Week 16Get the 5 most interesting stories from the week that was in the mobile industry.Happy Easter!
- Google Play downloads top iOS by 45% (Pocket Gamer)In their latest Q1 2014 Index, App Annie shows that Google Play downloads overall exceed iOS by 45%. The gap in monetization is still there (85%), but Google Play seems to be closing in on iOS, especially thanks to relatively mature markets such as the US or the UK. Click here for the full report.
- Watch out for the pitfalls of industry benchmarks (Mobile Dev Memo) In his latest blog post, freemium specialist Eric Seufert warns against interpreting industry averages too literally, especially in light of the effects that marketing has on retention and engagement metrics.
- King takes on China (TechInAsia)Recently IPO’ed King is taking on the tough Chinese market head-on by integrating Candy Crush Saga into Tencent’s messaging app WeChat. In September 2013 King had already partnered with Kakao Talk for the distribution of the game in South Korea.
- Apple Developers Must Now Agree To Ad Identifier Rules Or Risk App Store Rejection (TechCrunch)In an update to a section in iTunes connect, Apple has confirmed that the IDFA, its proprietary device identifier, was the only method to track targeted ads, and specified its use cases.
- In-app purchases really are most effective for mobile game monetization (Gamasutra)According to a new report by VentureBeat Intel, which surveyed 176 mobile game developers and over 1,000 games, in-app purchase of digital goods scored the highest across the axes of “more cost-effective for the effort” and “popularity on survey”. Here is the full chart plotting a wide array of monetization strategies:
