Steve Jobs Thinks "Mobile Ads Suck", Intends iTunes-style Fix?
BusinessWeek is reporting that, according to the cliched "source familiar with the situation", Apple CEO, Steve Jobs thinks "mobile ads suck" in their current form (oh, hai, Google!) and intends to do for them what he did for music with iTunes and mobile with the iPhone -- revolutionize it.
The sources did not reveal specific plans at Apple but say there are several possible ad approaches. Apple could employ its user data and geo-location technology to make ads more relevant, so that a user cruising the mobile Web at lunchtime could receive an ad for specials at a nearby restaurant. It could also use the iPhone's capabilities in creative ways—say, having someone shake the device to win a rebate the same way they do to roll dice in games.
If the present belongs to Google and desktop-based web search advertising, but the future is mobile and it looks like that battle ground is going to be contested, and by Apple of all companies.
Do they have a shot?
[Thanks to the Reptile for the tip!]
Editor-in-Chief of iMore, Executive Producer at Mobile Nations, co-host of Iterate and ZEN and TECH, cook, grappler, photon wrangler.
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Ow so Apple has a CES... Lol
on topic: I always see the same ads, so they're following me pretty good alllright, but none are of interest
They can have my location to send me ads if they pay me. Otherwise beat it.
How about no ads on my phone. I jailbreak mostly so I can use an adblocking hosts file. I don't want ads. I paid for the phone and I'm paying for the bandwidth. Leave me alone.
I'm more concerned with Apple revolutionizing ads with patent 20090265214, which they applied for applied for by Apple listing Steve Jobs as the first inventor. A relevant early paragraph:
"The operating system is configured to present one or more of the advertisements to users of the computer device. In some implementations, the operating system can disable one or more functions during the presentation of the advertisements and then enable the function(s) in response to the advertisements ending. That is, the operating system can disable some aspect of its operation to prompt the operator to pay attention to the advertisement."
In other words...pop up/flash banners enforced at the core OS level. Reading through the patent reveals enough tidbits like this to put a serious damper on any interest in the tablet (or next revision of the iphone), if Apple pursues this.
Article (link has dashes, so tinyurl'd): http://tinyurl.com/yk47vts
Complete patent application: http://ipwatchdog.com/patents/US20090265214.pdf
Google had a opportunity to really shake up the cell phone industry with the Nexus One, but they didn't, they should had released the Nexus One Unlocked and works with all carriers(ATT 3g, T-mobile 3g, etc) and for the low price of $299 or something.
What Google should do is relaunch the Nexus One at $299 and refund the differences to people who already bought one.
I agree, mobile ads suck. They don't interest me at all, and annoy me.
Mobile adds are a pain. Do they really help sell the product? Love to see some research.
@The Joe This article isn't even about the Nexus One...
I personally have an issue with the statement that iTunes revolutionized music. MP3s revolutionized music, iTunes simply bastardized the distribution of MP3s in a mass market. I will agree that the iPod was the original MP3 player, but with so many other options for playing MP3s, why not make iTunes a little more flexible. Apple is slowly loosing grip on their MP3 reign and it may be time for them to broaden their horizons and offer some options for non-apple products. It sure wouldn't make less people use iTunes. I personally don't because I have several different devices that play MP3s so using iTunes would be a pain. Luckily they cleared out the DRM stuff too because that was a disaster and disgrace at the same time.
A. The iPod was not the first mp3 player, it simply revolutionized the market B. We can all agree mobile adds are evil, and allowing adds accesss to core OS functions is an aweful idea. C. Why should iTunes allow others access to their music management software? It's vertical integration that has made apple so succesful, why let others reap the benefits of said success?