No GPS for Ads in iPhone Applications?

iPhone developers were told by Apple not to use its internal internal GPS for applications to deliver ads or their apps may be rejected. Instead, they must use the CoreLocation framework from the iPhone API.

The CoreLocation framework uses cellular tower triangulation, Wi-Fi positioning and the iPhone’s GPS which can be used for personalization services within iPhone applications. Apple stated that applications which use its internal GPS to “provide beneficial information” may slip by the application approval process, but others may be denied, which means that those apps would not make it into the iPhone App Catalog.

Apple’s announcement was intended to curtail the use of the iPhone’s internal wireless global positioning system to distribute location-based advertising. This move comes after Apple’s purchase of a mobile advertising firm called Quattro Wireless, which provided them with a mechanism which can be used to distribute locality-based advertising to mobile devices.

Many iPhone applications are provided free of charge to the iPhone community. In exchange for free software, the application may serve advertisements, some of which had been using Apple’s GPS technology. This announcement is likely to be frowned upon by those application developers who use geolocation to serve localized ads, which are themselves paid for by advertisers.

The increase in mobile users and mobile applications has brought a lot of attention to smartphones such as the Nexus, iPhone (and iPad) and Palm Pre, and many developers are still on the fence as to which OS to choose. Apple has recently filed a patent for location-based ad serving, with plans to use it along with its iTunes store to sell music and videos based on the user’s location.

Obviously, Apply has plans for geolocation services, and doesn’t like the idea of third parties creating applications using location data that its phone provides.