People aren't understanding the purpose of this "ban."
They aren't banning location-based ads, they are banning the use of the Core Location framework when it is being used only for advertising.
They are protecting a good user experience. For privacy reasons, applications that use Core Location need to ask for permission to do so. They don't want a bunch of ad-based apps asking the user for permission when they don't really need to know any location info. It's that simple.
If you know the user's location anyway, you can show location-based ads.
I'm not saying that Apple isn't going to try to take over the ad market for their devices, but all the recent speculation based on the news of the ban is just short-sighted.
They aren't banning location-based ads, they are banning the use of the Core Location framework when it is being used only for advertising.
They are protecting a good user experience. For privacy reasons, applications that use Core Location need to ask for permission to do so. They don't want a bunch of ad-based apps asking the user for permission when they don't really need to know any location info. It's that simple.
If you know the user's location anyway, you can show location-based ads.
I'm not saying that Apple isn't going to try to take over the ad market for their devices, but all the recent speculation based on the news of the ban is just short-sighted.