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Video Ads Are Coming to All Your Uber Apps

23 points by mfiguiere 3y ago

nness 3y ago
I think we're starting to see the death-throes of Uber.
- notyourday 3y ago
  Yup. This thing is done.
pavel_lishin 3y ago
> One of Uber’s key selling points will be its ability to use data based on users’ own travel and purchase histories to target them during the critical period between the time they open each app and the time they complete their transactions, according to Grether. The average Uber ride lasts approximately 15 minutes, and riders spend about two of those minutes paying attention to the app on average, he said. > “We have two minutes of your attention. We know where you are, we know where you are going to, we know what you have eaten,” he said. “We can use all of that to then basically target a video ad towards you.” Thanks, I hate it.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > “We have two minutes of your attention. And we're going to use those two minutes to actively piss you off.
envp 3y ago
I typically associate in-app video ads with C-tier mobile games that are a few steps removed from a click farm. None of those has a home on my device. I’m glad and feel lucky to live in a city with good public transportation, guess I can go back to the old call restaurant and pickup order method in peace now. It also seems that they are planning on adding tablets to the cars to play ads? We’ve come full circle to taxis…
- waselighis 3y ago
  > It also seems that they are planning on adding tablets to the cars to play ads? This one leaves me a little dumbfounded. Do they really expect Uber drivers to go along with this? Many drivers are motivated to provide a pleasant and comfortable experience so they get high feedback from their riders. Installing a tablet to force the rider to view ads is going to result in lots of negative feedback for the drivers who go along with it.
- JohnFen 3y ago
  > I’m glad and feel lucky to live in a city with good public transportation I wish we had good public transportation here, but I do feel lucky to live in a city where Uber hasn't destroyed the taxi industry. I've been to cities where Under and Lyft were the only viable options, and it makes me really miss taxis.
villgax 3y ago
I'm actually suprised YouTube hasn't nailed and Ads insertion & adblock. Could just slipstream HLS streams with Ads HLS chunks
- iraldir 3y ago
  That's... brilliant. But I'm guessing the risk then is to fuel an alternative "pirate youtube". If you show ads that are blockable by adblocker, everyone, even power users, goes on the same platform to comment, share subscribe etc. If you were to, as you say, put ads straight into the feed, you can be bet that torrents, newsgroup and russian websites would be crawling with ad free versions of the videos. You'd thus remove a significant portion of your userbase to those website. And sure, maybe they did not see ads so they did not contribute directly to your revenues, but they were probably sharing those videos on social networks etc. I'm guessing that's the rational anyway.
  - BoxOfRain 3y ago
    I wonder if the evolution of adblockers will be 'computer vision model figures out where the ads are, then propagates the timestamps to all subscribers to auto-skip them SponsorBlock style'? Not a great deal Google can do about that.
cainxinth 3y ago
Unpopular opinion, but I’m fine with this. Uber is incredibly useful to me and struggles with profitability. If they need to serve ads (that I’ll invariably ignore) to keep the lights on, so be it.
- rchaud 3y ago
  Enough to hand their advertising partners GPS-enhanced ad targeting? I'll just take a cab.
  - cainxinth 3y ago
    Like I said, unpopular opinion, but yes. I long ago made that deal with Waze, and I feel I’m getting enough back to warrant the intrusion.
AbrahamParangi 3y ago
It would honestly shock me if the monetization from ads exceeds the costs of having a slightly shittier app. I wonder if one of these “and oh well also sell ads” plays has ever worked? Adding secondary monetization via ads always struck me as a move of desperation when it comes from a non-entertainment app.
- closetohome 3y ago
  It strikes me as desperate and tacky. Definitely not a great look for a company that already produces pretty bad apps.
netsharc 3y ago
Your phone: "Ping! Your food is almost here. But the driver is only allowed to ring your door after you've seen this ad!".
add-sub-mul-div 3y ago
Any service that achieves a certain level of network effect will inevitably use that position against its users, knowing very few of them will change their behavior and abandon the network. The biggest networks have become too big to be disrupted on a short enough time scale that execs worry about. I don't know if a Digg to Reddit type migration is possible anymore. But Reddit and Twitter are well into their phase where we know we don't like using them anymore. We've just established these patterns and no one serves them well anymore. It will take a decade for these services to really die, but the die is cast. Between Twitter, Reddit, and now Uber it seems like the pretense of preserving a good user experience has suddenly been found to be unnecessary.
JohnFen 3y ago
So Uber is joining all those other companies in trying to make the world a worse place by bringing the very worst aspects of mobile apps and the internet into the real world? I wish that surprised me.
catchnear4321 3y ago
did an uber exec stop at a gas pump, breathe in some fumes, watch the ads play while pumping, down a couple of buzz balls from inside the convenience store, and shout eureka while driving off into the sunset? how many c-levels plan on getting a telly?
growingentropy 3y ago
Oh wow, it'll be so nice to turn my phone off until the expected arrival time. Sweet.
- TheLoafOfBread 3y ago
  I guess, it will get paused like YouTube app, until you will unlock phone again. I can completely imagine that. Can't wait on minority report like front camera watching your eyes checking that you are watching the ad.
  - deleted 3y ago
    [deleted]

23 points by mfiguiere 3y ago

nness 3y ago

I think we're starting to see the death-throes of Uber.

notyourday 3y ago
Yup. This thing is done.

pavel_lishin 3y ago

> One of Uber’s key selling points will be its ability to use data based on users’ own travel and purchase histories to target them during the critical period between the time they open each app and the time they complete their transactions, according to Grether. The average Uber ride lasts approximately 15 minutes, and riders spend about two of those minutes paying attention to the app on average, he said. > “We have two minutes of your attention. We know where you are, we know where you are going to, we know what you have eaten,” he said. “We can use all of that to then basically target a video ad towards you.” Thanks, I hate it.

