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Just throwing this out there: I consider it unethical to invest in Zynga. Edit: They are essentially using psychology, social and otherwise, to ultimately trick people out of their money. A classic on the topic: http://techcrunch.com/2009/10/31/scamville-the-social-gaming...
one man's "scam" could very well be another man's "deal."
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You get to run experiments on a huge number of users. Do a split test and get a significant result in an hour. Figure out a way to make it just 1% stickier and suddenly you created value worth millions to the company. It sounds fascinating and I could easily imagine working there.
Yeah, you'd think that, wouldn't you? The more users you get though, the more conservative you become. "But if this drops conversion by 0.1%, that will cost us $100k/week." Gets old fast and stifles change.
I think Google's worry about Facebook (partly justified, partly not) is starting to cause them to make pointless (and time wasting) decisions. If I had 5mins with Sergei and Larry, I would say (after taking a long sip from the free organic drink I just got from the snack bar we're standing next to) "Look, the real enemy is not FB but Apple (and sometimes your own engineering hubris, e.g. Buzz), so focus all your troo…
I see what you are trying to say but zynga are much more than a fad - at least for now. They have big profits and, more importantly for google, an instant social graph.
Google desperately wants to be your login provider and social graph. Really desperately.
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I would say that making a game addictive is the holy grail of gaming, no?
I'd say the holy grail is to improve people's lives, potentially even make the world a better place.
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The games are designed to be addictive, not fun in the long term. You could argue the same about WoW but at least in that case there is a lot to do over a long period before you truly get into the addictive repetition phase. Something like farmville is pretty much that from the start.
The games are designed to be addictive, not fun in the long term. Sorry, but I think you're pulling that out of your ass. All (good) games are addictive to some degree, precisely because they're fun, and I bet if you surveyed all the people who play Farmville, virtually all of them would say they enjoy it and are having fun. Don't confuse "I don't enjoy it" with "No one enjoys it."
I played farmville for about a month because some friends were, by the end of that I felt like I was wasting my time, the progression was for the sake of progression, the achievements were arbitrarily chosen to take more and more time and being better than your friends had a lot more to do with time invested then any form of strategy used. I had friends who admitted they were sick of the game and it frustrated them but continued playing just to finish off achievements.
Sure I'm not speaking for everyone but I do think it is a trend in Zynga games, they are build around user engagement and seek to maximise that for as long as possible.
Can you imagine working on Farmville? I mean, it would be like going into work every day to refine the equivilent of the Fisher Price moo farm toy [1] except a) for adults and b) relatively juvenile. Imagine the meetings, mostly run by marketing idiots. "Okay, we need the new chewy coco grove coconut tree special item out by next Monday. So that means everyone's coming in on saturday." But how can you argue with 85 m…
Can you imagine working on Farmville? I mean, it would be like going into work every day to refine the equivilent of the Fisher Price moo farm toy [1] except a) for adults and b) relatively juvenile. Imagine the meetings, mostly run by marketing idiots. "Okay, we need the new chewy coco grove coconut tree special item out by next Monday. So that means everyone's coming in on saturday." But how can you argue with 85 m…
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They have a pretty disappointing track record when it comes to consumer hardware. I bet it is not in their DNA.
I think that their hiring and internal quality-control process excludes it, actually. For building Google's search engine, you need people who know search and sorting algorithms backwards, forwards, inside-out, and upside down. You need hardcore A/B testing based on statistical significance, and rigorous respect of the data you collect. To make the iPhone and the iPad, you need neither of those. You need one guy who…
Does this mean we can finally abandon the idea that Google's mission is "to organize the world's information"?
In my opinion Google is all over the place, everywhere at the same time which could lead to overextension of resources and finances. This could ruin Google at some point in the future, they are losing focus.
Just throwing this out there: I consider it unethical to invest in Zynga. Edit: They are essentially using psychology, social and otherwise, to ultimately trick people out of their money. A classic on the topic: http://techcrunch.com/2009/10/31/scamville-the-social-gaming...