Does Facebook pay Apple 30% of revenue derived from ads made within its iOS app?
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If that explanation is true ^, then it's pretty rich, because Apple recently aimed to get 30% of virtual experiences offered through Airbnb. How would those not be considered "outside goods and services" when they involve people outside the app providing goods and services? [0] Others are saying Apple doesn't see it as an "in app purchase"; however, I can click "Place Order" for an ad in the iOS app... I'd call that an in-app purchase! Can all companies let you buy digital stuff within the app with non-Apple payments or in a bill-you-later manner? Just ads?
Almost certainly there have been behind-closed-doors discussions on this, as the line has been arbitrarily drawn (either way) to include/exclude this massive company from the 30% tax. Indies don't have the same clarity on the rules; for example, Marco Arment's app Overcast sells ads, but doesn't complete transactions in the app because he was worried he'd need to give up 30%. Like with Apple's quiet program that let Amazon and a couple other token companies get a separate deal on content-app rules [1]: how can small companies on the store know when to press Apple on some rules and not on others (without retaining lawyers)?
It's just baffling because Facebook has recently whipped up quite a stir [2] around Apple requiring 30% of creator revenue, yet none of the articles mention this point about Facebook ads getting/not-getting a 30% tax for (probably the better part of) the past decade ... their bread and butter!
Furthermore, Facebook is whining about Apple making IDFA tracking opt-in on iOS, yet this company has benefited HUGELY from the fact Apple didn't do that from the start AND somehow decided not to charge 30% on its ad buys on mobile.
[0] - https://www.nytimes.com/2020/07/28/technology/apple-app-stor...
[1] - https://stratechery.com/2020/apple-amazon-and-common-enemies...
[2]- https://www.google.com/search?biw=1440&bih=798&tbm=nws&ei=RR...
Where it all falls apart: Apple recently targeted 30% of Airbnb's (and ClassPass') virtual experiences revenue. These experiences do not make the app itself better (others were saying here these are done via Zoom). It's a transaction to set up people performing for others (not a purely digital good) in another app like Zoom. It doesn't really change/improve the Airbnb app. ... But Apple aims to treat it as an in-app-purchase...
Unlike with the Wordpress controversy, Apple has not backed down or apologized to ClassPass/Airbnb, demanding both still comply with the 30% rule by year's end.
As a user, are you buying ad placements on other people's news feeds? If so, I'd be very confused why you would continue to spend money on it (via your iPhone) if it doesn't change your experience as a user. I'd expect you to at least see some change, hopefully in the form of funds in your own paycheck.
Is there something special about users that buy ads that means Apple can't get a cut of their purchases, or that we don't consider them Facebook "users"?
I think the above comment was more about Facebook being somewhat hypocritical in complaining recently about the one time they do have to pay, despite the fact that in most of their business they don't.
Just be really careful, there’s tons of FinCen and KYC/AML laws that might cover what you’re doing if you go this route.
On the other hand, you can buy a Facebook ad in its iOS Ads Manager app that only targets iOS devices, right?
All of this is to say Apple has arbitrarily picked winner and loser categories of digital app businesses. Meanwhile it sticks to the line that the store is an even playing field. I'd love it if it were!
(I'm not arguing that Apple's 30% cut requirement for even purely digital goods is appropriate; I think Ben Thompson's recent suggestion of a difference between goods with marginal costs vs. zero-marginal costs goods would be a better starting point, if there were a way to express it simply. Of course, a better suggestion might just be for Apple to allow developers to integrate their own in-app purchase systems for goods and services that aren't explicitly tied to the Apple ecosystem and use non-Apple infrastructure for delivery -- not just video classes but Netflix subscriptions, Kindle books, and so on.)
Perhaps what the smaller organisations and some developers need is to fund a lawyery folk to advocate / negotiate collectively on their behalf?
Edit: improved grammar by removing a typo and changing a word or two.
Billions of users are the reason those negotiations are successful. Apple will be in a pickle if you can't get Facebook on an iPhone. Apple doesn't give two figs if someone can't get some shitty startup's app on an iPhone.
This in addition to the question of, what is 30% of all revenue FB makes via ad purchases in its iOS app? I don't think this number is published but easy to think it is in the billions (what is annual FB ad revenue? $60 billion something like that? How much of that is ad agencies (or ad buyers) managing ads via the iOS app?)