JohnFen 3y ago
> “We have two minutes of your attention. And we're going to use those two minutes to actively piss you off.

envp 3y ago

I typically associate in-app video ads with C-tier mobile games that are a few steps removed from a click farm. None of those has a home on my device. I’m glad and feel lucky to live in a city with good public transportation, guess I can go back to the old call restaurant and pickup order method in peace now. It also seems that they are planning on adding tablets to the cars to play ads? We’ve come full circle to taxis…

waselighis 3y ago
> It also seems that they are planning on adding tablets to the cars to play ads? This one leaves me a little dumbfounded. Do they really expect Uber drivers to go along with this? Many drivers are motivated to provide a pleasant and comfortable experience so they get high feedback from their riders. Installing a tablet to force the rider to view ads is going to result in lots of negative feedback for the drivers who go along with it.
JohnFen 3y ago
> I’m glad and feel lucky to live in a city with good public transportation I wish we had good public transportation here, but I do feel lucky to live in a city where Uber hasn't destroyed the taxi industry. I've been to cities where Under and Lyft were the only viable options, and it makes me really miss taxis.

villgax 3y ago

I'm actually suprised YouTube hasn't nailed and Ads insertion & adblock. Could just slipstream HLS streams with Ads HLS chunks

iraldir 3y ago
That's... brilliant. But I'm guessing the risk then is to fuel an alternative "pirate youtube". If you show ads that are blockable by adblocker, everyone, even power users, goes on the same platform to comment, share subscribe etc. If you were to, as you say, put ads straight into the feed, you can be bet that torrents, newsgroup and russian websites would be crawling with ad free versions of the videos. You'd thus remove a significant portion of your userbase to those website. And sure, maybe they did not see ads so they did not contribute directly to your revenues, but they were probably sharing those videos on social networks etc. I'm guessing that's the rational anyway.
- BoxOfRain 3y ago
  I wonder if the evolution of adblockers will be 'computer vision model figures out where the ads are, then propagates the timestamps to all subscribers to auto-skip them SponsorBlock style'? Not a great deal Google can do about that.

cainxinth 3y ago

Unpopular opinion, but I’m fine with this. Uber is incredibly useful to me and struggles with profitability. If they need to serve ads (that I’ll invariably ignore) to keep the lights on, so be it.

rchaud 3y ago
Enough to hand their advertising partners GPS-enhanced ad targeting? I'll just take a cab.
- cainxinth 3y ago
  Like I said, unpopular opinion, but yes. I long ago made that deal with Waze, and I feel I’m getting enough back to warrant the intrusion.

AbrahamParangi 3y ago

It would honestly shock me if the monetization from ads exceeds the costs of having a slightly shittier app. I wonder if one of these “and oh well also sell ads” plays has ever worked? Adding secondary monetization via ads always struck me as a move of desperation when it comes from a non-entertainment app.

closetohome 3y ago
It strikes me as desperate and tacky. Definitely not a great look for a company that already produces pretty bad apps.

netsharc 3y ago

Your phone: "Ping! Your food is almost here. But the driver is only allowed to ring your door after you've seen this ad!".

add-sub-mul-div 3y ago

Any service that achieves a certain level of network effect will inevitably use that position against its users, knowing very few of them will change their behavior and abandon the network. The biggest networks have become too big to be disrupted on a short enough time scale that execs worry about. I don't know if a Digg to Reddit type migration is possible anymore. But Reddit and Twitter are well into their phase where we know we don't like using them anymore. We've just established these patterns and no one serves them well anymore. It will take a decade for these services to really die, but the die is cast. Between Twitter, Reddit, and now Uber it seems like the pretense of preserving a good user experience has suddenly been found to be unnecessary.

JohnFen 3y ago

So Uber is joining all those other companies in trying to make the world a worse place by bringing the very worst aspects of mobile apps and the internet into the real world? I wish that surprised me.

catchnear4321 3y ago

did an uber exec stop at a gas pump, breathe in some fumes, watch the ads play while pumping, down a couple of buzz balls from inside the convenience store, and shout eureka while driving off into the sunset? how many c-levels plan on getting a telly?

growingentropy 3y ago

Oh wow, it'll be so nice to turn my phone off until the expected arrival time. Sweet.

TheLoafOfBread 3y ago
I guess, it will get paused like YouTube app, until you will unlock phone again. I can completely imagine that. Can't wait on minority report like front camera watching your eyes checking that you are watching the ad.
- deleted 3y ago
  [deleted]