At least one company is making money off of social networking. The game developer behind ‘FarmVille’ and ‘Mafia Wars’ has seen its web-based games take off – and deliver profits.Mark Pincus, founder and CEO of ZyngaMark Pincus, founder and CEO of ZyngaOn any given day 500,000 tractors are sold on the Internet. But don’t start buying stock in John Deere or Caterpillar just yet. These are $20 “virtual” tractors that belong to the 50 million players of FarmVille, the largest and fastest-growing social game on the Internet.Social games are free online applications accessed through sites such as MySpace and Facebook. If you’ve spent any time on either site you’re probably familiar with titles such as FarmVille, Mafia Wars, and Caf World. All three games, which rank among the top five games played daily on Facebook, were developed by San Francisco-based Zynga, one of the tech sector’s most talked-about companies these days.
via ‘FarmVille’ gamemaker Zynga sees dollar signs – Fortune Brainstorm Tech.
