Apple’s Brings a Bazooka to Facebook’s Gun Fight | by M.G. Siegler | Dec, 2020 |...

This is just such a killer response from Tim Cook and Apple to Facebook’s attack on the upcoming IDFA changes. Facebook undoubtedly thought they had the winning hand in playing the small business card, especially in the time of COVID. But Apple trotted out the trump card (pun obviously not intended) in the form of consumers. Not every consumer is a small business owner, but every small business owner is a consumer.

Look, Facebook has a point in that these changes will likely make it harder for small businesses to effectively use Facebook’s ad-targeting system. But what Cook is pointing out is that Apple isn’t cutting this off, they’re just making it more clear to end users what is going on to serve up those ads. This morphs Facebook’s argument from a positive one to a negative one. Facebook is arguing that Apple needs to keep doing things the old, opaque way. Sure, that would mean less choice for consumers, but that lack of choice would be better for small business — is a tough argument to make.

Cook shifted the battleground not with a competing ad, or an op-ed, but with a single tweet. Facebook thought they were bringing a gun to Apple’s knife fight. But Apple was actually bringing a bazooka.