1）据路透社报道，有知情者透露Facebook在2011上半年的收益达16亿美元，几乎是去年同期的2倍，其最大的营收来源是广告。

eMarketer六月份数据预测，2011年所有互联网展示广告市场规模将达123.3亿美元，Facebook所占比例将从2010年的12.2%，上升至今年的17.7%。如果这些预测成真，那么Facebook今年有可能通过展示广告创收近21.8亿美元。

与之形成对比的是雅虎，其广告收入在主流门户网站中所占比例已从原来的14.4%下降至13.1%。

谷歌广告收益预计将占9.3%的份额，而2009年的这一比例仅4.6%。

2）据gamezebo报道，社交游戏开发商Zynga将于本月底关闭《Warstorm》、《Scramble》、《Pathwords》和《Word Twist》这四款人气下降的Facebook游戏。

该消息来源于Mafia Wars Maniac这个论坛，一名Zynga版主在一则贴子中声明公司将在9月30日关闭这四款游戏，这些游戏现在不接纳任何新玩家，也不再支持用户购买游戏道具。但Zynga尚未对此作出正式回应。

《Warstorm》当前MAU仅超过15万，《Scramble》的MAU也不过是21万左右，《Pathwords》则仅有1.18万MAU，《Word Twist》仅有10万左右的MAU，后面三款字谜游戏的人气远逊于Zynga另一款Facebook游戏《Words With Friends》（当前MAU为1300万）。

3）继Zynga在7月份宣布关闭日文版《FarmVille》和《Treasure Isle》之后，另一家社交游戏开发商EA Playfish日前也宣布将于10月7日停止运营投放于PC端社交平台Mixi上的《Restaurant City》。

据观察者所称，该游戏于去年11月登陆Mixi平台，其Mixi用户仅有7.8万（游戏邦注：不过该游戏的Facebook版本目前仍有460万MAU），而只有那些用户达70万左右的社交游戏方有望进入Mixi平台前20名。

该公司称他们有可能重新运营这款游戏，但已不再支持用户购买游戏中的虚拟货币。

《Restaurant City》在今年4月还投放到功能性手机上的GREE平台，这个GREE版本尚未受此影响。

4）Konami热门社交游戏最近在GREE平台独占前三甲，排名第一的《Dragon Collection》在该平台注册用户已超过400万；《Professional Baseball Dream Nine》和《J-League Dream Eleven》分别居于第二第三席位。

据Gamebiz报道，Konami日前宣布向法院起诉东京社交游戏开发商gloops（原名为GMS），声称后者游戏《Dainekkyo!! Pro Yakyu Card》“在游戏机制、画面和特效等方面侵犯了《Professional Baseball Dream Nine》的知识产权”。

《Dainekkyo!! Pro Yakyu Card》目前投放于功能性手机及智能手机上的Mobage平台，与Konami一样，gloops的这款游戏也获得了日本职业棒球联盟的授权。玩家在游戏中可选择1200多种不同卡片组建自己最喜欢的球队（Konami作品也是一款卡片搜集游戏），观察者称gloops的这款游戏从画面风格上看确实与Konami作品极为相似（详见以下对比图）。

Konami之所以对此事颇为重视，原因是《Dainekkyo!! Pro Yakyu Card》目前已虏获70万Mobage用户，该游戏在8月18日发布当天就收获了10万用户，甚至有可能成为日本“最著名棒球社交游戏”，并为gloops创造大量收益。

而Konami的同款棒球卡片游戏自3月份在GREE平台发布以来，仅收获100万用户。

5）巴西社交游戏开发商Vostu日前宣布收购MP Game Studio，并于本月完成这笔交易。

MP Game Studio擅长开发授权游戏，其合作伙伴包括微软、Nickelodeon、Cartoon Network、TNT、可口可乐、Unilever、国家地理、Clarin Group、Miniclip等公司，代表作包括两款海绵宝宝游戏、两款《Ben 10》游戏，一款《Avatar: The Last Airbender》游戏，一款融合了数名Nickelodeon角色的游戏。

