I recently attended DigiDay: APPS in New York, focused on social and mobile applications.  With all the debate over native apps and web apps for mobile, the attention at this show was clearly on social.  Jason Calacanis, founder and CEO of Mahalo, stole the show with a blistering criticism of Steve Jobs and equating Apple with Microsoft.  His message was so relevant to mobile in his lament about how applications are not as open as the web and focus the mania on Apple, rather than innovation.

Many mobile ad networks, including Quattro and AdMob, were on hand to present recent case studies from recent in-app campaigns.  It was very interesting to note the large percent of their business that comes from in-app advertising, primarily focused on the Apple iPhone.  It seems that much of in-app advertising is driven by application developers seeking to increase discovery of their apps, and thereby improve their ranking in the AppStore. 

What is clear is that creating a quality brand experience that maintains the integrity of the application is critical to the brand perception and overall effectiveness of a campaign.  This is where it is essential to work with a mobile expert that can create this engagement within the envelope of the application.  But more on what we are doing in that area later.  Stay tuned and leave us a comment if you will be at DigiDay: Mobile in September.