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Apple is a company, and it’s interested in making profits. Right now, its methods of making profits are slightly more aligned with what privacy conscious users

Apple is a company, and it’s interested in making profits. Right now, its methods of making profits are slightly more aligned with what privacy conscious users desire than some other companies’, and that’s good. Apple absolutely needs to be checked in other ways—-the fact that it’s selling advertising while setting policies that hurt other advertisers stinks to high heaven. Let antitrust rake them over the coals for that.

samatman 4y ago
I don't agree with the second paragraph at all. Apple sets a restrictive and privacy-centric set of rules for advertisers, which it then follows. The fact that this is a problem for other advertising companies is an indictment of those companies and their bleak surveillance-enabling business model. Contrast this with the "use WebKit or go home" rule, which, like it or not, is favoring Apple's product over others. It's not like these advertising policies are "be headquartered in Cupertino", it's "if you want to track our users you must ask them first".
- judge2020 4y ago
  Exactly. This is the popup for app store personalized ads[0], which is a full-screen popup that forces you to choose one or the other before you can access the app. It's super transparent and easy to decline the personalization. 0: https://videoweek.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Apple-permission-1.jpg https://videoweek.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Apple-permi...
  - majewsky 4y ago
    I wonder how many people actually register that there are two buttons at the bottom? It's very obvious to power-users like us since we're used to [ Accept ] Cancel at this point, but I can only imagine the borderless design for the secondary button originating from a dark pattern.
    - samatman 4y ago
      The entire iOS operating system works that way now. I dislike it. I think buttons should be buttons. But this isn't a special case, so unless you consider every instance of two buttons looking this way a dark pattern, this one isn't either.
      - ayntkilove 4y ago
        Personally I find it subconsciously mirrors how we interact with classic HTML. A button posts, a link gets. As a step in the device setup, the button infers some form of enablement or configuration while a link is perfect for skipping.
        samatman 4y ago
        That's a reasonable perspective that I hadn't considered, and probably makes even more sense to people who barely used/use desktops in the first place. I still don't like it! But I also never had any trouble using it. Except Apple Music. Don't get me started.
      - account42 4y ago
        > unless you consider every instance of two buttons looking this way a dark pattern The entire point of this pattern is to guide the user into a "default" option so using it for anything where the user is suppposed to provide informed consent is a dark pattern. The only places where it is not a dark pattern is where default choice actually aligns with the interest of the average user and I think that is hard to argue for a choice whose purpose is primarily to be allowed to better manipulate the user into spending more.
      - emn13 4y ago
        That pattern may be reasonable for "Are you sure" kind of requests for actions that the user explicitly wanted - because then there really is a sane default; we expect the user didn't click on some button by accident. But it's not reasonable to portray questions that are asking the user to agree to something they did not explicitly want; that's just trying to trick the user to make the annoying popup go away by clicking the big button. There's no sane default here, so none should be preselected (and ideally, the layout of confirmation dialogs and agreement dialogs would not be identical in the first place). It's a dark pattern, and I really doubt it's accidental.
  - efaref 4y ago
    What's the one for third-party apps? How different is the wording?
  - markdown 4y ago
    The only button they provide is for accepting ads. To say no, they provide a link. That's a dark pattern.
    - ihuman 4y ago
      The bottom one isn't a button?
      - Timwi 4y ago
        It doesn't matter what you call it. It doesn't look like a button to the vast majority of non-techies. That makes it a dark pattern.
    - afiori 4y ago
      That is at most a slightly shadowy pattern, it is the equivalent of saying "please select this one". Darker patterns would be a preselected checkbox with a ok button or a default consent with a "go to settings to update your selection". This is a "Personalized Ads" popup with an On and Off option, it looks pretty ok to me.
- robonerd 4y ago
  It's easy to play by the rules when you're the one writing them.
