[tcd]

That's....Not beneficial, at least in terms of what is going on behind the scenes.

1: App knows your location - most likely is profiting from that

2: App can see how often you visit $place, all for the cost of a few 'sale' items.

3: More extensive profiling can possibly occur, depending on what data the OS allows you to access.

As apposed to:

1: Walk to shop, no smartphone, see discounts inside shop.

There's 0 reason this information needs to be presented via any form of 'notification'. It could literally be done by $shop.com/discounteditems.txt.

[jw1224]

Of course it's beneficial! Can you not put yourself in the shoes of a normal consumer and recognise that?

They probably don't care if the app is tracking their location to tell how often they visit the shop.

In exchange for this inconsequential sacrifice to their privacy they get easy and convenient discounts, tailored to them, when they go about their daily routine.

I'm privacy-conscious and technologically literate, and even I wouldn't have much issue with this example if it would save me some money.

[cloverich]

You see geo location data that can (and is) re-sold throughout the industry and aggregated by political parties as inconsequential? (Intentionally extreme example, but this is not hyperbole)

[jasonlotito]

Not the person you were asking, but no, I don't see that as significant. There are other far more significant things in my life. Data being aggregated about me isn't a significant issue in my life. It seems like most people are this way.

[samatman]

Exactly. My mother is a dedicated coupon-clipper on a fixed income, and she would be delighted if a grocery store offered her a couple customized chances to save money every time she walked in.

Also, let's not ignore that the headline is backwards: Apps can send ads via notifications right now, what Apple has done is made it a separate permission, so that users can turn off ads and keep other notifications.

This is a strict improvement.