Social gaming firm Zynga is to file for its initial public offering as early as next week, according to a report on AllThingsD.

The marker of Farmville and Petville will follow LinkedIn whose IPO last week saw the business social networking site valued at more than 500 times its earnings at around $8.5bn. Read More »

First off, I’m sure you have already worked out, that Faceook is not funded by the CIA, and instead the headline refers to a very funny Onion TV story where it reveals the CIA is to get a boost to its Facebook surveillance programme.

The segment also outs Mark Zuckerberg as a CIA agent and director of the CIA’s Facebook programme, which was first conceived as part of the US government’s Patriot Act. Read More »

While the fate of MySpace remains undecided Rupert Murdoch’s News Corporation is preparing to take another crack at social media.

It is reported to be looking at building its own social-gaming business as it looks on at the success of companies like Farmville and Petville firm Zynga, which is now valued at around $10bn. A price tag that means it is way too pricey to acquire. Read More »

You’ve probably read the articles here and there about how social commerce is set to be one of the big trends of 2011. I’ve heard from lots agencies who are working on projects with clients to try Facebook stores.

So far this year we’ve already seen fashion brands Asos.com and French Connection open stores on Facebook and now FMCG giant Heinz is getting in on the action selling Ketchup on Facebook. Read More »

After a year that saw some serious milestones tip in social media, such as Facebook reaching the 500 million member mark, you might be wondering what’s in store for 2011 trends in this lively medium.

Maz Nadjm

I met up with Maz Nadjm, Ogilvy Group UK’s now Head of Social Media, who formerly headed Sky’s online social media strategy,  to pick his brains about what he thinks is in store for the new year in social media. Read More »

Social games firm Zynga, of Farmville and PetVille fame, has announced the global launch of what could be its biggest and most popular game yet — CityVille.

As the name implies, not unlike classics such as SimCity, Zynga’s new social game CityVille allow anyone to build their own city from the ground up. It will be available in beta within the next few weeks. Read More »

Zynga, the maker of social networking games Petville, FarmVille and FrontierVille is now said to be valued at a whopping $5.51bn making it more valuable than games giant Electronic Arts, which is a publicly quoted company.

In the Spring the social gaming firm was valued at $4bn. Read More »

Zynga, the gaming giant behind time-sucking Facebook phenomena such as Farmville, Mafia Wars and Frontierville, is building a media giant out of tiny transactions from millions of people buying seeds, sheep, tractors, weapons, skill points and other virtual goods. Read More »

Could this be the most high-profile social gaming launch in the year that social gaming became really big news – a game where players vie to become movie stars, backed by the former head of one of the most famous film studios?

The New York Times reports that the launch of FameTown is due on November 1, and that the game will be announced by Michael Eisner, who is a former chief executive of the Walt Disney Company. (Eisner’s site confirms this launch date, but at the time of writing, Fame Town’s .net URL was not working. Read More »

Facebook could now be worth as much as $33.7bn according to valuations based on secondary market transactions. Such a figure sees it surpass Yahoo! and Ebay shows how far a few friends have come. Read More »