Comments on: Zynga & World Food Programme Team Up to Fight Hunger

By: Zynga Runs Virtual Goods Charity Campaign to Aid Gulf Coast Oil Spill Victims

Zynga Runs Virtual Goods Charity Campaign to Aid Gulf Coast Oil Spill Victims — Wed, 16 Jun 2010 18:23:38 +0000

[...] time Zynga has participated in such charities. Notable contributions of the past have been their partnership with World Food Programme to fight hunger in places such as Cameroon, its Sweet Seeds program that helped feed children in [...]

By: Social Gaming Roundup: Helping Haiti, Tracking Farms, Korea, and More

Social Gaming Roundup: Helping Haiti, Tracking Farms, Korea, and More — Sat, 16 Jan 2010 02:47:04 +0000

[...] like everyday people that aren’t in the Red Cross are contributing as well. In light of their recent charitable causes, Zynga is offering “limited edition social goods” within its top games of FarmVille, [...]

By: Social Gaming Roundup: Saving the World, WoW in China, Mystery Fundings and More

Social Gaming Roundup: Saving the World, WoW in China, Mystery Fundings and More — Sat, 09 Jan 2010 02:59:15 +0000

[...] the pressing issues. Along with games such as Food Force, Half the Sky, and the myriad of recent Zynga charity benefits in games, hundreds of thousands of people are being educated and moved with games which Alan [...]

By: Eric Eldon

Eric Eldon — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 19:18:10 +0000

Simon, I’m still not convinced that Zynga is doing anything too different from lots of other people by theming something around charity.

For example, here’s a closer look at Product Red: http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Product_Red#Criticism

By: Simon Wakefield

Simon Wakefield — Wed, 23 Dec 2009 10:15:11 +0000

Sure most companies who give to charity profit from in in some way. However when it usually comes to items to raise money for charity either its an existing item and they give a percentage of their sale profits OR its a special item which the company is only taking a percentage.

Zynga do neither, they are holding onto half the income of an item created for charity. Thats really not charity but profiteering. Its morally corrupt and unethical (although its Zynga so that should be expected)that abuses charity to get people who won’t usually buy virtual items to spend a significant more than the average user spends on normal items.

By: Eric Eldon

Eric Eldon — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 18:41:53 +0000

Simon, this is a very interesting issue and one that is much bigger than Zynga’s virtual goods.

There are a wide range of for-profit companies that work with charities in order to improve their own public image or otherwise make money. Still, these companies also bring in some additional money for charities. Is Zynga et al creating a net gain for the world by working with charities? I think probably.

Also, there’s the issue of how effective and/or altruistic charities are in the first place. Certainly, the WFP is doing good work — I’m just bringing up this point to illustrate how complicated the nature of “charity” is, regardless of what companies like Zynga do.

By: Simon Wakefield

Simon Wakefield — Tue, 22 Dec 2009 15:47:28 +0000

The problem with these Charity Items from Zynga is that they are effectively abusing the Charity in question to make themselves profit.

Now these items aren’t free for Zynga to add but the two items in Farmville raised Zynga $700k in the very short time they were available. I don’t have figures to back this up BUT I would hazard a guess thats alot more than any other new item that was available for Real money would generate in that time as they played on the Charity factor. The Charities don’t deserve to be treated this way, if something is created especially for charity then after the cost of that item have been covered the MAJORITY of the cash should go to the charity rather than the a business making a profit out of it. They could have given 80% or 90% and still covered their costs and given a lot more to the charities