If Apple were to attempt to tax that... they'd suddenly give Facebook a several-billion-dollar reason to push the market to create a third mobile device platform and have it overtake iOS.
Also, Facebook is going to find their ads are less effective in the next release of iOS, as they won't be able to track people as easily.
This sentence might very well be based on good intentions and a passion for discourse clarity.
It also feels extremely paternalistic and condescending to tell someone to edit in ones own viewpoint as their own and even demand a faux acknowledgement of personal progression. Almost like in a play that depicts a medieval trial.
I know it probably wasn't meant that way and we're certainly all frustrated by the repetitive parts of the conversation, but the on-topic sentences would've been great on their own.
(Also, I haven't "asked this around several times", and I won't edit my posts, you goofball!)
Likely, the real reason why Facebook won't have to pay the 30%, is that it is too big a customer to lose. Facebook is too important for Apple as a customer to have in the App Store. So Apple and Facebook made a deal, which is what you can do if you are big enough...
The fact that a new iOS will reduce the tracking of users by Facebook is not even remotely touching the topic we're discussing here. If Apple has a rule that it can take 30% of every sale made via an app from the App Store, this should be applied to every sale. Everything else smells like Trumpism, where you pay less taxes the richer you are...
So should Amazon pay 30% to Apple on every sale made via their iOS app? I assume you mean every digital sale.
A full list can be found here (on their helpful, seemingly recent, marketing site): https://www.apple.com/ios/app-store/principles-practices/#:~....
And the legalese is here in section 3.1: https://developer.apple.com/app-store/review/guidelines/#in-...
For a few categories, this is very well-defined. For example, a ride in Uber/Lyft is clearly a good/service consumed outside of the app, a subscription to Netflix is a subscription, and a +1 life in a game is a consumable digital good. However, for other categories it is not as clear; for example, what category does a "Ride Pass" fall under (which lowers the cost of Uber and Lyft rides, but is a monthly, purely-digital subscription)?
Ads as a whole probably gets bucketed into goods and services outside the app (because it doesn't improve your app experience). Beyond that, from a strategic perspective, I suspect Apple isn't trying to get into the b2b game, their ability to control supply there is probably much lower, esp when the developer and the user have a direct connection (through a sales person / customer success rep). However, this raises a really interesting question towards the category of lighter-weight personal ads (i.e. "Promote this post"). I suspect that these are not well regulated and probably not equally enforced. I'd be interested in the comps here: Do Twitter / FB / LinkedIn all use the same purchase method when you promote a post? How about the dating apps when you promote your profile? Are those materially different?
This is a completely digital service, and they're just ignoring in-app purchases completely. How do they get away with that? Are there exceptions for subscriptions? The app comes across as a scam to me, but it's not exactly an obscure product.
Or maybe they use AB tests or something that hides this from the app review team?
[1] https://apps.apple.com/us/app/noom/id634598719
Addendum for reference... I did screenshot the credit card form. This is in the app it self, not on a separate website. [2]
[1] https://www.facebook.com/business/news/branded-content-updat... [2] https://www.theverge.com/2020/2/12/21135183/ftc-influencer-a...
My understanding is it's potentially illegal [1] to pay someone to post and not tag it as being an advertisement. Instagram added new transparency guidelines [2] that require sponsored posts to be created inside their platform [3]
[1] https://www.usatoday.com/story/money/2016/03/15/lord--taylor...
[2] https://business.instagram.com/blog/tagging-and-insights/
Yes, this is absolutely the FCC guideline. But this has nothing to do with FB asking for revenue for off-site advertising (which they don't do).
So this part of your comment:
> "Instagram (Facebook) updated their rules in 2016[1] demanding that off platform deals for sponsored content go through them so they get a cut."
is completely wrong.
Kinda funny because these companies run around claiming ads are good for your user experience (via 1. funding the free experience, 2. platitudes like "connecting you with high quality offers")
It would be as if I paid money to change your app experience. Yes it is changing an app-experience but it's outside my app experience (curious how Apple thinks about in-app gifts, e.g. Farmville style)
Isn't that equivalent to an ad that drives more attention to your Facebook page?
So if I have two apps A and B, and app A only allows you to buy a license to unlock content/features in app B... no commission is due since what I buy in app A is consumed in app B, i.e. outside app A? :D
Apple can change the rules at any time for any reason with no notice. We may not provide details of the new rules.
Regulators know exactly what Apple is doing here, and have so far declined to take action. That's an explicit decision, not an oversight.
