Interesting observation in the Google Play store

Hey all,

A while ago I noticed an app named ‘Download Copyleft music MP3’ (it used to go by a different name a couple of months ago, same package name though)
This app has over 10,000,000 downloads and 700k+ ratings. Yet, it does not seem to show up anywhere.

Searching for the title on the Google Play website does not give me any results. so at first I thought it might not be available in all countries. However while browsing alternative apps, it showed under ‘similar’ apps. And clicking the app would then show the full page. And it can also be reached by going to https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.mp3downloaderandroid

So then I thought I would try AppAnnie (They keep track of all apps in the popular app stores). Check out: Download Copyleft music MP3 - Google Play Top Apps | App Annie and click daily ranks on the left.
It says it is not ranked in any country at all?
For an app that was only available for the first time on March 6th 2013 with over 10,000,000 downloads it sure is strange that it is not ranked anywhere at al. (Keeping in mind that AppAnnie tracks ranks up to the #400th position or something like that)

Taking into account the strange visibility (can not be found by searching the Google Play website, but can be found when visiting the app page directly or under ‘similar’ apps) and the fact that the developer changed the account name (which AFAIK is impossible unless you register a new account and have your apps transferred over by Google support). Is it possible that this developer got inside help from somebody at Google? Or am I just missing a few tricks in the Google Play Dev. dashboard?

Looking forward to any replies. Also very curious if the app can be found by searching for it on Google Play in your country. (If you can or can not find it, please mention your country)

I do find the app when i search for it on the store. I am from Chile

I have seen something similar with one of my apps - it was doing reasonably well in rankings and just dropped (from ALL countries) on a certain date.

Which suggests Google does a manual “intervention” - or their Google algorithms can just pull out apps they see as problematic in some way.

Reference:
http://forums.makingmoneywithandroid.com/marketing-methods/1101-how-does-google-play-ranking-work-what-your-conclusions-about-right-now-4.html#post13819

What I find really odd is that I have never seen this app rank anywhere (according to AppAnnie, and I have checked several times the last 2 months). And the strangest thing is that the account name of the developer changed?! This is not possible on the dashboard correct? Unless you create an entire new account and ask Google support to transfer over your apps to that account. (The rankings for the app were already messed up before the name change so that has nothing to do with it, just wanted to point out that it is pretty weird that they were able to change the account’s name while other devs can not do this).

From the dashboard - no. But you can sell your app and transfer it to a new account with Google help (you have to e-mail a request for that - I don’t know the details though).