据观察者所称，曾开发了大量Zynga游戏克隆产品的Vostu可能意在通过这项收购，与授权IP合作，以免再度遭遇侵权起诉。

Vostu用户集中于拉美地区，其游戏主要投放于Orkut、Facebook和MSN平台，据该公司所称，Vostu注册用户已达4200万。据AppData数据显示，Vostu游戏在Facebook的MAU总数是270万左右。

6）据路透社报道，在线零售巨头亚马逊目前正紧“招兵买马”，打算组建一个社交游戏团队，其宏伟目标是赶超Zynga。

games报道指出，亚马逊现在至少已聘请到一名知名游戏设计师，Gamehouse成员Jonathan Tweet（游戏邦注：他曾参与开发《龙与地下城》系列及一些社交游戏）在今年7月份加入亚马逊。

亚马逊已开始在其电子阅读器Kindle平台上发售由Big Fish推出的休闲《隐秘探险：亚马逊》，但该公司目前仍未透露其社交游戏团队的主要发展方向。

7）据路透社报道，芬兰开发商Sulake日前聘请Playdom前全球发行副总裁Paul LaFontaine出任公司新首席执行官，打算借助后者的丰富经验，与EA、Zynga等大型开发商角逐社交游戏市场。

Sulake原CEO是Timo Soininen，该公司代表产品是著名的《Habbo Hotel》虚拟社区休闲游戏，目前有1000万月访问用户。

8）据gamasutra报道，继《MapleStory Adventures》之后，韩国MMO游戏公司Nexon最近再向Facebook推出第二款社交游戏《Wonder Cruise》，其游戏任务是让玩家打造世界顶级的豪华游轮。

该游戏预计于9月12日发布，观察者称《Wonder Cruise》的风格与中国网游戏公司完美世界推出的Facebook游戏《Perfect Getaway》极为相似，只是玩法略有不同。

玩家如果能在规定的时间内顺利取悦和招待游轮乘客，就可以成功升级，但每帮助一名乘客，就会消耗一定的能量。

9）EA首席技术官Eric Brown在日前的Citi 2011科技大会上发言表示，公司专注于数字产品及将游戏视为服务的策略已取得初步成效。他表示EA旗下的PopCap和Playfish是两家不同领域的公司，前者擅长制作在线及手机平台的休闲游戏领域具有极高声誉，而Playfish则擅长开发Facebook社交游戏。

据他所称，EA最新热门社交游戏《模拟人生社交版》最近的DAU已达780万（据AppData数据显示，该游戏MAU已超3000万），目前在Facebook平台排名第三，用户每天平均三次访问游戏，每次玩游戏时间为15至20分钟。

10）在本周DAU增长最快的Facebook游戏榜单上，Social Point推出的《The Sims Social》晋升榜首，《模拟人生社交版》和《Mystery Manor》分列第二第三名。

《Mystery Manor》这款寻物解谜游戏是在Playdom游戏《Garden of Time》面世后才发布，它在本周初还登上了MAU增长最快的前10名社交游戏榜单，而《Gardens of Time》的用户则呈现缓慢增长之势。（本文为游戏邦/gamerboom.com编译，如需转载请联系：游戏邦）

1）Facebook Doubles Revenue – How Long Can it Sustain This Growth?

By Dan Rowinski

According to reports, Facebook has doubled its revenue in the first half of 2011. Reuters reports an undisclosed source that says the company made $1.6 billion in the first six months of this year, nearly double what it made in the same time in 2010. The largest portion of Facebook’s revenue is believed to come from advertising, indicating the company has created a dynamic niche for itself on the Web that advertisers are beginning to flock to en masse.

Contrast Facebook’s rising star to that of Yahoo, one of the original Web portals. Yahoo still does decent overall numbers with display ads, but its slice of the pie declined from 14.4% to 13.1% this year. Meanwhile, Facebook continues to rise as the way people interact with the Web shifts.

Given that the entire Internet display ad market is predicted to be $12.33 billion this year, 1.3% is a significant retreat for Yahoo. Meanwhile, Facebook rose from 12.2% of display ads in 2010 to 17.7% this year, according to eMarketer research from June. If those numbers hold their course, Facebook will make approximately $2.18 billion from displays this year.

