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Comment by neogodless | Hacker News Reader

This is a very valid criticism of my post and many that group "opinions" as if they come from a single source.

Here, the top-voted comment is OK with Apple software phoning home, but there's no evidence they are not equally OK with Microsoft software phoning home, so I'm contrasting this popular opinion with another popular opinion elsewhere.

Here's one example from a different user, where Microsoft is described as "the big daddy of spyware."

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=22246187

See also this sibling top-level comment from today:

https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=44256951

View on HN

Microsoft put ads in their OS menus. Kindof a stretch to "both sides" this one.

Apple does too! Drives me crazy, although it’s not nearly as bad as Windows.

I have never seen this. What ads are you referring to in MacOS?

They keep trying to get me to buy iCloud space in the settings menu

Uh…where?

You don't see them if you're already paying for all Apple services.

But otherwise, you get constantly nagged to get iCloud and also sometimes for their media and gaming subscriptions

Finally, what people for some reason ignore: Apple has been an advertisement company ever since their app store became the majority share of their revenue.

Ah okay yeah I have Apple One so I wouldn’t see them

Also, no, Apple makes nowhere close to a majority of its revenue from its App Store (source: https://www.visualcapitalist.com/charted-how-apple-makes-its...)

51% are iPhone sales 9% are wearables and home device sales 8% are Mac sales 7% are iPad sales

A portion of the 25% that make up services and subscriptions is advertising, in addition to Apple Music, iCloud, Google’s search default payment (20B/yr), etc.

Apple makes less than 5% of its revenue from advertising

Oof, I meant to write "a majority share", not the.

I still believe that to be true, as you're splitting the advertisement revenue - in my opinion, all app store revenue is related to their advertisement business.

From my perspective, only counting the money that went into the advert itself is misleading, as the store itself is what the adverts are shown on.

If it was a more general advertisement network I'd agree with your splitting though.

No, that is how Apple split them. There is no ad revenue in any segment outside of services. “Belief” is not necessary, this is accounting

I’m a shareholder, I read the reports. Apple make 70%+ of their revenue from direct device sales (no one else comes close to them)

I can see where you're coming from, but I still feel like you might be putting too much trust into how apple splits their revenue in documents as they're provided to the public.

I'm not saying that the numbers are false, but apple can ultimately freely choose how to categorize their revenue itself.

From my point of view, their advertising revenue inherently cannot be split from their app store revenue.

It's akin to me saying "I've only spent $50 on groceries yesterday", but omit that the actual cost was $100 because of added fees and taxes.

It's still technically correct, and a bookkeeper will categorize it as such, but it also incredibly misleading.

I hold that opinion because in the apple ecosystem, the customer journey doesn't end with the advertisement. Every successful capture inevitably ends with more revenue via their 30% cut.

And btw, I'm technically a shareholder too - though only in the low thousands (value, not #), so prolly a lot less then you ( • ‿ • )

App Store and ad revenue are part of the same category

But in aggregate, it's 25%, right?

I'd consider that a majority share, or would you say the term should only apply if it's over 50%? I considered it to be a majority share because it's a significant chunk of the total revenue and not just a minor footnote, but looking back, "a significant amount" would've probably been better

“majority share” means > 50%

“plurality” means it’s the biggest number

Neither apply in this case

No it isn't. The context is telemetry and spying, not built in advertising.

And none of the items in the original thread post were about telemetry. They were about functional requirements.

That's a stretch, but giving the benefit of the doubt, you alone say potahto, most here are saying potato.

I guess you didn't read the article then, there are entries for telemetry. He even helpfully listed the official use case next to the domain name that was accessed.

Thread post. Not article post. Try to keep up.

You made the claim that apple didn't make any telemetry requests in response to someone pointing out the double standard for Apple.

Yes the person further up in this thread lists features other then telemetry, but that's literally the double standard. It's also did telemetry, just like windows does. Did you unironically think windows phones home only for telemetry, and not for various features too?

Because the article you're commenting on lists telemetry requests.

Your comment makes straight up no sense.

Okay buddy. Enjoy your day.

Plus, the ads for Apple are like “buy our cloud storage solution” and the ads for MS are like “10 foods to make you SEXY this summer!” I’m not a fan of either, but one is significantly worse than the other

That's a hyperbolic cherry picked comparison from different areas. If you compare the settings and start menu equivalent they are the same.

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