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All they had to do was make showing ads part of the ToS for developing third party apps, Not a rhetorical question: have any companies done this successfu

All they had to do was make showing ads part of the ToS for developing third party apps, Not a rhetorical question: have any companies done this successfully? It seems like such an obvious solution to me, but I haven't seen it mentioned. One possible shortcoming (from Reddit's perspective) is the fact that the official Reddit app doesn't just show ads, it also collects all sorts of other user behavior data. So for them it might be able more than simply showing ads. That's just a wild guess on my part, though.

dx034 3y ago
Can you really make that much money with behavior data? If that was the case, wouldn't we see more sites with few ads? I believe ads bring in the vast majority of money, behavior data helps ad targeting and can maybe sometimes bring in insignificant amounts as well.
- JohnBooty 3y ago
  Can you really make that much money with behavior data? Good question. I don't know if companies sell behavior data directly or if it just helps them to target ads better and therefore theoretically improve conversion rates.
proto_lambda 3y ago
> Not a rhetorical question: have any companies done this successfully? Telegram does this, and I think they're successful with it.
- OJFord 3y ago
  Telegram? But there's no ads in the official app - are you saying they require them in third-party apps in order to make them a worse experience and push people back to the official one/make money from them if they don't? That'd be.. interesting, but I think I assume you meant something else, not Telegram?
  - proto_lambda 3y ago
    There are ads in the official apps - they appear similar to regular messages in large channels (telegram's few-to-many/broadcasting offering)
marcosdumay 3y ago
> So for them it might be able more than simply showing ads. Yeah, and this is them being unreasonable. The insistence on all the large platforms on doing that even when all of their users revolt is childish and killed a lot of platforms already.

dx034 3y ago

Can you really make that much money with behavior data? If that was the case, wouldn't we see more sites with few ads? I believe ads bring in the vast majority of money, behavior data helps ad targeting and can maybe sometimes bring in insignificant amounts as well.

JohnBooty 3y ago
Can you really make that much money with behavior data? Good question. I don't know if companies sell behavior data directly or if it just helps them to target ads better and therefore theoretically improve conversion rates.

proto_lambda 3y ago

> Not a rhetorical question: have any companies done this successfully? Telegram does this, and I think they're successful with it.

OJFord 3y ago
Telegram? But there's no ads in the official app - are you saying they require them in third-party apps in order to make them a worse experience and push people back to the official one/make money from them if they don't? That'd be.. interesting, but I think I assume you meant something else, not Telegram?
- proto_lambda 3y ago
  There are ads in the official apps - they appear similar to regular messages in large channels (telegram's few-to-many/broadcasting offering)

marcosdumay 3y ago

> So for them it might be able more than simply showing ads. Yeah, and this is them being unreasonable. The insistence on all the large platforms on doing that even when all of their users revolt is childish and killed a lot of platforms already.