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Short thread on the app-ripple effect of the Apple privacy/identity announcement. Apple is in midst of transitioning into a service company, where the premium users' pay on hardware is akin to a fee. That tradeoff will tickle down to 3rd party apps who need to contend w/biz model
up till now users' looking to use/access apps were asked to sign up using an identity layer (FB/Google) or share their email. the biz model was a trade-off, users' data was not only shared with the app, but that identity provider (FB/Google) in the following ways: 2/
1. Sell in-app ads using the combined cross-referenced data from FB/Google, mostly on the FB/Google ad exchanges. Where the tech giants serve as the market infrastructure, the sellers (of attention real estate) & the buyer (for their own content)
2. Tech giants aggregated all the data their identity layer + platform enable them to access in order to improve their own algos. Obviously, without any accountability as to the algo themselves, fake traffic, or transparency as to the non-discrimatory nature of these algos
The choice users' face currently is a binary. Either accept the terms of the market w/out any disclosure or be denied access to these services. The subscription model has taken off as a fremium tiering, and even then there is no guarantee or disclosure of users' data provenance
That has led to a disconnect. Even within Apple's closed garden, with secure hardware, users' data was leaking continuously by mere virtue of these third-party apps making their service contingent on this data wsj.com/articles/iphon…
The value of this data isn't a monolith. Dynamic pricing of users' data, and aggregated data is contingent on users' profiles. Apps needed access to the identity layer in order to determine apt pricing & track the success metrics of ads
Apple offering a private global identity service, means apps will no longer be able to access users' data, determine customized ad prices, or barter that data w/Fb or Google. Essentially, cutting off ads as a sustainable biz model for iOS apps, or forcing ad-pool prices
A private Single Sign-On (SSO) is a real threat to the Ad Duopoly FB/Google, but more immediately, to third party apps we're used to accessing for free. These companies have relied on user data. Apple will now let devs access only if users' approve that. Simpler than Privacy TOS
