I too claim that there is MUCH MORE to this Flappy Bird story then his feelings were hurt so bad he left $50,000 a day.

I'm pretty sure that this whole saga was orchestrated between the reptiloids and the people who live in the hollow earth--by convincing the current surface-dwellers to spend all their time tapping on smart-phone screens, they've assured a constant source of low-frequency vibrations which can be used to prime the time cube, helping to ensure that four-dimensional time will finally be brought into the mainstream conciousness.

He quit because his Illuminati handler told him that sufficient work had been completed, and that they could return back to Majestic.

The man was foolish to reveal his stellar earnings to the international press while living in a third world, communist, authoritarian country where many businessmen travel with fleets of bodyguards.

As someone who also lives in a similar country, I can say with near certainty that THAT was probably the cause of the deletion.

Rumors are what they are, in the absence of very strong evidence, I'd take it at face value. Almost everyone I know has/had Flappy Bird.

I think this is the real reason. And as well he announced it was going to be deleted in 24hrs... giving people final chance to buy it... if he really did want to stop it he would have pulled it straight away (I am assume the app stores let you do this - I don't know). He's milking it for what he can be being cautious. I don't blame him.

I suspect you're right, though I'm hoping it was done unintentionally, that he hired a company or acquaintance to "promote" the game, and it resulted in bot-fueled reviews and downloads.

The smoking gun is that he had two other games in the top ten, and that happened without in-app cross-promotion. People would have to look-up Flappy Birds in the app store and click on the "also by" link to even find those games, and there's no way enough people would be doing that to place them in the #2 and #6 slot.

Sounds like the sort of rumor usually caused by people not wanting to believe the universe is as random as it actually is.

Any idea which ads network is used in Flappy Bird? iAds?

On iOS, it is iAds.

What are the sources to these rumors?

That article says the opposite of what you claimed. That is, they acknowledge that some people made the accusations, but they explicitly state they found no evidence:

The game's sheer success has led some critics to accuse Nguyen of using shady practices — including buying traffic or paying for fake reviews — in order to help Flappy Bird ascend the app charts. After looking at the data that corresponds to when Flappy Bird started to build word-of-mouth buzz, however, we can't find any signs of impropriety, or manipulation of reviews or ratings.

Do you think either Apple or Google bring down the "hammer" for fake reviews? Hint: They don't. They remove the fake reviews, but if there were really a ban hammer it would be a fantastic way of getting your competitor's apps removed, now wouldn't it?

So no, that isn't the reason.

And FWIW, seeing sporadic spikes in attention does not prove that he bought reviews, and that post that hit the front-page here claiming so was just libelous, speculative garbage: For virtually every spike you could find a Vine meme or YouTube play-alonger who happened to pick it up. Organic growth for fringe game can come in fits, and those who automatically ascribe to malice have personality defects.

Nor does the "he was going to be sued" nonsense have any rational foundation -- this game is no less derivative than virtually all apps on the market, or the websites that we use and celebrate (OMG The Intercept is just a lame ripoff of Engadget but about surveillance).

The jealousy that crowds out rational discussion is boring.