Google has not historically been big in display ads, but it is also increasing its revenue from that advertising segment, to a predicted 9.3% share. That is up from 4.6% of the display ad revenue pie in 2009. Google still dominates most advertising on the Internet though, though it is increasingly setting up a battle with Facebook for advertisers’ dollars.（source:readwriteweb）

2）Report: four Zynga games shutting down this month, including Warstorm

By Andrew Webster

A new report claims that Zynga will be closing down four of its less popular Facebook games, including the collectible card game Warstorm, as well as Scramble, Pathwords, and Word Twist. All four games are expected to be shut down by the end of the month.

The news comes via fansite Mafia Wars Maniac, which cites a forum post by a Zynga moderator explaining that Warstorm and the three other games will be closed by September 30. In addition, the games are no longer accepting any new players and in-game purchases are no longer available.

Unfortunately, at the time of writing the Zynga forums appear to be down for maintenance, so we’ve been unable to see the forum post for ourselves. We’ve contacted Zynga for comment but haven’t heard back as of yet.

Warstorm currently has just over 150,000 monthly active users, while Scramble has more than 210,000, Pathwords has 118,00, and Word Twist has just over 100,000. Those numbers put the three word games significantly behind the recently launched Facebook version of Words With Friends, which is closing in on 13 million MAU.（source:gamezebo）

3）Playfish/EA Shuts Down Restaurant City On Mixi [Social Games]

by Dr. Serkan Toto

Japan’s social games market is lucrative, big and growing, but it’s a tough nut to crack for many foreign game developers, even the successful ones. One case in point is Zynga Japan, which decided to shut down the Japanese versions of Farmville And Treasure Isle in July after it turned out nobody played their games over here.

And now we have another US company that gives up on a social game in Japan: according to Gamebiz, Playfish/EA announced that it will be removing Restaurant City from Mixi for PCs on October 7, 2011.

Playfish/EA launched the Mixi version of its popular restaurant management game in November 2010. When I just checked, the game had only 78,000 registered players on the social network. By way of comparison: companies need around 700,000 players for a game to even make it into the Mixi top 20. The Facebook app (in English) still has 4.6 million MAU.

After I signed up, the following loading screen appeared. The speech bubble says that Playfish/EA thanks its loyal users for having played Restaurant City until today. It’s still possible to start the game, but players can’t purchase any virtual currency anymore:

Restaurant City was also released (in April) on GREE for feature phones: this version isn’t affected by Playfish/EA’s decision, but it wouldn’t surprise me to see that title pulled soon, too.（source:serkantoto）

4）Over “Professional Baseball Dream Nine”: Konami Sues GMS/gloops And Here Is Why [Social Games]

by Dr. Serkan Toto

Konami currently occupies the first three spots in the ranking of the most popular social games on GREE: the most popular title is Dragon Collection, No. 2 is Professional Baseball Dream Nine, and No. 3 is  soccer card game “J-League Dream Eleven”.

And now Konami has announced it filed a lawsuit against Tokyo-based social game maker GMS (now named gloops) with the Tokyo District Court on September 5. According to Konami, one of gloops’ games “infringes on the intellectual property rights of the game mechanics, images, and effects” of their second-biggest social game, Professional Baseball Dream Nine.

Apparently gloops received a warning before Konami decided to take legal action but chose to continue their game as is. The title in question is called “Dainekkyo!! Pro Yakyu Card”, which is available on Mobage for feature phones as well as smartphones.

Like Konami, gloops is using an offical license from Japan’s professional baseball league for the game.

Users can choose between a total of 1,200 different cards to create their favorite team of nine (the Konami title is a collectible card game, too). I am not a legal expert, but the style of the cards does look a lot like the one Konami chose for their game.

The reason why Konami is nervous is clear: according to Gamebiz, gloops managed to rack up a whopping 700,000 players on Mobage for “Dainekkyo!! Pro Yakyu Card” so far. It took just one day to get to 100,000 users after the game’s August 18 release, meaning the title is on track to become Japan’s “most popular baseball-related social game” and probably generates a lot of revenue for gloops.