  - shuckles 4y ago
    This is only a criticism if you enumerate the deficiencies with the rules you believe are only justified by self-interest.
    - emn13 4y ago
      The linked article lists a bunch of those. Most of that bullet-point list of required or conversely prohibited behaviors apply to Apple. And all of those are justified only by self-interest. Incidentally, that doesn't mean the alternative has to be the wild west - that's a false dichotomy. Controlling access is fine; it's simply not fine that it's the platform that holds exclusive sway, especially if the answer is "only if we're the ones providing that app."
      - shuckles 4y ago
        This thread is about Apple’s privacy rules for App Store developers, and it’s not plainly obvious which items in the EU proposal enhance those protections at all, but the person I was responding to was insinuating that those protections have self-serving flaws.
        emn13 4y ago
        Is that distinction really helpful? The App Store has _rules_ some of which relate to user privacy, and some of which are in a grey area, and some of which don't relate to user privacy. Is needing to use Apple's payment provider a privacy protection? If you squint just right it might be. I'm sure there are some subset of app-store rules that taken by themselves, without the context of the other app-store rules are not self-serving. But that doesn't mean the rules overall are - and that's the reality that competitors need to deal with. Unlike apple, they can't change the restrictions they need to comply with. Both in actually immediate sense, and in a more meta process sense Apple has an unfair advantage they can and do exploit to extract tolls from the interactions between users and third-party providers. The fact that some of those protections also protect user privacy to the extent the user stays in Apple's walled garden is almost akin to blackmail: rather than trying to protect the user's privacy regardless, they've tied the user's privacy to the Apple ecosystem. It's all or nothing. Would be a shame if anything happened to that privacy of yours - are you sure you want to leave our walled garden? There aren't any other curated gardens (we made sure of that!), and your device unfortunately has no way to safely and conveniently opt in to risks worth taking, so it's our way, or the wild west out there... oh, and if you really want the wild west, we'll take your hardware too, you'll need to use android, and we use obvious UI patents to ensure it's inconvenient to switch a lot. It doesn't take an evil, machiavellian plan to end up in a situation in which the rules are so slanted in Apple's favor. All it takes are lots of tiny by themselves reasonable features - but steps that are always tested against Apple's interests, since those get a voice in the decision-making process, and rarely tested against third-party interests. It may well be that Apple was well intentioned in its privacy rules, and that those rules truly do protect the user - yet still have those rules stifle competition in a way that also harms the user down the line.
- disgruntledphd2 4y ago
  Apple have repeatedly refused to confirm that their ad system is compliant with the ATT rules.
  - shuckles 4y ago
    Which ad system? Their programmatic ad inventory does not support tracking, as anyone who has access to developer ads can confirm.
    - itsoktocry 4y ago
      Forgive my ignorance, but how do we know that Apple doesn't track more data than they provide to developers?
      - svnt 4y ago
        This is a great point. You could probably sum up Apple’s strategy as “capture the most lucrative market through initial quality/vanity, learn more about it than anyone else, then ring-fence it and protect it.” They aren’t a monopoly as long as you don’t consider income demographics.
        account42 4y ago
        I think is whole platform-holder strategy is where antitrust legislation needs a significant update. We must recognize the inherent platform lock-in and the effective monopoly over the platform even if there are other platforms that the users could theoretically switch to and regulate the platform holders accordingly. Anything else would be akin to ignoring a monopoly just because alternatives are available in a different town or country.
      - novok 4y ago
        If you ever interview apple developers for other companies, or just inspect what is being sent to apple's servers constantly from their devices, you'll realize that apple is recording A LOT of very private info about their users. Apple is very much a 'private from everyone but apple' company, they smartly just don't talk about it out loud. For their high level apps like TV and such, have things like privacy review. But their security, activation and map parts do record a lot of info.
moffkalast 4y ago
kevando 4y ago
100%

