First Steps

Abstract

Facebook has emerged over the last several years as the dominant social space. Their astronomical growth has made it the platform for social interaction on the web. Although there have been some hiccups along the way with privacy concerns, Facebook continues to grow and provide a space for users worldwide to interact with one another. Facebook has also introduced a new breed of casual social gaming to the world. Individuals who would never consider themselves gamers are suddenly spending real money to play games such as Farmville, Mafia Wars, War Commander, and SpaLife. The success of companies like Zynga and CrowdStar have made companies including Electronic Arts take notice and start rethinking some of their games for social play.