Konami says they have one million users for their baseball card game on GREE (which was released in March).（source:serkantoto）

5）Vostu Acquires MP Game Studio, Could Be Getting Into Licensed Games

By AJ Glasser

Brazilian social game developer Vostu announced the acquisition of MP Game Studio today and plans to consummate the deal with a new online game due out this month.

To date, MP Game Studio specializes in developing games for licensed intellectual property. Some of its partners named in the press release announcing the acquisition include Nickelodeon, Cartoon Network, TNT, Coca-Cola, Microsoft, Unilever, National Geographic, Clarin Group, and Miniclip. Its highest-profile games include two Ben 10 titles, two SpongeBob SquarePants titles, an Avatar: The Last Airbender game, and a mash-up fighting game that combines several Nickelodeon characters.

This acquisition could put Vostu in a more favorable position for developing licensed games. Up until now, the developer has produced one soccer title and a handful of games that come close enough to cloning Zynga’s FarmVille, Cafe World, CityVille, and Texas HoldEm Poker as to provoke lawsuits. By working with licensed IP, Vostu could shield itself from legal drama while leveraging a preexisting fan base to drive growth in its games.

Vostu’s primary audience is based in Latin America where its games run on a proprietary platform in addition to Orkut, Facebook, and MSN. According to COO Matias Recchia, the company has an audience of 42 million registered users; our AppData traffic tracking service shows 2.7 million monthly active users across all Vostu games available on Facebook.（source:insidesocialgames）

6）Amazon forms social games group to compete with Zynga

By Andrew Webster

You can buy PC and Android downloads from Amazon, and soon it looks like the online retail giant will be developing social games, too. A new report from Reuters claims that Amazon has formed a social games group that is “actively looking” for additional talent.

According to the report, the new game development group was created with the ambitious goal of taking on Zynga, something no one has really been able to do up until now. And as Games.com notes, Amazon has already hired at least one notable game designer. Jonathan Tweet joined the company back in July, after a career spent working both on role playing games like the Dungeons and Dragons franchise and social games developed by Gamehouse, including Collapse.

Amazon has also started selling games on its Kindle eReader, including casual games like Big Fish’s Hidden Expedition: Amazon.

Unfortunately, no details are available yet on what exactly the team is working on. Is Amazon creating games for Facebook? Google+? Or maybe developing its own gaming platform at Amazon.com? Only time will tell.（source:gamezebo）

7）Habbo Hotel maker names ex-Playdom exec CEO in social games push

by Joe Osborne

You might have heard of the mega popular social network slash social game Habbo Hotel (pictured), but Finnish developer Sulake wants to turn “might” into “absolutely.” The company just announced that it has hired former Playdom VP of global distribution Paul LaFontaine as CEO, Reuters reports. Sulake made the hire in an ambitious attempt to help the company break into the world of social gaming, and who would know the space better than a guy who was there from the beginning?

LaFontaine, who was largely responsible for publishing Playdom’s–now owned by entertainment behemoth Disney–games will replace Timo Soininen as CEO of Sulake. “We have been turning that direction for two years and are now accelerating it with this new CEO,” Sulake chairman Mika Salmi told Reuters.

Habbo Hotel, for the uninformed, is a social network-meets-social game in which about 10 million monthly visitors interact in a world designed to hearken back to the good old days of 8-bit gaming. Players create their own rooms in collective hotels normally restricted to countries of origin or native language, and play mini games, decorate and share gifts with other hotel denizens. Of course, like any social game, players can buy premium items using real money.

Judging from the fact that prospective players can already connect to Habbo Hotel through Facebook Connect, and that Sulake has made their interest in traditional social games clear, Sulake making games for Facebook is certainly a possibility. Alright, with the crazy money everyone seems to be raking in on Facebook, this is most likely exactly where the company is headed. And LaFontaine will lead the charge–watch out, Zynga and EA, Habbo is looking hinder your hottest games.（source:games）

8）MapleStory maker Nexon sets sail on Facebook with Wonder Cruise

by Joe Osborne

Clicking cute creatures in MapleStory Adventures sure was fun, but Korean MMO (massively multiplayer online game) developer Nexon is ready to tread new water on Facebook. (Well, at least new water for Nexon.) The global studio based in South Korea has released Wonder Cruise, its second Facebook game tasking players with creating a world-class cruise ship.

