[TheDong]

I don't like companies forcing their newest features on me noisily and constantly trying to ship new features and see what sticks so you can't trust whether a feature advertised one week will even be there the next.

However, I have even less patience for companies forcing paid-for third-party ads down my throat on a paid product. Slack at least doesn't sell my eyeballs. Facebook, Twitter, Google's ads are worse to me than new feature dialogues.

Which brings me to Apple. I pay for a $1k+ device, and yet the app store's first result is always a sponsored bit of spam, adware, or sometimes even malware (like the fake ledger wallet on iOS, that was a sponsored result for a crypto stealer). On my other devices, I can at least choose to not use ad-ridden BS (like on android you can use F-Droid and AuroraStore, on Linux my package manager has no ads), but on iOS it's harder to avoid.

Apple hasn't sunk to Google levels in terms of ads, but they've crossed a line.

[nirava]

I agree. App store is really horrible. Why is it that when I'm searching for a first party or a very very popular, the first result and many of the other results are weird scammy malware like things? I don't particularly care about the stupid homepage ads tho, I think thats just because I have "personalize app store recommendations" turned off.

Search inside Settings (both mac and ios) was also really really stupid for a long while. Why are you taking me to some random accessibility toggle when I'm looking for "displays" ? But I checked right now and it's good.

[colechristensen]

I get it but... well I think of App Store as... a store. I don't have to go there.

I'm actually pretty disappointed in the lack of discovery available in the App Store, but I rarely go there. I'm fine with advertising being there. I wish it was better but I'm not offended that there is paid promotion in a store.

[DaedalusII]

>get letter from bank

>"to fix this, please install our app"

>search BankName

>comes up with other banks, BankNames US app (not the country you are in)

>revolut etc (cant use in the country you are in)

>ten minutes later

even worse when its your telecomm telling you to install their Official App so you can pay your bills or they will cut your cellular service, and you cant find it

[Someone]

I don’t see what that has to do with (increased) advertising on the App Store (IMO search there never has been good) or the comment you replied to in which colechristensen said: “I'm actually pretty disappointed in the lack of discovery available”.

I think paid advertising may even help improve discoverability on the App Store because, instead of making 10 or 20 to do list apps and hoping to get them to rank high by a combination of sheer luck and SEO tricks, scammers may only make one, and pay to get that to the top of the list.

In super markets product placement is affected by two factors: how much producers are willing to pay for a good spot (e.g. by offering lower wholesale prices if the product gets a more visible place) and vetting by the store owner.

I don’t think different solutions exist in the App Store. Apple doesn’t want to do much vetting, making advertising the only thing that may help (and yes, it would be awesome if there were a store that did do much vetting, but that requires a world where many different stores exist, and we aren’t there (yet))

[TheDong]

> I think paid advertising may even help improve discoverability on the App Store

So my grandmother searching "Powerpoint" and getting malware instead of the microsoft app is good actually?

Let me compare some search terms and see if ads are giving me "better" results:

* ublock - surfshark vpn

* wordle - spammy adware word game

* slack - spammy adware game

* microsoft word - spammy spyware office app (not the one made by MS)

* every bank I could think of - different financial app

Like, this isn't a good user experience. The ads aren't relevant, even when you type in a hyper-popular app's name exactly, something like 80% of the time a competitor has sniped the top spot.

For the "microsoft word" search, the spam app had an identical logo to word, and I have no doubt many people have been fooled. If you look at the reviews, some of the 1 star reviews are detailed complaints, and all the 5 star reviews are inhuman sounding "This helped me do my job" and "great app" reviews.

> I don’t think different solutions exist in the App Store

Sorting roughly by popularity and reviews, and also doing a little more to combat fake reviews, seems like it would be better. It at least would mean that if I searched "bank name" my bank's app would come up, since for every bank I tried the first non-ad result was in fact the bank in question.

It would save grandmothers around the world who just click on the first result.

[Someone]

> So my grandmother searching "Powerpoint" and getting malware instead of the microsoft app is good actually?

Where do I claim that? My argument is that, with paid advertising, the store may show fewer items, making it easier to find the right thing.

And no, I’m not claiming that’s ideal; only that it c/would be an improvement.

[TheDong]

So you're saying a hypothetically well implemented advertisement service could be better than a hypothetical poorly implemented ranking service.

The reality is right now we have a poorly implemented advertisement service that shows malware, and if you ignore the ads and look at the search results based on relevance, they're clearly better.

The claim "A good ad service would be good" is a truism, but that's not the reality we live in.

[instalabsai]

As someone who recently moved to NL from the US I encounter this issue about once a week and it’s blocking me from doing serious things like paying for parking, taxes, utilities or government services, all of which have apps that are only available on the Dutch app store.

I have a separate Dutch Apple ID I can switch to, but each time I log out I risk accidentally deleting all my data.

[matwood]

> all of which have apps that are only available on the Dutch app store.

This isn’t really on Apple though. Blame the companies/developers for geo gating their apps. It’s a simple checkbox in the store to make it available for other countries.

[nozzlegear]

That letter from the bank would probably include a QR code linking directly to their app oui?

[marcus_holmes]

Where do you install apps from then?

I get an app recommendation from a friend, I go to the App Store and search for it. I have to be super careful about which link I'm actually clicking on and which app I'm installing, because the App Store is riddled with spam and malware.

I wouldn't mind, except that Apple charge 30% of everything with the justification that they are keeping the ecosystem free of spam and malware...

[anon7000]

I’ve been installing apps from the App Store for more than a decade and have never ever accidentally downloaded spam or malware. I’m sure it’s there but it’s really not “riddled” with it in my experience searching for apps. What it’s riddled with is subscription-based apps whose free tier is worthless

[rconti]

I install a new app maybe once every 6 months. I agree that the app store is trash, littered with ads and casino games for kids.

I just don't find it hard to find the app I want, when I want something specific, and install, and then _get the hell out of that shithole_.

[nozzlegear]

I thought the justification was that they curate an ecosystem of apps with loyal/paying customers

[karel-3d]

It's best to avoid App Store and look for apps on Google (with ad blocker).

[slopinthebag]

I haven't noticed this at all and I wonder if you're mistaking curation for advertising? When I open up the App Store I get a panel written "games we love" and a listing of indie games that are clearly not paid for ads. The ads in search are visibly marked as ads, and while I don't particularly like ads in general, they are pretty easy to avoid.

[16bitvoid]

On iOS, if you open the App Store and click on the Today tab (it's the default tab if you kill and reopen), there's ads interspersed with curations.

For me, the second tile is an ad for Upside, some cashback app

[slopinthebag]

Mine is Moneris Go, and the top review is titled "Garbage App!!!!" lol

Honestly the last time I remember using the App Store was years ago and I can't recall if they had ads or not. Imo it's distasteful and I wish they didn't have them. Still leagues better than the fucking ads in the start menu which caused me to give up on gaming and Windows forever.

[TheDong]

If I open the app store and search "Gemini", the first result is "ChatGPT (advertisement)"

If I search for my bank, I get another bank. If I search for "Wordle", I get a bunch of ad-supported spamware (both the ad and non-ad results) before the real NYT Games app.

The app store has ads in search results. This is the primary way that my technologically inept relatives end up with the wrong app installed btw, is by searching and clicking the first result, and getting complete trash adware.

Apple should be ashamed of selling out their users.