Judges question "Why 30% exactly?" indicates that people no longer think Apple is entitled to that.
How come these companies don't do something similar for subscriptions? ex: HBO Now (or whatever the fuck it's called these days) could have a subscribe button that takes you out of the app to their site - completely circumventing the in-app subscription purchase. Right?
See: https://www.amazon.ca/gp/help/customer/display.html?nodeId=G...
How is this not monopoly abuse?
However, if your app happens to be a game (a "free" game, for instance) and your in-app purchases enhance that game in some way (e.g. unlocking features) then Apple gets a cut of that.
The "core app experience" of Floatplane is "you get to watch videos in high quality" and "you get to chat during live streams". Their app is an amalgamation of Patreon and the Youtube video player, both of which are on the App Store already.
I don't know why buying video access would be so different from making ads show up. Both are purely digital services. There's probably some vague notion of "consumption" that determines if the fee is mandatory or not, but the rules are as vague as they are arbitrary when you get down to that level.
It's clear that the actual rule is "we can make a deal if you're big enough". Apps like Uber have gotten warnings for pulling stunts that smaller developers would get their dev account banned for. Adding 30% on top of Facebook would kill the feature on iOS and subsequently kill iPhone presence among marketeers.
[1]: https://www.floatplane.com/ [2]: https://youtu.be/Rs4hTm6B9QQ?t=368
Quote:
"Apple has an established program for premium subscription video entertainment providers to offer a variety of customer benefits — including integration with the Apple TV app, AirPlay 2 support, tvOS apps, universal search, Siri support and, where applicable, single or zero sign-on. On qualifying premium video entertainment apps such as Prime Video, Altice One and Canal+, customers have the option to buy or rent movies and TV shows using the payment method tied to their existing video subscription."
Why does this bypass exist for Premium Streaming Apps, but not exist for Game Streaming? What's the fundamental difference between streaming video and streaming a game, or purchasing an Ebook?
Apple's 'we apply the rules to everyone' defense is a bit like a store-owner saying, "I'm not playing favorites, I'm giving a special discount to anyone with green eyes, a buzzcut, and a striped t-shirt. It just so happens that my friend Tim fits that description."
The thing that's really interesting here is that their whole shtick now is privacy, which implies paying for things rather than funding them with advertising. But then they're taking 30% of the things you pay for and not 30% of the advertising, which pushes developers toward funding from advertising. So who is supposed to be the favorite?
You can say ‘they are fundamentally the same’ in the sense that bits are traveling in both ways across the network.
But everyone does in fact make a distinction between games and movies. That’s why we have two different words for them.
It’s true that one day, the distinction between interactive movies - e.g. Bandernatch, and real-time interactive games may go away.
That day is not here yet.
It’s also true that if Apple won’t sell us what we want, we’ll buy it from someone else.
No official source qualifies and the article you linked just guesses based on screenshots. It also tells you that Apple does take the 30% cut if you trick the user into not realizing there's an Apple tax.
The video I linked (I know, it's long) discusses limitations as decreed by Apple itself. There's another video on that channel with even more in-depth information from Apple. There's no offer to make a deal and become a "premium service". I'm sure these guys would love to get their app available on more platforms, providing more value than they already can with just smartphone apps.
"The requirement: those platforms must be able to integrate core Apple services, apps, and features — including AirPlay 2, universal search and Siri support, and single or zero sign-on, among others."
Spotify is a subscription service.
To be honest I don't understand the rationale here - the criteria seem somewhat arbitrary - but I don't think Apple is being inconsistent in applying the criteria.
In contrast from what you’re describing floatplane purchases are for subscriptions that will show up directly in the app.
That shows they've indexed three results from the domain. Maybe they rejected ddg trawlers?
Linus Media Group made an alternative to Youtube to not put all of their eggs in one basket, that's what eventually became Floatplane. There's more creators on there, basically all in the tech Youtube space, but they do extensively use their own streaming platform of course.
If you install the Netflix app, you'll be hit with a login screen and no way to proceed until you go online, create an account, and pay.
However, if you were to make a game that had the same UI, it would be refused access to the store - apps must have some level of functionality without requiring a purchase outside the app, except if they are in the 'reader' category.
Apple refused to approve the app unless we added a storefront to our app and used in-app purchases. But that’s not something we consider a core feature of the app.
I've seen various demos and showcases, some of them with pretty impressive UIs, but I've never encountered PWAs outside of exploring them as a novelty.
