Popular App uses Push Notifications

The other day I thought I would peruse the play store and see what was number one for “Flappy Bird.”

I came across this app, https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.hzdi.happybird&hl=en. I thought I would download it and run it to see what it’s like. It seems like it’s a direct ripoff of the original code with assets and ad modifications. The app is by publisher, HZDI.

Then, the other interesting thing I have noticed is that every time I run the app, a push notification comes up advertising one of their other apps, https://play.google.com/store/apps/details?id=com.hzdi.swype2048. Not only that, the icon that they use is Google’s +1 icon. I was really surprised at that. I am really surprised that such a popular app would get away with such a big no-no…

you can use push ads to advertise your other apps, I see major game dev studios do it all the time.

I wasn’t sure. I was too lazy to go look at Play policies. :slight_smile:

The way I read the policy, is you can only use push notifications if your notifying the user about something directly related to the app they came from. Like “Play <app> and get your free 50 coins today”. I don’t think it’s allowed to advertise a different app even if it’s yours.

Yeah, I think the same thing, because I just looked at the Play policies and this is what is says under under “System Interference”:

“Apps and their ads must not display advertisements through system level notifications on the user’s device, unless the notifications derive from an integral feature provided by the app (e.g. an airline app that notifies users of special deals, or a game that notifies users of in-game promotions).”

Boy, that can be really tempting to advertise your other app in that…

Publishing other app(even if its yours) within another app is against google play policy.I gone through this dev app and found they use flappy in tittle.isn’t that against?I wish google play could be more lenient with small devs if they aren’t suspending popular apps with policy violation either they could make a rule "whatever the app may be use only admob within no other ads are allowed " a disclaimer too must be added.I know they won’t .

Not really. You cannot put there text like ‘click here to download my other app’ but you can put text like ‘You did not play our XX game for a long. Click to check what’s new in town’… This could open game screen… and soon afterwards you could show an advertisement.

Flappy and Bird are not copyrighted neither is Flappy Bird, game was made by a small dev and he never registered the trademark so by USA Law people can freely use it.

Another offending app, Splashy Fish…