumarm 10y ago
It appears its Fill Rate. (Click Through rate is around 2%). It appears to me that dev is involved in shady stuff (The fact that dev posted this in several forums without ever posting link to his app should be noted).

ap22213 10y ago

The spike in ad clicks (or some other metric) probably triggered an automated fraud detection system. Apparently FB sent him a separate email that contains the details (see the email's top paragraph). Also, the email from FB has simple grammar errors and typos. I would expect a company of FB's size to have QA for this type of automated content. So, it leaves some doubt in my mind that the email wasn't edited before he posted to Reddit. It's not 'stealing' if there's a violation in a contract (terms of service) and a payment is withheld. He could get a lawyer at this point. Or, maybe there is an arbitration clause in the contract. Who knows. But, there are legal remedies to these types of disputes. The dude should calm down, stop posting to the internet, be professional about it, and search for legit legal advice.

ChoHag 10y ago
I've worked for companies of FB's size. I wouldn't.

zazpowered 10y ago

I feel like something must be wrong here. It's in Facebook's best interest to keep high performing publishers because thats how they make their money. I don't think they would try to harm that relationship just to prevent paying out publishers because they would just bounce and use a different network.

pbhjpbhj 10y ago
>"because they would just bounce and use a different network." // Yeah, just switch to the other network that everyone and their granny uses ...?

deleted 10y ago

[deleted]

downandout 10y ago

Google, through its Adsense program, has turned this kind of behavior into an art form [1]. Facebook must have decided that their legal team is now strong enough to perform the same scam without legal consequences. The elements of the scam are essentially the same between the two: 1) Pay on a net-30 basis, so that in most cases publishers send two months of traffic before they are paid; 2) Wait until the last minute before a payday to claim a policy violation so that the maximum amount of traffic that the network will refuse to pay for is sent; and 3) Make the description of the policy violation so vague that a successful lawsuit is nearly impossible without significant pre-trial discovery efforts, which will be aggressively fought by the phalanx of attorneys employed by the ad network. What should be even more concerning to publishers in Google's case is the new "Valuable Inventory" policy [2]. In a nutshell, this essentially says that Google is the sole judge of whether or not your content is good enough to display ads against. If they decide at any time that it isn't, you will be banned and your earnings will be withheld. They've also implemented a policy forbidding ad placement that pushes down the site's content - an impossibility on mobile devices. The aim of all of this is to make all publishers technically in violation of one or more policies, which gives them unilateral discretion as to which publishers they choose to pay. It's sad, but not altogether surprising, that Google and Facebook are acting in the same underhanded way in the operation of their ad networks. The only way to avoid this kind of behavior is to use lower tier ad networks, which sadly produce lower RPM. [1] http://www.businessinsider.com/google-search-ad-policies-cost-this-company-1-million-2014-12 http://www.businessinsider.com/google-search-ad-policies-cos... [2] https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/1346295?hl=en#Ad_limit_per_page https://support.google.com/adsense/answer/1346295?hl=en#Ad_l...

annnnd 10y ago
I worked for online advertising platform for a while and I must say it's difficult here to decide who to trust. In case of Google I would way G, but with Facebook... who knows. It is simply incredible what scammers do to get the money from advertisers (except delivering any value, that is) and what lengths they will go to to get "their" money. Of course G and FB can't reveal their countermeasures, so we must trust them blindly... But I believe Google has no problem distinguishing between legitimate ad shows/clicks (not that I approve of this invasion of privacy, but that's the way it is). I do understand the risk publishers are taking (it might be someone else making fraudulent clicks which could get them banned), but I don't think there is a better way.

inevitable2 10y ago

I know this developer's app because I compete in a similar space. His app is actually quite illegal and also violates copyright laws and Google Play policies. Facebook was correct in withholding payment to him. As far as I'm concerned, AdMob should be withholding payment to him too. If anyone from Google wants me to describe the very illegal techniques being used by this app, please email me with a (@google.com) at finokioto@gmail.com . I would prefer not to share what this developer is doing in a public forum because of copycats.

roryisok 10y ago

this might seem silly or off topic, but one of the many things I love about HN is that the mods (I assume) rename thread titles to be a little clearer and less cryptic. This morning the title of this post was "Facebook stole my $160000 For those who use Facebook ads in their Android apps" - incorrect grammar, and stripped punctuation made this a pain to process in my sleep-deprived brain. I'm delighted to see it's now much clearer. Thank you, mods!

codelike 10y ago
Yes, in this case it was a good change. On the other hand, some of the mods' title changes significantly reduce the information content, as for example the title that was changed for that other thread today: https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12690853 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12690853 Originally that title was something like "Microsoft SQL Server 2016 in Docker", which gave some helpful context. But they replaced that with: "Microsoft SQL Server 2016 Express", a change that was not helpful at all, since it sounds like a product announcement of SQL Server 2016 now.
- pbhjpbhj 10y ago
  Which is why I advocate for a subtitle, so that mods can alter the local title but the original can still be given. Another problem with retitling is knowing if you've seen the story already.

achow 10y ago

Comment from one of the redditor: I know this developer's app because I compete in a similar space. His app violates copyright laws and a bunch of other Google Play policies. Facebook was correct in withholding payment to him. As far as I'm concerned, AdMob should be withholding payment to him too. If anyone from Google wants me to describe the very illegal techniques being used by this app, please email me with a (@google.com) at finokioto@gmail.com . I would prefer not to share what this developer is doing in a public forum because of copycats. I'm an admin at https://www.reddit.com/r/badapps https://www.reddit.com/r/badapps https://www.reddit.com/r/androiddev/comments/570gco/facebook_stole_my_160000_for_those_who_use/d8olom5 https://www.reddit.com/r/androiddev/comments/570gco/facebook...

zandroid 10y ago

I think he is lying to promote his subredit.

afghanPower 10y ago
Why did you react so badly to that comment?
inevitable2 10y ago
This is the first comment you've ever made on Hacker News. Are you sure you're not the developer of the app in question?
dang 10y ago
On HN, we try to give others the benefit of the doubt, so please don't post comments that are unsubstantive and uncharitable. We detached this subthread from https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12691967 https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=12691967 and marked it off-topic.