Mobile Dev Memo Podcast

In this episode of the Mobile Dev Memo podcast, I speak with Rameez Tase about the applicability of panel data in the new advertising environment in which device-level and user-level identifiers are not available for use in creating behavioral profiles. Rameez and I speak about the use case for panel data in developing marketing audiences for both product testing and development (for whom is this product being built?) and advertising targeting (to whom should we show this product's ads?). Without the direct feedback loop of behavioral targeting and conversions measurement, both product managers and marketers must rely on much more broadly conceived audiences for input into the tough balancing problems they face in scaling a product. We discuss what panel data is, how it has been used historically, and why it is becoming more critical as a product development and marketing tool in the new digital privacy landscape. Rameez Tase is the co-founder & President of Antenna, a subscription services insights platform.

In this episode of the Mobile Dev Memo podcast, Adam Lieb and I discuss the prospects for advertising in console games, following news that both Microsoft and Sony will pursue advertising programs for their game consoles. In our conversation, we consider what ads might look like in console games, what types of developers and games are capable of integrating ads in a way that is gratifying for players, and how advertising might transform the commercial landscape of console gaming. Adam Lieb is the CEO of Gamesight, a Seattle-based marketing platform for PC, console, and web3 games.

In this episode of the Mobile Dev Memo podcast, I speak with Yevgeny Peres, the VP of Growth at ironSource, about Google's announcement that it will deprecate the GAID as well as its introduction of the Privacy Sandbox for Android. I unpacked Google's announcement of its Privacy Sandbox and the deprecation of the GAID in a post that was published shortly after the announcement.  But my thinking was mostly out of alignment with the commentary delivered by other outlets. Popular sentiment following the announcement characterized the deprecation of the GAID as the Android equivalent of Apple's App Tracking Transparency (ATT) framework, and the coverage generally surmised that the changes would catalyze another disaster for mobile advertising performance. But I believe the Privacy Sandbox, which is a collaborative environment for proposing and evaluating Privacy Enhancing Technologies (PET) concepts, is a positive and optimism-inducing development for the mobile advertising ecosystem. In the episode, Yevgeny and I discuss the three tools proposed in the Privacy Sandbox for Android, as well as the new SDK Runtime that Google revealed.

In this episode of the Mobile Dev Memo podcast, I discuss the economics of advertising auctions with Garrett Johnson, who is a professor at the Questrom School of Business at Boston University. I find that the auction dynamic is one of the most poorly understood aspects of digital marketing for practitioners: most advertisers are so intently focused on their own business objectives that they ignore the machinations of ad platforms that are invisible to them. But the auction mechanic is the beating heart of digital advertising, and it determines the pricing that advertisers pay for ad inventory. I'm happy to record this foundational, evergreen episode because I think it might help to inform a broader discussion about pricing in digital advertising generally -- and to explain how it is that ad platforms don't set prices.

In this week's episode, I speak with Canaan Linder and Atif Khan, the CEO and Head of Operations, respectively, at Stardust, a platform that allows game developers to incorporate crypto assets into their games. In this episode, we talk about the challenge of some of the various foundational notions underpinning web3 gaming -- such as the interoperability of in-game items expressed as NFTs -- as well as the potential promise in terms of expanded gameplay and player enjoyment that they present. We also talk about the skillsets needed to build web3 games, the correct way to bring a web3 game to market, and what kind of infrastructure these games require to thrive.

In this new episode of the Mobile Dev Memo podcast, I speak with Maor Sadra, the CEO of INCRMNTAL, about probabilistic attribution for mobile advertising and why bad incentives prevent advertisers from rejecting it. We also talk about Media Mix Models and Facebook's efforts to drive adoption for Robyn, its open-sourced measurement product, and budget diversification post-ATT.

In this third and final episode of ATT, One Month In, I speak with Alex Bauer of Branch about the iOS 14.6 adoption rate curve, why it's unfortunate that misleading opt-in rate measurements proliferated throughout the mainstream media so quickly after the release of iOS 14.5, device fingerprinting and whether or for how long Apple will tolerate it, and Apple's PR campaign around ATT. The previous episodes in the series are: Episode 1: ATT, one month in: privacy thresholds with Rich Jones of Dataseat (ep. 1 of 3) Episode 2: ATT, one month in: SKAdNetwork standards with Paul Bowen of AlgoLift (ep. 2 of 3) In conjunction with the podcast series, I am offering a 20% discount on my iOS 14: How to prevail in Q2 2021 course which can be accessed with the code MDM_4325_OMI_20PCT or through this link. The discount will only be available through June 4th, 2021. As always, the Mobile Dev Memo podcast is available on: Apple Podcasts Spotify Google Podcasts

This is the second episode of ATT, One Month In, which is a podcast series that aims to provide advertisers with an overview of ATT's impact on mobile ecosystem as it takes root. The first episode in the series can be found here: ATT, one month in: privacy thresholds with Rich Jones of Dataseat (ep. 1 of 3) In this episode, I speak with Paul Bowen, the GM of AlgoLift, a mobile marketing analytics and campaign automation company that was acquired by Vungle last year. We discuss SKAdNetwork conversion value standards, the conversion value window, and why and for how long fingerprinting will be tolerated.

Today I am publishing the first episode in a three-part podcast series called "ATT, one month in" that will report observations on iOS 14.5 and its impact on mobile advertising from various corners of the ad tech ecosystem. The purpose of this podcast series is to serve as an analytical waypoint in the roll-out of iOS 14.5: what is currently happening in the ecosystem as the mobile landscape changes, and what can be expected in the near-term future. These episodes are not expected to age well: they are snapshots of what is happening right now -- in this very transformative moment -- in the mobile ecosystem. In conjunction with the podcast series, I am offering a 20% discount on my iOS 14: How to prevail in Q2 2021 course which can be accessed with the code MDM_4325_OMI_20PCT or through this link. The discount will only be available through June 4th, 2021. In today's episode, I speak with Rich Jones, the Head of Product at Dataseat, a mobile DSP. Rich and I discuss the nature of Apple's privacy threshold and what we've learned about it since ATT was first announced. Rich yesterday posted a very provocative graph (above) of the prevalence of conversion values in the postbacks that Dataseat is seeing across its network, which precipitated the conversation.

On Monday, April 5th, I hosted a Clubhouse room in which I provided brief commentary on Tim Cook's recent interview with Kara Swisher. The interview focused on Apple's upcoming ATT privacy policy -- and, in the interview, Tim Cook indicated that ATT will be rolled out in the next few weeks -- and I explained why I felt the interview fell short of holding Apple accountable for the structural changes that ATT will wreak on the mobile ecosystem. I recorded a rough representation of the commentary I gave in the Clubhouse room and am releasing it as a podcast.