While Gamasutra reports that the game will launch after testing with a small audience later this month, it appears that Wonder Cruise is live now for all. So, consider this the open beta for Wonder Cruise, or as we see it: The game is live. The game comes hot off of the heels of MapleStory Adventures, a Facebook rendition of the hugely successful free-to-play MMO that has already amassed over 2.8 million monthly players.

Wonder Cruise looks an awful lot like Perfect World Entertainment’s recent Perfect Getaway, but plays a bit differently. Yes, you’re still stuck on the same old cruise ship while your customers see the best of what the world has to offer. But this time around, the cruises, well, actually mean something. Each cruise is timed, and once you leave port after customizing and upgrading your ship with decorations and whatnot from the money that guests throw your way, you must help as many patrons have a good time before your ETA by clicking on them.

Then, you’ll be graded on how many guests you satisfied in the time limit, which matches up with a leaderboard spanning your friends. However, each time you help a guest, it consumes Energy that refills at a slow rate, like all Facebook games. This would be fine if you weren’t graded on how many guests you help on a given timed cruise. Unfortunately, if you want those coveted S ranks for each trip, you’ll have to either buy Energy or bug your friends.

Wonder Cruise is expected to “officially” launch on Sept. 12, Gamasutra reports. When the game releases from an open beta to most likely yet another open beta, Nexon will introduce more content (and hopefully a fix to this Energy system). As the game is testing, Nexon urges players to take a survey. Until then, keep clicking away on those guests … at least for a minute or two.（source:games）

9）EA Details Strong Digital Growth, Sims Social Numbers

by Frank Cifaldi

EA’s new focus on digital titles and games as services is only starting to pay off for the company, CFO Eric Brown said at the Citi 2011 Tech Conference on Wednesday.

Gamasutra previously reported on Brown’s commentary on upcoming subscription-based MMORPG Star Wars: The Old Republic, though in further commentary, he spoke to the success of the company’s current and upcoming casual games, freemium social games, and downloadable content for its console titles.

On PopCap and Playfish

“They’re two different companies, both leaders in different regards,” Brown said. Playfish offers expertise in social network gaming on Facebook, while PopCap has a peerless record of quality casual game releases that span online and mobile platforms.

“We’re very excited about further leveraging industry leading intellectual properties like Plants vs. Zombies from PopCap.”

The Sims Social

The company recently launched The Sims Social, a major launch for EA’s social business based on a franchise that has sold tens of millions of units at retail.

According to EA, The Sims Social sees about 7.8 million daily active users, placing it third on the charts (about 200k shy of Zynga’s Farmville at number two).

Brown says the ratio of daily to monthly active users is “quite high,” and that players play an average of three times a day in 15 to 20 minute sessions.

“What has made [The Sims Social] a success so far is the Playfish expertise… combined with the creative excellence of the core Sims team,” said Brown. “Those teams work together exceptionally well.” （source:gamasutra）

10）Social Empires Squeezes Past The Sims Social on This Week’s List of Fastest-Growing Facebook Games by DAU

By AJ Glasser

Social Point’s Social Empires squeezes past The Sims Social to claim the top spot on this week’s list of fastest-growing growing Facebook games by daily active users. Mystery Manor rounds out the top three.

Casino, card, and slot games still make up a healthy chunk of this list this week. JackpotJoy Slots drops off as of press time, but Slotomania, DoubleDown Casino, Texas HoldEm, and SlotSpot all turn up here as the genres expand and converge.

It’s been a while since we’ve seen Mystery Manor on our weekly rankings of games by traffic. The hidden object game typically turned up behind Playdom’s competing title, Gardens of Time, but here we see it standing alone in the top three. Earlier this week, Mystery Manor’s recent growth spike pushed it into the top 10 on our fastest-growing games by monthly active user list. Gardens of Time, meanwhile, is experiencing a shallower growth spike.（source:insidesocialgames）