It's a shame there is seemingly nothing you can do as the app owner to stop this. Maybe buying your own ad for your own keyword, but we don't have money to spend on that.
@Gargron yeah. Apple selling ads that appear first when people search for the name of your app is unethical, and also just makes the experience of iPhones worse
@Gargron From my point of view (I’m not a lawyer, just a regular user), I consider it a form of misleading advertising. It's one thing to search for "social" and see other sponsored social networks appear first, but if I specifically search for the word "Mastodon" and they show something that isn’t Mastodon, it’s an attempt to bypass the user’s choices. It would be different if they said, "You might also like..."
you could view this incident as a PR opportunity, and write about it in the blogosphere, in terms of ethics, capitalism, post-twitterism, enshittification, and all what attracts Target Mastodon users. This would work as a positive story about Mastodon because the user bases are practically diametrically opposed.
Eugen Rochko
in reply to Micah Lee • • •Micah Lee
in reply to Eugen Rochko • • •Katrina Katrinka :donor:
in reply to Eugen Rochko • • •Is Mastodon a nonprofit 501(c)3? If yes, Google Ads will give you $250 in ads every month.
Stefano Marinelli
in reply to Eugen Rochko • • •Bob Massarczyk
in reply to Eugen Rochko • • •@Gargron > Maybe buying your own ad for your own keyword
That is usually the practice that most of my clients use. It's terrible to spend money on your own organic search, but that's how it works. 🤷♂️
Nick Yorke
in reply to Eugen Rochko • • •@Gargron
>> Maybe buying your own ad for your own keyword, but we don't have money to spend on that.
Based on Truth Social's financials and stock prices they might not have the money for that soon either. 🙂
Sérgio Machado
in reply to Eugen Rochko • • •At least in my country mastodon is listed ok 😀
Cluster Fcku
in reply to Eugen Rochko • • •