Facebook and Apple have been at odds for several years now; Apple announced back at WWDC 2020 that iOS would require apps to ask users to opt-in to cross-app advertising tracking. Facebook spent much of the next months speaking out against Apple’s plans and predicting revenue instability due to the upcoming changes, but the feature was released in iOS 14.5 back in April of 2021. Somewhat surprisingly, though, a new report from The Wall Street Journal claims that before this all went down, Facebook and Apple were working on a partnership and revenue-sharing agreement.
According to the Journal, Apple and Facebook were considering a a subscription service that would offer an ad-free version of the platform. And since Apple takes a cut of in-app purchases, including subscriptions, it could have been a very lucrative arrangement indeed.
Another arrangement that was discussed and ended…
