You make money by not assuming people won't pay for apps. I'll happily pay for an app that serves a purpose for me and makes my life easier. If your app is good enough, people will pay for it. I'm more likely to uninstall an app with ads. Believe it or not, I don't want to sit through ads for the latest castle crasher or casino game that I'll never install.
Most average users I know HATE ads. They understand that every app has them but they’re in the same boat as the user you responded to: much more likely to uninstall an ad based app
That's the beauty we lost with targeted ads: less ads for the user, and more revenue for the app. There were obviously issues with that model, but it was a better experience for most people.
Wait wait wait... you think that having more-targeted ads (which will have a higher CTR and thus are more valuable to the advertiser, and thus lead to a higher CPM for the publisher) will lead to less ads? What planet are you on?
I was already starting to think you're full of it from your responses to other posters, but now I'm sure of it.
On iOS at least, ad prevalence has increased over time because targeted ads have been effectively abolished: more ads, with less relevance, are required to gain the same amount of revenue.
it seems more like ad prevalence has increased over time so that advertisers and ad-based services can make more money
after all, it increased before any attempts to rein in targeted advertising (which still exists, it's just harder to hyper-target in some circumstances)
