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> Users can easily choose to keep providing Facebook (and anyone else) with all the information they want. Or they can choose not to. This part hits the nail o

> Users can easily choose to keep providing Facebook (and anyone else) with all the information they want. Or they can choose not to. This part hits the nail on the head. Facebook is intentionally being misleading in this campaign. I’ve had the IDFA turned off on my phone for years. Now apps have to ask for it individually. If apps have to prompt to access it, and this benefits small businesses so much, wouldn’t people agree to it with the right framing? Why doesn’t Facebook provide a method in its tracking SDKs that shows an interstitial about how this is good for small business before asking users if they want to be tracked? Of course, Facebook would never do that. That’s because “informed consent” with adware doesn’t really exist... once people actually understand the scope of ad tracking networks... they don’t want it. I’m not even against the concept of targeted advertising. Facebook’s first party properties are fine venues for it. I’m even (generally) ok with an advertiser retargeting me based on information they have about me. I wish that Facebook was prohibited from scooping up data in every other app I use and combining it with other data that they purchase. You can have targeted advertising without a massive surveillance dragnet.

qsort 6y ago
Super agree. I can't describe that ad in any other way than a sophisticated lie. They are making it look like Apple wants to take away choice from the user when it's exactly the other way around. They are careful to never mention what the iOS 14 updates are actually about, but a lie by omission is still a lie.
- bredren 6y ago
  I call it fundamental dishonesty. Some big problems for team fb: 1. It is difficult to recover from such an obviously dishonest position. 2. Users are supposed to be the customers, not small businesses. If users aren't the customers, they can't receive Facebook as a product "for free." 3. The current business model offers outsized returns because it leverages tech people don't want or don't yet know they don't want.
zpeti 6y ago
I am extremely torn about this thing, especially as I work in the privacy space. But it's hard to ignore the argument put forward by Ben Thompson that better tracking for facebook, actually tends to help small businesses. If you can't hyper target, you get ads for tooth paste, cars and deodorant (TV ads). If you can then you get ads for boutique florists in your area or gadgets you might actually like. I don't know what the solution is, because I want to be on small businesses side. And the issue with apple now is, I guarantee 99% of people will reject IDFA, because it is about personal data and it does sound bad. But the end result of this might not be that good for small business.
- dannyw 6y ago
  Allowing small businesses to tack on a stealth 5% charge onto your credit card also helps small businesses, but would you advocate for that?
  - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
    If you could convince credit card companies to waive their fees for small businesses and make it back by charging more to big businesses, that could be a pretty big win.
    - willcipriano 6y ago
      That will lead to what happened to farm subsidies. They were targeted to small farms so the large farms broke themselves into a series of small farms to maximize the subsidy.
      - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
        That's pretty hard to do if you use a definition of small business that excludes any company owned in whole or in part by a parent corporation.
- firloop 6y ago
  I don't intuitively understand how this change blocks targeted advertising outright. Sure, Facebook will have less information about me from other apps that I use, but certainly it has numerous other ways of targeting ads to me. Facebook knows my demographic because I provided it to them when I signed up and the types of content I interact with in their apps, and they have both coarse and granular location (IP address and the location permission) from their first party apps. Most relevant forms of targeting seem to still work. Ads from the local florist can still be targeted. It's credible to me that other, Facebook specific, magic such as "lookalike audience" and other behavior cohorting tools may be impacted by this change, but I don't view this narrow issue of IDFA consent to be an absolute judgment on ad targeting.
greggman3 6y ago
> once people actually understand the scope of ad tracking networks... they don’t want it. I wish this was true but I have friends who want the perceived benefits. They firmly believe handing over that data benefits them. More relevant ads, more useful services and features, more free stuff, etc. I bring up yet another place I don't want to be tracked and they just retort they want to share as much info as possible.
- bluelu 6y ago
  I also don't mind being tracked. If I must see ads, then I rather see relevant ads. There is nothing bad in this. I don't understand the facebook/google bashing here. It's not as you could advertise on apple for something against apple. It should also be clear to you what game Apple is playing here. Their end game is to do the tracking themselves and then they will slowly introduce and sell ads themselves. Their marketing department will then call it "privacy ads", but it's going to be the same as todays google/fb ads.
  - j2bax 6y ago
    I would argue that using mass amounts of collective and your personal data to tap into your psychology and encourage more consumption isn’t good per se. Apple has been around an awfully long time now to assume their end game is to own ad tech...
    - bluelu 6y ago
      I don't want to infer that this is their only goal. But it's certainly a strategy they will be pursuing and they certainly wouldn't mind introducing the famous apple tax on all ads shown on their devices.
  - allendoerfer 6y ago
    At the moment of collection, you do not know how your data will be used in the end. Even though you might be totally okay with what the original collector does with your data, you cannot be sure that your data is not being sold, stolen or legally requested by a government. Think of Nazis using church data to hunt Jews or the US government orchestrating drone strikes. I am not saying things like this will happen to your Facebook data, it's just that church members in 1930 also could not foresee what would eventually be done using their data. Data collections are inherently risky. We should just avoid them wherever we can. The world is changing, take a look at China. Just because young people in the West have only seen democracy, does not mean it will last forever.
Shivetya 6y ago
I would not put it out of the realm of possibility of facebook and others working with Congress on a privacy protection act which basically handcuffs Apple and others. It will come with some protection sounding name and in effect make it easier for companies to get users back into the reflex habit of clicking away any protections they may have had

