Posts Tagged ‘Facebook Games’
Know your Facebook Better or Have a Facebook Addiction Disorder
We must confess to the fact that Facebook is not just a social network but has become a way of life for most of us. Logging on to the site seems to be an integral part of our daily life.
Here are a few fun facts you didn’t know about your favourite social adda: Facebook deletes accounts with strange sounding names like ‘Leboe’, ‘Allien’ etc. These names could be genuine but Facebook will delete them without any further explanation!
Scientists have introduced a new diagnosis which they call ‘FAD’ or Facebook Addiction Disorder according to which people actually suffer from an addiction to Facebook and this must be treated in a certain way.
Were you aware that Syria has banned Facebook? This has apparently been done due to the government’s fear of people creating virtual societies which may result in an uprising of sorts.
Facebook has more than 300 million active users. It has had a growth rate of 250% in 5 years! It is interesting to find that more than 60% men and women have used Facebook to stalk their ex! Facebook is the perfect place to find out what your ex has been up to since your break-up and it seems that people around the world make the most of the information provided by this site!
Did you know that the number of pictures uploaded daily on Facebook is over 14 million? Also, this social network officially became Facebook.com in August 2005 when it purchased the web address for a sum of $200,000! The original founder and CEO of Facebook is 24 year old Mark Zuckerburg who has been named the world’s youngest billionaire worth $1.5 billion. Mark, along with three of his roommates, created Facebook while attending Harvard University and launched the site on February 4, 2004.
Facebook is used so regularly that more then 40 million status’s are updated daily! Around 70% of college students on Facebook log in every single day. Although Facebook is popular amongst all age groups, it is estimated that 85% of college students have Facebook profiles.
Facebook Ties up With PayPal to Collect Ad Revenue
Facebook and PayPal Thursday announced a tie-up to use PayPal as the way to pay for Facebook’s advertising and developer systems.
Facebook has currently over 400 million users worldwide, including 120 million in the US alone. Owned by eBay, PayPal is the online mode to pay for e-commerce transactions worldwide. It has 81 million accounts in 24 currencies around the world.
Under the tie-up, advertisers around the world will be able to use PayPal to pay for Facebook advertisements, PayPal said in a press release.
For businesses in areas where the payment process can be difficult and expensive, PayPal said its services will make it easier for advertisers to run campaigns on Facebook.
PayPal can also be used for the newly started Facebook Credits which aims to give (Facebook) users a fast and easy way
to buy virtual goods on Facebook, including items from the Facebook Gift Shop, the statement said.
“We want to give the people who use Facebook, as well as advertisers and developers, a fast and trusted way to pay across our service,” the statement quoted Dan Levy, director of payment operations at Facebook.
“As our business has grown, offering local methods of payment has become increasingly important for advertisers who
want to buy Facebook Ads. Teaming with PayPal, a global leader in online payments, makes this possible,” he said.
Osama Bedier, PayPal vice president (emerging technologies), added, “Put simply, PayPal’s business is payments. We make
it easier for customers to send and receive money online in 24 currencies and 190 markets around the world.
Facebook Removes Microsoft Banner Ads From Site
Facebook is taking full control of display ads on the world’s No. 1 social networking website, cutting short an exclusive deal that had allowed Microsoft Corp to manage part of that business.
However, Microsoft – the exclusive provider of Web search on Facebook – will continue to sell text-based search ads on the website as the partners extended the arrangement beyond 2011, when it had been due to expire. A Facebook spokesman declined to say how long the deal has been extended. Microsoft also said it will further integrate its Bing search engine into Facebook while expanding its reach beyond the United States.
Facebook, which counts nearly 400 million users, said its own display ads feature interactive aspects and can target viewers based on their personal information, making them better suited to its social networking service than Microsoft’s standard Web banner ads. “Ad formats that feature social actions perform better and provide a better user experience since they are more consistent with the look and feel of Facebook,” the company said in a statement. “This combination of targeting and social relevance is the primary driver behind the shift in strategy.” Facebook said it stopped displaying Microsoft banner ads in some international markets recently, and following additional talks with Microsoft, has agreed to stop running the banner ads across all of Facebook. The change will take place over the next 30 days. Facebook has long sold its own display ads on users’ profile pages and other parts of the site, but the company allowed Microsoft to sell banner ads in certain sections of its website in 2006. The deal, which was extended in 2007, was supposed to run until 2011.
A Facebook spokesperson would not provide details on whether the advertising deal with Microsoft entailed any revenue sharing agreement, or whether Facebook would pay Microsoft a fee for altering the deal early. The news comes as Facebook has increased its focus on its financial performance. In September, Facebook said it had become free cash flow positive – meaning that the company makes enough money to cover the costs associated with running the service — ahead of schedule. Microsoft said on its corporate blog on Friday that Web searches within Facebook will bring up information from Bing beyond just links to websites. Microsoft’s search technology will be available on Facebook worldwide, instead of just the United States, it added. Facebook, which lets users connect and share information with friends online, has emerged as one of the Internet’s most popular destinations and is increasingly challenging the Web’s established powerhouses like Yahoo Inc and Google Inc. Microsoft invested $240 million in Facebook for a 1.6 percent stake in the company in October 2007. On Thursday, Facebook said it expected to reach 400 million active users of its site within the week, representing a gain of 50 million new users since December. The company also announced a new design to its homepage.
EA Eyes Facebook Sports Games, More Digital Buys
Electronic Arts, maker of the Madden NFL and FIFA soccer video games, is looking to build sports games for Facebook after buying social-games maker Playfish for $275 million, and may buy other similar companies.
The head of EA Sports, Peter Moore, said the company was learning from Playfish about building communities that could actively help it improve its games as it seeks to expand its online offerings amid a decline in packaged games for consoles. Venture capital-backed Playfish makes games for people to play for free on computers with friends, mainly on Facebook. Its hits include “Pet Society”, in which players create pets that interact with each other, and buy virtual goods for them. EA, which slashed its fiscal 2010 forecast this month, partly due to a steep fall in sales of packaged games in Europe, has been criticised by some investors for paying too much for Playfish. The acquisition was completed a few weeks ago. “We are learning an awful lot about a very different type of game experience than we are used to doing,” Moore told Reuters in an interview. “We use social networks primarily right now for building marketing tools,” he said. “We then look at how do we build games, and we will be doing that in conjunction with Playfish.”
EA Sports accounts for about 30 percent of the company’s overall revenue, which was $4.2 billion in the year to March 31. Moore said EA, which failed in a hostile bid for rival Take-Two in 2008, would likely look to buy more companies like Playfish. “You’re seeing a focus in our M&A activity being on companies that will enhance our digital strategy,” he said. Moore said online games were not only a way of compensating for lost revenue from packaged games but also potentially a source of new ideas and better games. “It allows you to go out and go get more friends, get more people involved. You’re building a labour force quite frankly that helps you build your game and be more powerful or more relevant in that game environment,” he said.
Facebook Beats Google as US Most-Visited Website
Facebook has become the most-visited site in the US after beating former titleholder Google.
The popular social networking page toppled the search giant after accounting for 7.07 per cent of all US web traffic compared to Google’s 7.03 per cent, web analysts Hitwise revealed.
“It’s definitely a big moment for Facebook, even though they beat by a small margin,” News.com.au quoted Hitwise’s Matt Tatham as telling CNN.
He added: “People want information from friends they trust, versus the anonymity of a search engine.”
The research did not include other Google services such as Gmail and YouTube.