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"The company behind Mafia Wars and Farmville doesn't like to talk about the sad addicts who fuel its profits. But it does quietly run a special store for them, where imaginary credits are bought with very real bank transfers.
The minimum purchase in Zynga's underground "Platinum Purchase Program" is $500, payable by wire transfer (see email below). The reward over buying online with your credit card: Extra points with which to buy virtual goods for the company's Facebook games. If you refer a friend to the program, you get even more points. Zynga, meanwhile, gets word of mouth, which is especially important since Zynga keeps this bulk sales program hush hush; it's not mentioned on the company website, nor within its games. If you Google for it, you'll get a few complaints for disgruntled customers and a couple of posts from a blogger named "Loot Lady," who writes that it was
"hard to find a lot of information out about this" program.
Well, naturally. With top-drawer partners like Apple and Google, Zynga is not going to be keen to draw attention to
how much of its profits come from obsessive online gaming junkies, many of them underaged or low income, like the unemployed disabled man the
New York Times discovered was spending 16 hous a day on Zynga's YoVille."
moreFarmVillainshttp://www.sfweekly.com/2010-09-08/news/farmvillains/Steal someone else's game. Change its name. Make millions. Repeat.
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