AllThingsD » Mob Wars

Call the Consigliere: Digital Chocolate Sues Zynga Over Mafia Wars Name

Voices — Wed, 25 Aug 2010 20:33:10 +0000

One of the hits that has propelled Zynga to the top of the social-gaming heap is Mafia Wars, which gives users the chance to participate in the warm embrace of an extended crime family. But before there was Mafia Wars, there was, well, Mafia Wars, a similar game made by Digital Chocolate. Now DC is suing Zynga, alleging trademark infringement. Zynga–which in 2009 paid several million dollars to settle a lawsuit with David Maestri, creator of the game Mob Wars–pronounced itself “surprised and disappointed” at the suit and said it planned a vigorous defense.

Adknowledge Buys Virtual Currency Company

Marisa Taylor — Wed, 22 Jul 2009 14:27:49 +0000

Adknowledge, one of the largest independent online ad networks, announced Tuesday that it has acquired KITN Media, owner of Super Rewards, a virtual currency monetization platform for online games and social networking sites like Facebook and MySpace, for an undisclosed amount.

Super Rewards uses virtual currency as an incentive for online gamers in order to target them with advertising. For example, in games like Mob Wars or Spy Master, a user may get to skip a level or earn a weapon if he or she fills out a form to choose which kinds of ads are displayed on the page.

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Virtual Goods + Mobile Payments = Small Market Worth Fighting For?

Peter Kafka — Tue, 16 Jun 2009 11:00:02 +0000

The promise of “virtual goods”–pretend things you buy with real money in cyberspace–has lured entrepreneurs and venture capitalists for years. Same goes for mobile payments–using your iPhone instead of your Amex to buy stuff. But what if you combined the two?

You’d have a market that barely exists yet is worth fighting over. At least that’s what Zong, a Swiss-based company, and Boku, a rollup of two other mobile payment companies (Mobillcash and Paymo) are doing. Both offer the same thing: The ability to buy stuff online that gets billed to your wireless account.

In theory, you could use the same technology to buy actual stuff as well, but the businesses are really geared around microtransactions–pretend weapons on the “Mob Wars” Facebook app, piratey stuff on Puzzle Pirates–for which it wouldn’t make sense to use a credit card. They’re also assuming that many of their customers won’t have credit cards, either because they’re kids or because they live in countries where it’s more common to own a mobile phone than a Mastercard.

Both companies are happy to explain why they’re better than their rivals–who covers more territory, who has the better carrier relationships, who has less onerous fees, etc.–but I won’t bore you with that. Similarly, while Boku is formally announcing its presence today, along with $13 million in funding from Benchmark Capital, Index Ventures and Khosla Ventures, the Zong guys argue that this is really a rebranding of Mobillcash, which had previously received funding from Index and Khosla. Whatever.

The real story here will be if and when the really big platforms for virtual goods–like, say, Facebook, News Corp.’s (NWS) MySpace and game companies like Electronic Arts (ERTS)–decide they want to formally integrate one or more of the mobile payment guys, and under what terms.

Right now, for instance, Facebook isn’t involved in any of the microtransactions that any of its apps are generating, and the same goes for mobile payments–each app is free to work with whatever vendor it chooses. But that could change in the near future as Mark Zuckerberg and company start testing their own payments platform. If there is going to be a big market for virtual goods bought via mobile payments, it could get carved up in the near future.