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Comment by ErikAugust | Hacker News Reader

Let me get this straight:

Apple comes out with an Ad Blocker for Safari. Then it comes out with Apple News, which places ads next to RSS content, and doesn't compensate the author?

Come on, man. That is infinitely upsetting.

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If you enable adverts next to your content, you get a cut of the profits (presumably 70%). By default, there are no adverts.

(Updated the comment to remove uncertainty now that I have a citation: https://developer.apple.com/news-publisher/)

Struggling to see where that is mentioned anywhere in the article.

It isn't, but I seem to recall it being mentioned either in the keynote or in the reporting after WWDC.

Update: https://developer.apple.com/news-publisher/

> Monetization is made simple with iAd, Apple’s advertising platform. Earn 100% of the revenue from ads you sell, and 70% when iAd sells ads for you. iAd provides campaign management, targeting and reporting capabilities that help drive your business.

So that's very fair, they don't take a cut if you sell the adverts yourself - otherwise they take a (industry standard?) 30% cut.

Thank you.

How does that square with "You agree to let us use, display, store, and reproduce the content in your RSS feeds including placing advertising next to or near your content without compensation to you."?

Honestly no idea. I'd imagine that's just in case they change their mind? The email itself was very poorly thought through (and is honestly quite arrogant).

It seems common for big companies to put things in their legal agreements that are stupid and unfair and are never intended to actually be used. I don't know why.

Because there's usually no downside? The same reason people put those goofy "this message is for the intended recipient only..." notes in their sig file. It almost certainly has no legal force ever but it doesn't hurt.

It squares perfectly. That line says Apple won't pay you for _impressions_. It doesn't say they won't pay you for clicks.

That is an extremely tortured reading of the e-mail. And it's not true. See:

https://developer.apple.com/library/prerelease/ios/documenta...

Apple pays you 70% or 100% of ad revenue if you use their Apple News Format. Apple pays you nothing if you use RSS.

Click on the FAQ on the left

How much revenue can I earn when monetizing with iAd? Keep 100% of the revenue from the ads you sell in your articles or channel, or 70% if iAd sells the ads for you. You can also earn revenue from ads sold by iAd that appear in Apple-curated topic feeds, such as Fashion or Technology.

> Apple comes out with an Ad Blocker for Safari.

No, they didn't. They came out with an extension API for Safari that allows extensions which block ads, amongst other things.

Do you expect feed reader companies to compensate the authors of the feeds they aggregate too?

Jeez, I mean, you don't have to love Apple, but it probably wouldn't kill you to be honest about what they are actually doing.

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