qsort 6y ago

Super agree. I can't describe that ad in any other way than a sophisticated lie. They are making it look like Apple wants to take away choice from the user when it's exactly the other way around. They are careful to never mention what the iOS 14 updates are actually about, but a lie by omission is still a lie.

bredren 6y ago
I call it fundamental dishonesty. Some big problems for team fb: 1. It is difficult to recover from such an obviously dishonest position. 2. Users are supposed to be the customers, not small businesses. If users aren't the customers, they can't receive Facebook as a product "for free." 3. The current business model offers outsized returns because it leverages tech people don't want or don't yet know they don't want.

zpeti 6y ago

I am extremely torn about this thing, especially as I work in the privacy space. But it's hard to ignore the argument put forward by Ben Thompson that better tracking for facebook, actually tends to help small businesses. If you can't hyper target, you get ads for tooth paste, cars and deodorant (TV ads). If you can then you get ads for boutique florists in your area or gadgets you might actually like. I don't know what the solution is, because I want to be on small businesses side. And the issue with apple now is, I guarantee 99% of people will reject IDFA, because it is about personal data and it does sound bad. But the end result of this might not be that good for small business.

dannyw 6y ago
Allowing small businesses to tack on a stealth 5% charge onto your credit card also helps small businesses, but would you advocate for that?
- AnthonyMouse 6y ago
  If you could convince credit card companies to waive their fees for small businesses and make it back by charging more to big businesses, that could be a pretty big win.
  - willcipriano 6y ago
    That will lead to what happened to farm subsidies. They were targeted to small farms so the large farms broke themselves into a series of small farms to maximize the subsidy.
    - AnthonyMouse 6y ago
      That's pretty hard to do if you use a definition of small business that excludes any company owned in whole or in part by a parent corporation.
firloop 6y ago
I don't intuitively understand how this change blocks targeted advertising outright. Sure, Facebook will have less information about me from other apps that I use, but certainly it has numerous other ways of targeting ads to me. Facebook knows my demographic because I provided it to them when I signed up and the types of content I interact with in their apps, and they have both coarse and granular location (IP address and the location permission) from their first party apps. Most relevant forms of targeting seem to still work. Ads from the local florist can still be targeted. It's credible to me that other, Facebook specific, magic such as "lookalike audience" and other behavior cohorting tools may be impacted by this change, but I don't view this narrow issue of IDFA consent to be an absolute judgment on ad targeting.

greggman3 6y ago

> once people actually understand the scope of ad tracking networks... they don’t want it. I wish this was true but I have friends who want the perceived benefits. They firmly believe handing over that data benefits them. More relevant ads, more useful services and features, more free stuff, etc. I bring up yet another place I don't want to be tracked and they just retort they want to share as much info as possible.

bluelu 6y ago
I also don't mind being tracked. If I must see ads, then I rather see relevant ads. There is nothing bad in this. I don't understand the facebook/google bashing here. It's not as you could advertise on apple for something against apple. It should also be clear to you what game Apple is playing here. Their end game is to do the tracking themselves and then they will slowly introduce and sell ads themselves. Their marketing department will then call it "privacy ads", but it's going to be the same as todays google/fb ads.
- j2bax 6y ago
  I would argue that using mass amounts of collective and your personal data to tap into your psychology and encourage more consumption isn’t good per se. Apple has been around an awfully long time now to assume their end game is to own ad tech...
  - bluelu 6y ago
    I don't want to infer that this is their only goal. But it's certainly a strategy they will be pursuing and they certainly wouldn't mind introducing the famous apple tax on all ads shown on their devices.
- allendoerfer 6y ago
  At the moment of collection, you do not know how your data will be used in the end. Even though you might be totally okay with what the original collector does with your data, you cannot be sure that your data is not being sold, stolen or legally requested by a government. Think of Nazis using church data to hunt Jews or the US government orchestrating drone strikes. I am not saying things like this will happen to your Facebook data, it's just that church members in 1930 also could not foresee what would eventually be done using their data. Data collections are inherently risky. We should just avoid them wherever we can. The world is changing, take a look at China. Just because young people in the West have only seen democracy, does not mean it will last forever.

Shivetya 6y ago

I would not put it out of the realm of possibility of facebook and others working with Congress on a privacy protection act which basically handcuffs Apple and others. It will come with some protection sounding name and in effect make it easier for companies to get users back into the reflex habit of clicking away any protections they may have had