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It's Unclear What Apple's Mobile Foray Means To The Industry

At the D8 conference last week, Steve Jobs said he wasn't interested in banning third-party ad networks from Apple's iAd mobile ad platform. Yet, according to a new version of Apple's developer agreement, Jobs wasn't referring to any company that poses a creditable threat to Apple's core business model.

Concerning the use of data collection, the newly revised developer agreement reads: "The collection, use or disclosure is for the purpose of serving advertising to Your Application ... is provided to an independent advertising service provider whose primary business is serving mobile ads (for example, an advertising service provider owned by or affiliated with a developer or distributor of mobile devices, mobile operating systems or development environments other than Apple would not qualify as independent)."

"The language ... appears to disqualify potential rivals -- if, for instance, Microsoft tried entering the mobile display market," writes MediaMemo. What's more, "It appears as if Apple may still be limiting its biggest potential rival -- Google's AdMob."

It's unlikely that not inviting AdMob to the iAd party was an Apple oversight. "iAd could provide a formidable challenge for Google and its AdMob mobile display ad and AdSense for mobile products, which aim to run on any smartphone platform but will be omnipresent on smartphones running Google Android," eWeek suggests.

From Apple's Worldwide Developers' Conference, this week, Jobs said advertisers have already committed to $60 million worth of ads for the iAd platform, eWeek reports.

EMarketer senior analyst Noah Elkin tells The Wall Street Journal that $60 million is a lot of money for an unproven platform. Still, "By getting behind mobile advertising in this way, Apple could create a rising-tide situation that will give the business a lot of momentum," Elkin tells The Journal.

Read the whole story at MediaMemo et al. »

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