We made the change after reassessing the PWA landscape and seeing that iOS 13 and Android's level of support for PWA features makes it worthwhile. Apple is dragging its feet with PWAs - but the way our app works means we don't need any of the missing functionality (like Web Push) and iOS's weird PWA app lifecycle suits our application fine as it isn't intended to be used offline for more than a few hours anyway.
Would love to be corrected on this btw.
Covid killed our product though so for us I'm relieved I don't have to deal with Apple's shit anymore to get the app deployed.
Still have to deal with it for other clients though :/
Content that’s consumed on the device to be more precise.
You can sell domains and hosting etc. using alternative payment methods. For example I use namecheap’s App to buy domains and I would use CC to do so.
So why not ads then? Well Apple doesn't have insight into the ad spending, and they are not a middle man to the cash transfer. They could try to force themselves into that position, say "if you want to have ads in your app, you have to use our SDK for that". But if they tried such a stunt, then Google and Facebook, would become very powerful very motivated enemies.
https://www.theverge.com/2020/4/1/21203294/amazon-prime-vide...
Interestingly they also allow you to deposit with Apple Pay (along with many other payment processors, which the user can choose).
My guess would be that the rule is that there's no Apple cut if you're selling a physical thing and there's a digital attachment. But Apple probably reserves the right to disregard sham physical transactions, where the physical item is de minimis in value compared to the digital item.
Supposing I have a B2B (not B2C) web-application + SaaS for a hypothetical professional studio photographers’s portfolio app. The app is entirely free (gratis) with self-service signup in the app for a free SaaS service tier - the app itself is only used for uploading photos to the SaaS service (I.e. it’s a utility/companion app).
Now, supposing that users on the free tier can pay a one-off fee (in the iOS app or on the web) to enable the ability to set a custom colour scheme for their portfolio page (which doesn’t affect the appearance of the iOS app at all) - that doesn’t count as a purchase which enhances the app experience - it doesn’t enable/disable or change anything in the app - should that be an IAP with the 30% tax - or an Apple Pay purchase with only ~3% processing fees?
Now, what if instead of selling that digital-only, app-irrelevant good in the app instead users could buy a physical “welcome pack” in the app which consists of a cheap Zazzle tote-bag with the company logo on - and as a bonus to the user enables the same custom-colour-scheme feature as a “thank you” to the user (like how Reddit and GitHub add flair to your account if you’re a paying user). Does (or should) Apple get 30% or 3% of that? If the cost of selling the tote bag is less than Apple’s 30% fee then I’ve found a loophole in IAP vs. AP.
That is not a thing at Reddit (I'm a paying user and there is no special flair nor any setting to add one).
On GitHub, you get the purple "PRO" badge next to your username on your profile page and in the profile-tooltips elsewhere on GitHub.
Not legally, in most jurisdictions.
The only way to compete with Apple in the browsers space on iOS is to build your own app marketplace/store, since Apple controls distribution through the App Store.
The only way to compete with Apple in the app store space is to build your own OS, since iOS only allows the Apple App Store, not competing ones.
The only way to compete with Apple in the OS space is to build your own hardware (or buy from someone else and distribute), since Apple hardware locks out other operating systems from running.
So the only way to compete with Apple in a space where they've decided you aren't allowed to is to replace their entire platform stack, and compete with them at the platform level.
So to compete with Apple in the browser space you have to compete at the level of Google, where you make hardware, the OS, and the marketplace, and hope people move over wholesale to your hardware and OS just so they can use your browser.
That's why Apple's behavior is anti-competitive. They've put walls to competition in place at every possible level to make it so the amount of money and expertise required to compete at any level is the same to competing at almost all levels.
Edit: This made more sense when I realized the headline was about purchasing ad placement within the app, not viewing ads.
No buying a kindle book, you'll be forced to open a web browser and do it that way. No purchasing movies, or music.
Physical goods that are delivered to your home, all good. Not an issue.
Also I don’t think you can subscribe to amazon prime via the iOS app — you certainly can’t buy video via the prime video app!
Ultimately, large corporations can get side deals because they wield more power and influence than smaller companies.
Inst Facebook timeline carefully curated based on that ?
Is Epic obligated to censor them because of Apple's rules?
I think there is a very good case to be made that the in-app experience is improved by allowing these purchases in-app, and the in-app experience and value would be significantly reduced if Facebook did not allow marketers to buy ads using their iPhone or iPad.
