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by joerobot 1057 days ago
You make money by not assuming people won't pay for apps. I'll happily pay for an app that serves a purpose for me and makes my life easier. If your app is good enough, people will pay for it. I'm more likely to uninstall an app with ads. Believe it or not, I don't want to sit through ads for the latest castle crasher or casino game that I'll never install.
1 comments
asow92 1057 days ago
Would you agree that the average hacker news user isn't the average app user? Most app users don't care at all if they don't have to pay.
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joerobot 1057 days ago
Sure, but those average users are my family and friends. I don't think their privacy deserves to be invaded either. Average users purchase apps too.
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photonerd 1057 days ago
Most average users I know HATE ads. They understand that every app has them but they’re in the same boat as the user you responded to: much more likely to uninstall an ad based app
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asow92 1057 days ago
That's the beauty we lost with targeted ads: less ads for the user, and more revenue for the app. There were obviously issues with that model, but it was a better experience for most people.
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labcomputer 1057 days ago
Wait wait wait... you think that having more-targeted ads (which will have a higher CTR and thus are more valuable to the advertiser, and thus lead to a higher CPM for the publisher) will lead to less ads? What planet are you on?

I was already starting to think you're full of it from your responses to other posters, but now I'm sure of it.

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asow92 1057 days ago
If the CPM is lower, we need more ads achieve the same amount of revenue. Basic math.

We don’t want to pack our experience with ads, but we literally need to post IDFA nerfing.

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nullstyle 1057 days ago
“Less ads for the User”

That does not track with my experience at all. Ad prevalence has only increased over time.

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asow92 1057 days ago
On iOS at least, ad prevalence has increased over time because targeted ads have been effectively abolished: more ads, with less relevance, are required to gain the same amount of revenue.
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ImPostingOnHN 1056 days ago
it seems more like ad prevalence has increased over time so that advertisers and ad-based services can make more money

after all, it increased before any attempts to rein in targeted advertising (which still exists, it's just harder to hyper-target in some circumstances)

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photonerd 1056 days ago
They haven’t been abolished at all. Source: part of my job for the last 15 years.
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nullstyle 1057 days ago
Yeah, sure. Not
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