@gruber just a hunch, but I think this is the power of default configuration. That giant News widget has been standard for years now when you swipe right on the Home Screen. I was guilty of this until I set up my 15 Pro Max and finally removed it.
It’s an absolutely miserable reading experience. I understand they probably have to subsidize with advertising, but figure out a better way than serving up the same trash ads you get on E! news or other gossip drivel.
@gruber Apple news in the UK does not appear to get these ads. It's usually ads for Apple things or financial advice aimed at retirees. I’m not close to being retired so they're not well targeted. In general all web ads are garbage. I think it's the natural effect of cheaper advertising rates and quality brands have their own website as an advertisement. I'm sure Apple would like News to look like an old magazine wrt to ads but that sort of advertising just is gone.
@gruber Haven’t seen any meaningful ads pretty much anywhere in ages (except in very specific cases, like “one man shops” or in online stores and similar).
The ad networks seems full of the worst, and it frightens me that they somehow see ROI on this:(
@gruber I won't defend the quality of these (I believe most of them come from Yahoo) but they're only this bad when you turn off Settings > Privacy & Security > Apple Advertising > Personalized Ads. They're the fallback, generic ads you get when ad companies don't track you.
@gruber I have not heard an explanation as to any way in which Apple News (at least the Mac version—I don't use phones for reading) is not far inferior to literally any web browser. The Mac News app doesn't even have pinch to zoom. Swiping back and forth with two fingers, unlike in Safari, is completely incoherent. It will go back (sometimes without the animation), but swiping the other direction brings up random stories rather than bringing you back to the page you were on. It's a clunky monstrosity, like most of the built in apps now (Music being the other big offender, I'd say). The last time I pointed this out, someone said, well it has News Plus which you can't get on the web. That's not an advantage. Having premium content only available in app makes it even worse that the app is so bad. Everything about Apple News is like a web browser that has been crippled—taking away even the built-in OS niceties that should work without having to write them into the app. It's like a browser was cloned with genetic errors during the cloning process.
@gruber I haven’t been happy with any news app. It would be nice to see curation and related stories, but at this point I would settle for RSS feeds making a comeback and I would just use NetNewsWire.
@gruber are you sure these are ad spots sold by Apple? Publishers are allowed to run their own monetisation. As an ad guy, I’m not defending this ads, nor Apple’s responsibility to maintain a high quality environment, but figured it was worth checking on what the actual issue is (apple’s ad product, or the quality control on partner publishers and their ads).
@adamrussell It doesn’t matter who sells them. Apple News is Apple’s app, and News+ is their premium subscription service, so when you see them, it’s a blight on Apple as much as the publisher.
@gruber It used to be that most of the ads in a reputable publications were themselves vaguely reputable, but these days so many ads are trash, and are all run through brokers, and reputable websites and apps have scammy, clickbait ads. It's a shame. :/
@gruber I suspect advertisers are not getting any info from Apple News. So the major players don’t want to put their tracking filled ads there. Second tier ads then bubble up and take up that space.
@gruber The idea that Apple News “+” does nothing to hide these and compensate publishers the micro-pennies instead is confounding. Even with personalization on, I have never wanted to click on them, so they are visual noise, something Apple usually wants to avoid in customer experience. Either curate the ad quality (a la The Deck, RIP) or hide the trash and pay the tax via News + subscription money.
@gruber probably others can do it, but 1Blocker seems effective for me for most. For example, the full screen ads that appear between stories when swiping between them are just blank.
@gruber Things humans are still good at: “Your honor, it is clear that this company has, in order to continue to emphasize growth potential, rather than consumer benefit, made a product demonstrably worse. Should the jury agree, said intentional destruction of product shall be deemed illegal and reversed.”
@gruber When I first subscribed to Apple News+ I assumed those awful ads would go away after paying, but they don’t. So now I don’t subscribe …and have stopped using the app entirely.
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