Maybe a case can be made for adspace having a real cost too?
Though one could argue that more likes/conversions/CTAs improve's a business's app experience
You can borrow KindleUnlimited titles, provided you've purchased that subscription outside of the app. Same thing with Audible, you can use existing credits within the app, but can't purchase more.
Seems to me FB ads fit the definition. FB core product isn’t a consumer social network, it’s a targeted ad platform, and their actual customers are advertisers that serve ads on the platform.
Clearly ad buying/managing enriches the core app experience for FB’s advertisers.
Just more favoritism and unequal treatment between the tech giants.
I think Apple is absolutely abusive and I would love for that to be stopped, but this doesn't sound malicious to me on the surface.
Lots of apps do this, and they are not exempt from the 30% fee. Basically paywalling an existing part of your app is exactly what the 30% from IAP is for.
We complied of course. :(
“Mr. Cook - tear down this wall!” :-)
It worked out pretty well in both directions actually.
You always have the choice to move to Android/Windows and never see Apple ever again. People enter the garden of their own volition, because it's a garden compared to all the crap out there.
None of this whining is about protecting the people, but rather about grabbing a slice of the billion-user pie, which Apple has historically denied other companies ever since they refused to put AT&T bloatware on the first iPhone.
Can you imagine what that would have been like?
People fucking loved the iPhone -because- Apple kept every other company’s bullshit off it!
And people who love curated platforms will continue to love it.
1 Downvote = 1 Trillion (funny how people advocating for freedom try to bury all dissent)
iMessage has (or at least had) engineered non-interoperability with non-iPhone devices and has a significantly degraded user experience for everyone if anyone has a non-iPhone device in a group chat. There were multiple people who "freely" made the choice to switch to an Android device, only to have their friends drop them from group chats and remake it without them.
Get real. Apple's behaviour is profit seeking, not altruistic.
Despite many making a reversed-logic assumption: because a company is not legally punished (yet), shows that what they do has to be legal, history on the other hand is littered with examples of powerful entities proving that assumption utter bullshit. Involvement with anything modern regularly being a key factor, in the law only slowly catching up. The USA becoming ever more like a corrupt and tribal banana republic, sure doesn't help either.
Good luck to you all, from across the pond.
And then they need to keep adding these strange restrictions and rules to try and contort every app so that their rules kinda work, but it's just such a mess.
There's virtually no chance of running into Apple if you don't own an Apple device and choose not to use any Apple services (iTunes, Music etc.)
Have you thought about just putting 30% fee on your users? For example google when you subscribe to youtube premium in the iphone app just charges you a straight 17 USD with no info or note saying that it is 12 USD through the website. (which I'm sure they were made to do as well)
They wouldn't approve the app with any mention of the site at all.
It's all a load of BS. My Ring app tells me I can only buy it on their site. But since we don't have a lot of "power" we are screwed.
No retail store that sells your product allows you to put a giant sticker on it that says "buy this product from us instead and get a 30% discount".
You're intentionally trying to benefit from the store's distribution channel at the same trying to screw them out of the money they need to finance it.
Many developers would love to not "intentionally benefit" from Apple's distribution channel. The issue is Apple forces them to use the App Store for distribution.
Apple is like Walmart taking a 30% cut off Xbox live subscription fees after a customer buys an Xbox from them.
So, reality disagrees with you.
Physical goods are not the same as digital goods, but even if you do want to go with your analogy, brands will often times include coupons and refill offers and other promotional material with items they sell and push the consumer to buy directly from them and retail stores still carry their products.
This UX is bad for customers.
https://www.bloomberg.com/news/articles/2020-07-29/apple-con...
Depending on the product, you could be losing a significant portion of your customer base before then. For example Netflix, known for insanely good retention, loses nearly 40% of customers by month 12. [1]
[1] https://secondmeasure.com/datapoints/netflix-disney-plus-app...
"The agreement with Amazon is similar to a program Apple announced earlier this year letting select developers avoid the 30% fee in exchange for integrating with certain features. Amazon is part of that program."
Clearly for amazon, but not the same as any hypothetical negotiated private side deal with facebook.
Still, now that mobile hardware comes close to being commoditized i think there's hope, maybe from an unexpected place (like the open source community ? one can dream..)
Most us of don't want a recreation of the web where companies try to "optimize" the subscription cancellation experience. Or to have multiple app stores each with exclusive apps being sold at a premium and having to manage payments separately.
