Mobile Dev Memo Podcast

On this week's episode of the podcast, I am joined by Ananya Sen and Saharsh Agarwal to discuss their research on the impact of Google's AI Overviews on web publisher traffic. We explore the results of their field experiment, currently in pre-print, which utilized a custom browser extension to measure how generative search results influence outbound clicks and user satisfaction.
The results of the field experiment suggest a significant reduction in traffic for certain queries, challenging the narrative that these interfaces only filter out low-quality interactions. We dive into the implications for the broader web ecosystem, including the risks posed to smaller publishers and the role of data licensing deals. Among other things, we discuss:
How generative search interfaces might fundamentally alter the symbiotic relationship between search engines and the publishers who provide their data
Whether the removal of low-quality clicks truly compensates publishers for the overall decline in traffic driven by AI-generated summaries
What happens to smaller publishers when major outlets secure exclusive data licensing deals that prioritize their content in search results
Why AI Mode represents a potential endpoint for search that could essentially eliminate outbound traffic for a majority of queries
Whether the long-tail of the internet can survive a transition where search engines become information destinations rather than mere conduits
Thanks to the sponsors of this week’s episode of the Mobile Dev Memo podcast:
⁠⁠INCRMNTAL⁠⁠⁠. True attribution measures incrementality, always on.
Xsolla⁠. With the Xsolla Web Shop, you can create a direct storefront, cut fees down to as low as 5%, and keep players engaged with bundles, rewards, and analytics.
⁠Branch⁠. Branch is an AI-powered MMP, connecting every paid, owned, and organic touchpoint so growth teams can see exactly where to put their dollars to bring users in the door and keep them coming back
Interested in sponsoring the Mobile Dev Memo podcast? Contact Mobile Dev Memo advertising.
The Mobile Dev Memo podcast is available on:
Spotify
YouTube
Apple Podcasts

On this week's episode of the podcast, I am joined by Tricia Han, CEO of Mistplay, and Sampsa Jaatinen, Chief Data and AI Officer at Mistplay, to explore the rapidly evolving world of rewarded user acquisition. We dive into how the rewarded model has matured from a niche Android-focused strategy into a primary growth engine for mobile gaming across both major platforms. Among other things, we discuss:
Why rewarded user acquisition has moved from a niche tactic to a cornerstone of modern mobile gaming growth strategies
How the shift in Apple's App Store policies regarding incentivized installs has created a new frontier for iOS developers
Whether the rich behavioral data sets generated by rewarded platforms provide a significant competitive advantage over traditional ad networks
What role machine learning and reinforcement learning play in optimizing the timing and nature of user rewards and recommendations
If the play-and-earn philosophy can be successfully exported to non-gaming industries like retail, finance, and quick-service restaurants
How the blurring lines between mobile and console gaming will influence the way platforms compete for limited user attention
When the industry will fully realize the potential of direct-to-consumer web shops coupled with highly personalized reward mechanisms
Thanks to the sponsors of this week’s episode of the Mobile Dev Memo podcast:
⁠⁠INCRMNTAL⁠⁠⁠. True attribution measures incrementality, always on.
Xsolla⁠. With the Xsolla Web Shop, you can create a direct storefront, cut fees down to as low as 5%, and keep players engaged with bundles, rewards, and analytics.
⁠Branch⁠. Branch is an AI-powered MMP, connecting every paid, owned, and organic touchpoint so growth teams can see exactly where to put their dollars to bring users in the door and keep them coming back
Interested in sponsoring the Mobile Dev Memo podcast? Contact Mobile Dev Memo advertising.
The Mobile Dev Memo podcast is available on:
Spotify
YouTube
Apple Podcasts

We discuss the transition of AI-native applications toward ad-supported monetization models. Among other things, we cover:
Whether AI-native apps will follow the mobile gaming trajectory by adopting hybrid monetization models to reach massive global audiences
How the high operational costs of AI inference necessitate a move toward ad-supported tiers to maintain sustainable profit margins
Why the granular intent signals captured in LLM conversations offer a superior alternative to traditional search-based advertising targeting mechanisms
What new native ad formats will emerge to integrate seamlessly into AI workflows without disrupting the core user experience
When the venture capital funding environment will demand more disciplined monetization strategies from AI startups over pure user growth
How established ad-tech infrastructure from the mobile gaming era can be adapted to serve the unique needs of AI developers

