iOS 9 To Have Ad Blocking Capabilities

An anonymous reader writes: iOS 9 will reportedly carry ad blocking capabilities for it's Safari browser when it is released later this year. The feature wasn't rolled out with the usual fanfare one might expect, and flew under the radar. ZDNet reports: "It's not immediately clear why the new ad-blocking privacy feature was included in iOS 9, due out later this year. After all, the iPhone and iPad maker has its own advertising network -- even if its success was limited (which is putting it nicely). What's clear is that allowing ad-blockers in iOS 9 could deliver a serious blow to Google, the biggest rival to Apple in the mobile space, because advertising remains a massive portion of the search giant's income."

Comments

simpler? exclusive ad channel?

[MessyBlob]

This makes sense in the Apple ecosystem. It speeds up web browsing and streamlines the experience, and if ads are blocked at browser or OS level, it gives Apple a chance to create their own approved ad market. I think it's a step too far to assume that they can insert unintended content arbitrarily into a web page or existing ad slot.

Re:simpler? exclusive ad channel?

[msauve]

Why sell ads, when you can sell the ability to let ads be seen?

Re:simpler? exclusive ad channel?

[Black.Shuck]

Apple makes, relatively speaking, no money at all from advertising.

Indeed, if you take its entire software ecosystem as a whole, it makes up for a mere fraction of Apple's total profit when compared to its hardware sales.

So when we're all being very clever cynics and conspiracy theorists, perhaps we would do well to look at the motivation of a company in a holistic sense. For Apple, perhaps if they let users control ads, their overall experience of the platform improves, and they're more likely to remain loyal and keep buying hardware.

Re: simpler? exclusive ad channel?

[alvinrod]

If you can't beat them, destroy their revenue stream. It's the same reason Google released free online office software to combat Microsoft and why Android is free. It's just good business sense.

Re:simpler? exclusive ad channel?

[gnasher719]

Why sell ads, when you can make bazillions from selling phones, and you might sell even more if web sites come ad free?

As for hurting Google, that's a strategy that Google loves to employ themselves, so that's likely a very welcome side effect.

Re:simpler? exclusive ad channel?

[jbolden]

Apple does $231.5b in revenue. Paid apps revenue is $5.37b. So a couple percent. Advertising BTW is much smaller at $94.5m

Re:simpler? exclusive ad channel?

[vivaoporto]

That's not what's in play here. Here is the same story with more sources, more technical information and without the Google vs. Apple flamebait angle:

Adblocking is coming to the iPhone with iOS 9

The next version of Safari will let users block ads on iPhones and iPads.

With the roll-out of iOS 9, Apple is giving app developers an easy way to create mobile ad blockers for Safari on iPhones and iPads. The new "Content Blocking" feature allows developers to pass a JSON file with a set of rules for images, popups, cookies, resources and other elements in Safari.

Sources like The Next Web point out that such a feature would allow ad blocking and privacy apps "to exist on iOS for the first time since launch".

On the other hand the Marketing Land warns that this move "could chip away at Google's and other ad networks' mobile ad revenue from iOS devices", NiemanLab calls it "a blow for mobile advertising" and Cult of Mac asks if that is a good thing and proposes as an answer:

Is that a good thing? Well, maybe for the average user, for a period of time. But when you block ads on the web, you prevent content providers from earning any revenue from them. If we all did that, our favorite sites would have to find other sources of revenue, or stop supplying content altogether.

I have no idea why, in a technical and privacy oriented forum as ours, the focus of the accepted submission was not on the fact that this is an "Adblocker app enabler" move instead of a "Google killer move".

Including App Store ads?

[garyok]

The ad-blocking better include those bloody irritating ads that switch you out of the browser with no warning to the App Store for Clash of Clans, or some other flavour of freemium shiteware the kids are degrading themselves with these days.

iOS is the majority of Google's mobile revenue

[WankerWeasel]

iOS drives 75% of Google's mobile revenue meaning this could really hurt them depending on how much is blocked. http://www.nytimes.com/2015/05...

Browser Extension Required

[jomuyo]

After reading the linked ZDNet article, looks like Apple is only allowing extensions in Safari to block content with in the browser. Thus allowing things like Ghostery and NoScript to be possible or more affective in iOS 9. Bottom line, if you want ad-blocking in iOS 9 you will have to wait for the proper ad-blocking extension to be available, or write one yourself.

Not clear?

[nine-times]

It's not immediately clear why the new ad-blocking privacy feature was included in iOS 9

Well there's a pretty obvious reason why, and I don't see any reason to discount it. It's a feature that users will like, and Apple is in the business of trying to make devices that people like. Even more specifically, Apple's general approach to making "devices that people like" tends to be to try to take the hassle out of using the product, as much as is possible. Ads are a big hassle.

It seems like a pretty obvious answer, so much so that I don't see a reason to go hunting for another one without some kind of additional information that there's some other reason.

More Paywalls

[Merk42]

If it gets really popular, how long until sites remove ads altogether and instead switch to paywalls?