Tag: Facebook

Mobile games off to a rocky start at Zynga

| April 5, 2013

Zynga mobile gamesZynga has some trouble getting traction in mobile games

Zynga had once been a formidable force in the social games sector. The company is responsible for some of the most popular social games in the history of gaming, with much of its success coming from a close-knit relationship with Facebook. Over the past two years, however, Zynga has experienced a proverbial fall from grace among consumers, largely due to allegations regarding copying certain features of other very popular games. Zynga has since been struggling to restructure itself in order to reclaim its throne, adopting a strong focus on mobile games.

Mobile may be the future, but it is not without challenges

Zynga believes that mobile games, especially those designed for tablet devices, could help it reassert its dominance in the game industry. Mobile games have certainly been very successful for a variety of other development studios and continue to be well loved by consumers, but Zynga has had trouble finding the traction it needs to be successful. Last year, Zynga purchased mobile games startup OMGPOP, which is responsible for the highly popular “Draw Something” game. Since the acquisition, however, Zynga has seen lackluster performance in the market.

Dan Porter bows out of Zynga

This week, Zynga has announced that Dan Porter, former CEO of OMGPOP and the head of Zynga, has left the company. Porter is well known as a colorful and outspoken individual in the game industry, two traits that have made his integration into Zynga somewhat difficult. Last month, Porter was quoted as claiming that Zynga deliberately copies the games produced by its competitors, a comment that he later apologized for. Porter’s tenure with Zynga is marked with turbulence, mostly represented by the poor performance of the company’s mobile games.

Sean Kelly to take the helm

Porter did help draw attention to Zynga’s new focus on mobile games, helping generate hype behind the shift away from social gaming. The former executive will be replaced by Sean Kelly, who was formerlly the head of one of Zynga’s most popular games “CityVille.” Kelly is expected to keep Zynga focused on the development of mobile games while also helping the company recover from some of the damage that has been done to its stocks over the past year.

Facebook may be losing its young audience

| April 2, 2013

Facebook losing young usersYouth begin to flee from Facebook

The youth of the world are beginning to favor simple messaging applications for their mobile devices over Facebook. These applications allow consumers to create personal profiles, build networks of friends and other contacts, share digital content, such as video, music, and pictures. While these applications provide many of the same services that made Facebook popular several years ago, these applications have one thing that Facebook does not have: They are not Facebook.

Consumers beginning to favor simple messaging apps for their mobile devices

Young, tech-savvy consumers through North America, Asia, and Europe are beginning to flock to these messaging applications in order to connect with one another. Many of these applications, such as Kik and Whatsapp, both of which are very popular in North America, combine text messaging with social networking, allowing users to connect with one another quickly without relying on messaging plans offered by wireless network operators or the sometimes stifling design of social networking platforms.

Apps could provide better services than Facebook

These apps have an appeal to consumers based on the fact that they are designed around the concept of communication. Google Ventures partner Rich Miner suggests that the majority of interactions that people have with one another come in the form of text messages and phone calls. Many people do not involve themselves in social networks simply for the purpose of communication. Consumers are beginning to find that simple messaging applications can suffice their need to communicate with others. These applications can also effectively share digital content, removing yet another reason for consumers to rely on social networking platforms.

Facebook remains the champion of social networking

Facebook boasts of more than 1 billion users worldwide, thus solidifying it as the most popular and widely used social networking platform in the world. The company recently began embracing the mobile space more aggressively, producing the most used smartphone application on the market today. Nonetheless, consumers are still flocking to messaging applications that offer the same services as Facebook but without any association to the sometimes controversial social network.