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Comment by moreira | Hacker News Reader

You might be surprised to know that Apple has been doing ads for over a decade. [0] They‘ve had ads for a long time, and still do - App Store search ads[1] and Apple News ads, to my knowledge.

[0]: https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/IAd [1]: https://searchads.apple.com/

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Let's not forget that App Store search ads replaced iAds, which was an in-app ad network. I assume that it was shut down because of too much competition in the space, but perhaps we'll see it come full circle as Apple diminishes the "effectiveness" of third-parties.

I don't get where people get that 'Apple didn't do ads'. I'm not even an iOS user and I know that much. Must be drinking unreal levels of kool-aid.

Apple was and is so bad at advertising that people think they didn't do it until recently.

Part of it just comes with the territory. Apple is a computer company that prides itself on not only having a sense of taste, but being able to impose that sense of taste on its business partners. This is contrary to the goals of advertisers - tastelessness kind of comes with the territory and advertising inherently messes with the user experience.

And there was the Steve Jobs era ad network that has big, interactive type flash ads that Apple had to approve as being "good". I don't remember much except working on a video component of a Geico ad that was mobile only in ~2009.

Also: both the App Store and Apple News cannot be uninstalled on MacOS.

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