With Apple's booming sales from devices, software, and digital content, Steve Jobs hasn't had to think much about advertising revenue. The consumer comes first (his mantra), and advertising must fit their experiences.
On Tuesday night at the Wall Street Journal's All Things Digital conference, he minimized the absence of Flash on the iPad, quipping that the only (Flash-less) holes in the iPad experience was for Flash-enabled ads.
He went onto explain how the world of digital content consumption, particularly on mobile, is becoming increasingly "App-based" — telling the audience that 20,000 new Apps are authorized each week.
He explained that ads within the Apps are being strictly controlled by Apple.
Not only is the format being controlled by Apple, but the company does not allow data from the Apps to be used to by third parties.
Publishers and advertisers are mostly in the learning phase when it comes to the Apple Apps. The trade association for digital publishers, the IAB, has not yet released any standards.
Getting Ready for the "iAd"
Now, Apple is actually getting into the mobile ad selling business with an initiative called iAd. It is expected to launch this summer, but there have been few details. John Battelle, CEO of Federated Media, gathered some intelligence and speculated some in a post last week.
Engineering iPad Apps for $100K, Says UM's Marc Ruxin
All this is raising considerable concern on Madison Avenue. On Wednesday at the All Things D conference, I spoke with Marc Ruxin, Chief Innovation Officer of Universal McCann, one of the world's leading ad agencies, now known as UM.
In this video, he says that there will be a steep and costly learning curve around the new world of Apps. He says that the creation of simple ad programs will be as much as $100,000 to create.
As advertisers watch the rise of AppWorld at Apple, they are also tracking the fast growth of Google Apps for the Android and developments with AdMob, a mobile ad platform which was recently bought by Google.
Mobile Apps Nearly Eclipse Web Browsing, comScore
comScore just announced that nearly 30 percent of U.S. mobile users used downloaded Apps in April, just one point behind Web browsing. Believe it: it's an AppWorld and we're all in it.
Here is Dan Gillmor's story about the "walled garden" of Apple — it's Dan's first piece for Salon.
Andy Plesser, Executive Producer