Thanks to the sponsors of this week’s episode of the Mobile Dev Memo podcast:
⁠⁠INCRMNTAL⁠⁠⁠. True attribution measures incrementality, always on.
Xsolla⁠. With the Xsolla Web Shop, you can create a direct storefront, cut fees down to as low as 5%, and keep players engaged with bundles, rewards, and analytics.
⁠Branch⁠. Branch is an AI-powered MMP, connecting every paid, owned, and organic touchpoint so growth teams can see exactly where to put their dollars to bring users in the door and keep them coming back

Interested in sponsoring the Mobile Dev Memo podcast? Contact Mobile Dev Memo advertising.
The Mobile Dev Memo podcast is available on:
Spotify
YouTube
Apple Podcasts

The Prosperous Society is a three-hour, four-part series by Eric Seufert of Mobile Dev Memo that explores the political economy of artificial intelligence, grounded in the liberal tradition of the Western canon.
Framed as an extended response to John Kenneth Galbraith's The Affluent Society, which serves as the intellectual foil for the series, The Prosperous Society makes the case that AI is not principally a story about intelligence, but about economics: it represents a progressive technological revolution that shifts the binding constraint on economic growth from production to distribution. In doing so, it redefines the role of digital advertising as the coordination infrastructure of an increasingly personalized economy.
Last summer, when I began outlining The Prosperous Society, I set out to write an economic defense of artificial intelligence to serve as ballast for more pessimistic narratives. It was originally intended to be a short book.
I pivoted to the podcast format when those narratives reached fever pitch earlier this year because I wanted to respond quickly and release new episodes on a regular cadence. But The Prosperous Society evolved into something broader: a defense of liberal political economy in the age of artificial intelligence.
Over the course of three hours, I develop that thesis through four linked but distinct arguments:
Part 1: Why AI makes distribution more important than production.

Part 2: Why autonomous commerce is a false ideal.

Part 3: Why personalization changes the economics of the long tail—and of identity itself.

Part 4: Where the moral boundary lies between AI that expands freedom and AI that robs us of it.

If the series succeeds, I hope it provides a rigorous intellectual case for why AI, if properly constrained and thoughtfully applied, can reaffirm the liberal tradition of Western political economy while helping to usher in one of the great periods of economic expansion in human history.

On this week's episode of the podcast, I am joined by Garrett Johnson and Shunto Kobayashi, professors at Boston University who have co-authored a paper titled "Can privacy technologies replace cookies? Ad revenue in a field experiment." The paper quantifies the impact of Google's Privacy Sandbox on publisher revenue, user experience, and market competition through a field experiment conducted in collaboration with Raptive, a digital advertising management platform.
Our conversation highlights the specific challenges faced by the digital advertising ecosystem as it moves away from traditional identifiers and toward a new, more restrictive privacy regime. Among other things, we discuss:
How the loss of third-party cookies specifically affects regional markets with stricter privacy regulations like the European Union
If the adoption of privacy-enhancing technologies like the Privacy Sandbox could truly bridge the revenue gap created by the deprecation of cookies
What role browser vendors should play in establishing technical guarantees that satisfy both regulators and advertising stakeholders
Why the industry tends to respond to identity restrictions by developing more complex identifiers instead of contextual alternatives
When the concentration of traffic toward larger platforms will reach a tipping point for small-scale content creators
How the removal of personalization features on platforms like YouTube serves as a blueprint for future privacy-driven market shifts
We also cover another paper by Garrett Johnson, "COPPAcalypse? The Youtube Settlement's Impact on Kids Content."
Thanks to the sponsors of this week’s episode of the Mobile Dev Memo podcast:
⁠⁠INCRMNTAL⁠⁠⁠. True attribution measures incrementality, always on.
Xsolla⁠. With the Xsolla Web Shop, you can create a direct storefront, cut fees down to as low as 5%, and keep players engaged with bundles, rewards, and analytics.
⁠Branch⁠. Branch is an AI-powered MMP, connecting every paid, owned, and organic touchpoint so growth teams can see exactly where to put their dollars to bring users in the door and keep them coming back
Interested in sponsoring the Mobile Dev Memo podcast? Contact Mobile Dev Memo advertising.
The Mobile Dev Memo podcast is available on:
Spotify
YouTube
Apple Podcasts