Apple's rules do have a lot of real benefits for users and so you have to weigh that up against the interests of developers.
The argument is that the store owner brought the customer to the seller, so they should get a cut - and it shouldn't be possible for the seller to avoid that cut by selling direct.
Ads have money flowing from the Advertiser -> Developer. Apple isn't involved in that relationship, and didn't bring the customer (the Advertiser) to the seller.
One problem is that Apple does not allow developers to bring customers directly. You always have to go through the Apple Store to install an app on iOS. So, even if you bring your own customers, you have to bring them through the iOS Store.
Responding to many of the arguments I read around on Twitter: I don’t see how anyone can use the word “fair” to describe this arrangement, no matter how many ways people compare it to a console like Nintendo.
> Instagram/FB lets users purchase ads in its iOS app
So Apple does bring advertisers to the seller.
Consider stock trading apps/fees, for one random example at the top of my head.
However, with some types of apps the lines are more vague. Say, we have an email client, which works over IMAP, and can work with any email account. And suppose we provide free accounts and 1 GB of space for free, and 10 GB for $1. Naturally, when user gets to 80% of his quota, we'll send him an email, which will be displayed within an app and will link to our website suggesting do a non-Apple payment.
Common sense says that this should be allowed, but I'd bet that apple moderators won't allow it.
That would be significant overreach, ripe for legal action, imo.
I also tried to find out more about it, during the last year since I am making a mobile app which would also sell users the ability to buy ads just like Facebook does, and I spent DAYS trying to find any sort of information regarding it.
There was none, no one speaks about it, like it is buried deep down, if you were to apply Apple's arbitary rules then you would expect that Facebook also pays the 30% mafia tax, but somehow I doubt it, since that amount would just be enormous.
I'm honestly excited and curious to follow this thread and see what the results are going to be.
To take the thought a bit further though, FB also has an ads manager app [1] which ad buyers can purchase ads through (pretty much no one uses this app to be fair). No payment ever goes through Apple so I can't imagine they get a cut from sales there either.
If Facebook stopped all their applications (Facebook, Instagram, Whatsapp) from working on iOS, who would lose more? Will most people start using other social media platforms more, or will they buy Android devices?
Of course not. But Apple can't afford kicking out Facebook or Google. Not even Uber[2].
All of these background deals and exeptions are not unprecedented, really. If I went to Target and wanted them to distribute my craft beer, I'd get worse terms than Heineken has.
[1] - https://www.macrumors.com/2019/01/29/facebook-sideloading-vp...
[2] - https://www.theverge.com/2017/4/23/15399438/apple-uber-app-s...
I can't imagine any ad supported business ignoring iOS users. The demographic is too lucrative.
One freemium iOS app I worked on did nearly 5X the revenue compared to its Android counterpart (others were at varied-but-similar multiples). I imagine the ad-supported business would reflect the same - the iOS audience is just too lucrative for advertisers to ignore.
edit to adjust multiple. I went back and looked it up.
They would probably use 2 phones one iOS and one Android for FB apps cause utility of FB apps is just too big.
Heck, if Google and FB banded up right now to reject iOS out of the blue, iOS would fall into an unclimbable chasm. Of course, that won't happen though.
I get billed at the end of the month based on clicks or views, and Apple has nothing to do with that. The ads might not even show on iOS.
Facebook clearly saw an opportunity to improve marketers' experiences in the app by allowing them to make ad buys from within the app. A marketer could certainly log on to their desktop and create an ad buy there, but their experience on the Facebook app is improved by being able to buy ads while on the couch or travelling. Facebook is improving their in-app experience by offering something for sale in the app.
How does that not warrant a 30% cut to Apple?
In India Facebook even sold Facebook-only internet access through a large mobile provider until the Indian government stopped them for data neutrality reasons and rightfully so. [1]
Look at the Facebook Zero project that is targeting many third-world countries, the disguised as charity to help those countries gain wide-spread internet access. [2]
1: https://www.theguardian.com/technology/2017/jul/27/facebook-...
Not that I have anything wrong with that, but for a long time open source evangelist and currently working for microsoft, it seems notable.
Ads are distinctly different from direct commerce. Good luck computing 30% of the value of an ad or a product placement.
Have their own advertising platform which they take a 30% cut and ban any app that uses a competing platform the same way they do with IAP.
If not- please bury before this turns into a 900 comment waste of time thread