A new patent application filed by Apple on Thursday lays out a method to target customers with product ads based on their current income and credit card limits. The opt-in system would monitor the status of your income and credit usage and balances, and then select product ads that it believes are in your price range.
From the patent application, via Mashable:
Goods and services are marketed to particular target groups of users sharing a common profile which may be selected to increase the likelihood of the users responding to the advertisements and purchasing the advertised goods and services. The common profile of users may be based on the amount of pre-paid credit available to each user.
“An advantage of such targeted advertising is that only advertisements for goods and services which particular users can afford, are delivered to these users,” the application says.
It all comes down to if you can’t afford to buy a new MacBook, you won’t see an ad for it. Unfortunately, that means this writer would receive only ads for earbuds, Lightning cables, and silicone iPhone cases.
As usual, it should be pointed out that Apple files for a number of patents, and just because they file for one doesn’t mean they’ll ever put it to use.
Apple has made it very clear over time that they don’t believe in “people as products.” ApplePay is a prime example of this, and Tim Cook has even been explicit publicly about it.
To me this seems like a good patent to own so other companies can launch a service that would compete with iAd. Especially if apple were to take iAds to more than just iOS.
Excellent point!