The cloud miner runs in the cloud. Your phone does not need to be on for it to run.
Once every 7 days you press extend, that’s the only time your phone has to actually be on and the app open connected to the internet. The second you press extend, you can close the app, turn off your phone and leave it off for another 7 days if you felt like it.
They moved to the cloud miner method so users wouldn’t have to have the app running in the background or have their phone on all the time or keep it connected to the internet. They realized that would be an issue in their target markets.
Cloud miner means it happens on ETN’s virtual servers set up for mobile cloud mining not on the user’s phone.
I think it also probably allows a more direct, simpler method to adjust the payout rate in any given region based on if there is a live Mobile Operator use case or not. I’d imagine it’s much simpler to manage the way they have it setup now.