• by Mark Walsh  @markfwal, June 14, 2011

Is "Angry Birds" too much of a good thing for Android? The version of the blockbuster app for the Google platform is placing far greater strain on wireless networks than the game does on the iPhone and other smartphones, according to a study by Nokia Siemens Network's Smart Labs covered by Light Mobile Reading.

Measured against NSN's smartphone baseline, researchers found "Angry Birds" players on the Android-based Samsung Galaxy smartphone generated 352% more signal traffic from an hour of play than the norm. Those playing the game on the iPhone generated only 8% more signal traffic. What was the bandwidth hog? No, not those nasty green pigs. In a word, advertising.

The free, ad-supported Android version of "Angry Birds," for instance, generates an interstitial ad every time a player reaches a new level in the game. Multiply that by millions of players and you've got network traffic jam. The paid iPhone version of "Angry Birds" doesn't carry advertising, so creates less of a problem.

Peter Vesterbacka, founder of "Angry Birds"-maker Rovio Mobile Ltd., is quoted in the Light Mobile article saying the company is aware of the issue and is planning to address it by making changes within the app. One obvious solution is reducing the frequency of ads, which would also enhance the user experience. That has to be balanced against the inclination to milk the game's popularity (addictiveness?) to squeeze the maximum amount of advertising from it.

Besides adding pressure to Android-attached networks, "Angry Birds" hasn't been all fun and games for the Android Market. Last week Google suspended 10 apps after learning they were infected with malware. One particular piece of malware was embedded in apps that promised to help users cheat their way through "Angry Birds" (though the game itself wasn't infected), according to an InformationWeek report.

The Google app storefront hardly needs any more negative publicity stemming from malware. Back in March, the company pulled 55 infected apps from the Android Market that had been downloaded by tens of thousands of people. It subsequently disabled the malicious software remotely. It's in Google's own interest to help insure popular apps like "Angry Birds" don't take on negative associations in connection with Android.