samatman 4y ago

I don't agree with the second paragraph at all. Apple sets a restrictive and privacy-centric set of rules for advertisers, which it then follows. The fact that this is a problem for other advertising companies is an indictment of those companies and their bleak surveillance-enabling business model. Contrast this with the "use WebKit or go home" rule, which, like it or not, is favoring Apple's product over others. It's not like these advertising policies are "be headquartered in Cupertino", it's "if you want to track our users you must ask them first".

judge2020 4y ago
Exactly. This is the popup for app store personalized ads[0], which is a full-screen popup that forces you to choose one or the other before you can access the app. It's super transparent and easy to decline the personalization. 0: https://videoweek.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Apple-permission-1.jpg https://videoweek.com/wp-content/uploads/2021/09/Apple-permi...
- majewsky 4y ago
  I wonder how many people actually register that there are two buttons at the bottom? It's very obvious to power-users like us since we're used to [ Accept ] Cancel at this point, but I can only imagine the borderless design for the secondary button originating from a dark pattern.
  - samatman 4y ago
    The entire iOS operating system works that way now. I dislike it. I think buttons should be buttons. But this isn't a special case, so unless you consider every instance of two buttons looking this way a dark pattern, this one isn't either.
    - ayntkilove 4y ago
      Personally I find it subconsciously mirrors how we interact with classic HTML. A button posts, a link gets. As a step in the device setup, the button infers some form of enablement or configuration while a link is perfect for skipping.
      - samatman 4y ago
        That's a reasonable perspective that I hadn't considered, and probably makes even more sense to people who barely used/use desktops in the first place. I still don't like it! But I also never had any trouble using it. Except Apple Music. Don't get me started.
    - account42 4y ago
      > unless you consider every instance of two buttons looking this way a dark pattern The entire point of this pattern is to guide the user into a "default" option so using it for anything where the user is suppposed to provide informed consent is a dark pattern. The only places where it is not a dark pattern is where default choice actually aligns with the interest of the average user and I think that is hard to argue for a choice whose purpose is primarily to be allowed to better manipulate the user into spending more.
    - emn13 4y ago
      That pattern may be reasonable for "Are you sure" kind of requests for actions that the user explicitly wanted - because then there really is a sane default; we expect the user didn't click on some button by accident. But it's not reasonable to portray questions that are asking the user to agree to something they did not explicitly want; that's just trying to trick the user to make the annoying popup go away by clicking the big button. There's no sane default here, so none should be preselected (and ideally, the layout of confirmation dialogs and agreement dialogs would not be identical in the first place). It's a dark pattern, and I really doubt it's accidental.
- efaref 4y ago
  What's the one for third-party apps? How different is the wording?
- markdown 4y ago
  The only button they provide is for accepting ads. To say no, they provide a link. That's a dark pattern.
  - ihuman 4y ago
    The bottom one isn't a button?
    - Timwi 4y ago
      It doesn't matter what you call it. It doesn't look like a button to the vast majority of non-techies. That makes it a dark pattern.
  - afiori 4y ago
    That is at most a slightly shadowy pattern, it is the equivalent of saying "please select this one". Darker patterns would be a preselected checkbox with a ok button or a default consent with a "go to settings to update your selection". This is a "Personalized Ads" popup with an On and Off option, it looks pretty ok to me.
robonerd 4y ago
It's easy to play by the rules when you're the one writing them.
- shuckles 4y ago
  This is only a criticism if you enumerate the deficiencies with the rules you believe are only justified by self-interest.
  - emn13 4y ago
    The linked article lists a bunch of those. Most of that bullet-point list of required or conversely prohibited behaviors apply to Apple. And all of those are justified only by self-interest. Incidentally, that doesn't mean the alternative has to be the wild west - that's a false dichotomy. Controlling access is fine; it's simply not fine that it's the platform that holds exclusive sway, especially if the answer is "only if we're the ones providing that app."
    - shuckles 4y ago
      This thread is about Apple’s privacy rules for App Store developers, and it’s not plainly obvious which items in the EU proposal enhance those protections at all, but the person I was responding to was insinuating that those protections have self-serving flaws.
      - emn13 4y ago
        Is that distinction really helpful? The App Store has _rules_ some of which relate to user privacy, and some of which are in a grey area, and some of which don't relate to user privacy. Is needing to use Apple's payment provider a privacy protection? If you squint just right it might be. I'm sure there are some subset of app-store rules that taken by themselves, without the context of the other app-store rules are not self-serving. But that doesn't mean the rules overall are - and that's the reality that competitors need to deal with. Unlike apple, they can't change the restrictions they need to comply with. Both in actually immediate sense, and in a more meta process sense Apple has an unfair advantage they can and do exploit to extract tolls from the interactions between users and third-party providers. The fact that some of those protections also protect user privacy to the extent the user stays in Apple's walled garden is almost akin to blackmail: rather than trying to protect the user's privacy regardless, they've tied the user's privacy to the Apple ecosystem. It's all or nothing. Would be a shame if anything happened to that privacy of yours - are you sure you want to leave our walled garden? There aren't any other curated gardens (we made sure of that!), and your device unfortunately has no way to safely and conveniently opt in to risks worth taking, so it's our way, or the wild west out there... oh, and if you really want the wild west, we'll take your hardware too, you'll need to use android, and we use obvious UI patents to ensure it's inconvenient to switch a lot. It doesn't take an evil, machiavellian plan to end up in a situation in which the rules are so slanted in Apple's favor. All it takes are lots of tiny by themselves reasonable features - but steps that are always tested against Apple's interests, since those get a voice in the decision-making process, and rarely tested against third-party interests. It may well be that Apple was well intentioned in its privacy rules, and that those rules truly do protect the user - yet still have those rules stifle competition in a way that also harms the user down the line.
disgruntledphd2 4y ago
Apple have repeatedly refused to confirm that their ad system is compliant with the ATT rules.
- shuckles 4y ago
  Which ad system? Their programmatic ad inventory does not support tracking, as anyone who has access to developer ads can confirm.
  - itsoktocry 4y ago
    Forgive my ignorance, but how do we know that Apple doesn't track more data than they provide to developers?
    - svnt 4y ago
      This is a great point. You could probably sum up Apple’s strategy as “capture the most lucrative market through initial quality/vanity, learn more about it than anyone else, then ring-fence it and protect it.” They aren’t a monopoly as long as you don’t consider income demographics.
      - account42 4y ago
        I think is whole platform-holder strategy is where antitrust legislation needs a significant update. We must recognize the inherent platform lock-in and the effective monopoly over the platform even if there are other platforms that the users could theoretically switch to and regulate the platform holders accordingly. Anything else would be akin to ignoring a monopoly just because alternatives are available in a different town or country.
    - novok 4y ago
      If you ever interview apple developers for other companies, or just inspect what is being sent to apple's servers constantly from their devices, you'll realize that apple is recording A LOT of very private info about their users. Apple is very much a 'private from everyone but apple' company, they smartly just don't talk about it out loud. For their high level apps like TV and such, have things like privacy review. But their security, activation and map parts do record a lot of info.

moffkalast 4y ago

kevando 4y ago

100%