Beginning this summer in the U.S. and Canada, businesses will have a new way to be discovered by using Apple Business to create ads on Maps. Ads on Maps will appear when users search in Maps, and can appear at the top of a user’s search results based on relevance, as well as at the top of a new Suggested Places experience in Maps, which will display recommendations based on what’s trending nearby, the user’s recent searches, and more. Ads will be clearly marked to ensure transparency for Maps users.
Dear Tim Apple, in the interest of your paying customers and their user experience, I expect you to give us a toggle to turn this off. And while you’re at it, make sure to also give us a toggle to turn off ads in the App Store.
If we get these toggles, we’ll know Apple takes user experience as serious as ever. And if not, I guess we can conclude that apparently $435B annual revenue (of which $116B was profit) is just not enough and thus milking your loyal customers is an entirely sensible approach. Perhaps Spotlight could start showing ads too. Or better yet, macOS Finder could start displaying ads as the desktop background. Beats passing a hat around.
As painful as it is for us end users, the undeniable truth is that right now, the only more secure source of revenue than advertising is subscriptions. Both are increasing exponentially throughout the tech world, and even beyond. I can’t judge Apple too harshly for trying to get more of that—they’re a profit-making business before anything else.
What will be telling is the quality of the ads being served. If they’re relevant, such as showing ads for only the kind of business being searched for, and selective, prioritizing good businesses over bad, that’s not too bad. If it’s the same free-for-all Google Ads have become, well, that’s another story.
There already exists in Maps a search field for exactly that purpose.
If I enter “Indian Restaurant” and then get a bunch of relevant suggestions (as presently) that is discovery.
If I enter “Indian Restaurant” and then get a link to McDonalds because they happen to be paying off Apple that’s enshittification.
And before anybody tells me the 2nd won’t happen, I present exhibit A: the App Store. Where exactly that happens. All. The. Time.
LOL. You should go check out some of the slop that gets suggested when you do a search on the App Store.
I’d argue, if anything, ads and paid placements have made discoverability worse on the App Store. Not better. But they have padded Apple’s bottom line, that’s for sure.
Sort of, but it’s only showing you what you searched for, and what’s nearby. If I search for Indian Food and get an ad for a place that’s on the other side of town – perhaps with a special offer – I’m interested. Especially if I’m not familiar with the area.
Finally, considering that none of us have seen this feature, it’s a waste of energy to criticize. We don’t even know if the rumors are true.
That’s why I said “if”. As others have pointed out, we have zero details about how this will be implemented. We don’t even know enough to say whether it will reuse advertising algorithms from other Apple products.
Currently if I set Maps on a town and search for “hotels near the area on the map” a list of (most) hotels appears. If I click on a hotel in the list it then offers Tripadvisor/Booking.com and following that link is a prompt to book that hotel. I have always assumed Apple gets a (small) payment for that referral.
Other map apps such as Google blatantly show advertised businesses on the map. They have from the start and I suppose I have got used to ignoring them. Even our local government-operated websites such traffic info and disaster info (!) have these irrelevant ads.
If Apple introduces splash windows or other types of intrusive advertising I will be very annoyed. April 1st is next week - maybe the media release was too soon?
As someone who sold advertising for her entire career, and developing selling subscriptions data is super duper important to the very, very, very, very, vast majority of advertisers. As painful as it is for many end users, the undeniable truth is that now the only more secure source of revenue than advertising. Both are increasing $$$$$$$$$$$$$ throughout the tech world, and even beyond. And I also can not judge Apple too harshly for wanting more of that. they’re a profit-making business before anything else.
I’d call it befitting. Like Apple’s insatiable greed that lets them turns their valued customers into a cheap product to be sold out to the highest bidder. I agree with you that this is vulgar, but rather than shooting the messenger, you should blame the perpetrator of the vulgarity.
I’ll write more about the ads in Maps in TidBITS soon, but since this thread has devolved into back and forth about word choice, I’m going to shut it down.
You should go check out some of the slop that gets suggested when you do a search on the App Store.
