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A new report in The Wall Street Journal said Apple and Facebook have supposedly teamed up from 2016 to 2018. One of the sources said Apple actually designed the idea to grab a piece of revenue from Facebook. A source also quoted in the WSJ said that Apple needed to build businesses together with Facebook. Apple and Facebook are reportedly selling subscriptions on the App Store to an ad-free version of the social media.

The source said there was a special ad-free version of Facebook for iOS users from the App Store. Facebook will generate revenue and Apple will get its normal 15 to 30 percent cut with a subscription service. The Journal report said both companies contested whether Apple gets a cut from boosted posts. The author of a post also gets more views from Facebook users after paying for the social platform.

Meta asserted that Apple will not get revenue from boosted posts. Apple doesn’t take ad money from developers since various small businesses use the feature to maintain more potential users. The company stressed that this revenue was unrestricted. However, Apple considers the generated revenue from boosted posts to be in-app revenue with 30%.

Meta has Stopped Making New Changes in User Privacy

However, multiple reports said that both companies will eventually break off negotiations. Facebook was working on alterations to empower privacy on the site when the talks came to an end. Meta CEO Mark Zuckerberg earlier decided to stop making changes in favor of user privacy to enhance advertising business. Moreover, Apple announced its ATT (App Tracking Transparency) feature in 2020.

The ATT feature enables iPhone and iPad users to prevent getting tracked from apps and websites. These tracking mechanisms are used to target ads for products online. Zuckerberg said Facebook was standing up for small businesses against Apple. Insider Intelligence reported that just 37% of iPhone and iPad users contributed to continuing tracking and decreasing users.

Apple Broadcasted ATT to iPhone and iPad Users

Moreover, the ATT was broadcasted to iPhone and iPad users in April 2021 for iOS 14.5 and iPadOS 14.5. The report of WSJ said Facebook, YouTube, Snap, and Twitter have drained around $17.8 billion in revenue this year. Keep in mind that Meta and Apple were moving in 2 different directions related to the user privacy issues. Last month, Facebook reported a decline in its yearly quarterly revenue.

However, the market capitalization of Meta has dropped by $600 billion in the last year. On the other hand, Apple is working to enhance the privacy of the iPhone. A spokesperson for Meta said the company has made considerable alterations over the last 5 years to secure users’ data. The company also enabled its customers and businesses of all sizes to grow.

Boosted Posts Were One Point of Assertion

However, Meta and Apple aren’t currently in the best positions after releasing new privacy features. The new privacy features are set to cost billions of dollars to the social media network. But both companies are in close discussions to become business mates. Apple has reportedly given the Cupertino-based tech giant a share of the social media mixture’s revenue.

Meanwhile, both companies have discussed creating an ad-free subscription-based version of Facebook. It is noteworthy that a subscription-based version of Facebook provided significant support to the iPhone in generating significant revenues. The report of WSJ said boosted posts were one point of assertion between both companies.