My youngest child is currently not allowed on Facebook for getting his mate banned from Club Penguin. This is a huge relief to me because he embarked on his mission to acquire friends with such gusto that I was a little concerned and began to regret my decision to let him join all his mates online. He became friends with my friends (of which I have about 6). He became friends with his brother and sister’s friends (of which they have about 856 each). He became friends with people he barely knows. This is probably the reason why there is an age limit and why I have to hope that I will find another excuse quite quickly to ban him again.
However, my biggest concern is with the withdrawal symptoms he is exhibiting as a result of not being able to tend to his farm on FarmVille. “I reckon I’m going to have to spend like £50m now to get everything growing again. My strawberries are dead and there’s no one feeding my cattle – please mum, I have to go back on. I’ll be way behind everybody else now”.
I have recently read that FarmVille, the online computer game built into the social networking site has 69m players and is rising fast. Uniting the world of social networking and gaming is genius for addiction obviously. 69 million!! That’s more than the entire population of the UK.
Last month in the US a scam behind the special offers on adverts on the FarmVille site was revealed. Zynga is an advertising company that has “an extremely tight relationship with Facebook through committing to large ad buys” and according to Nick O’Neill from the social media site All Facebook, Znyga is making £304,000 ($500K) a day from its Facebook games. Facebook have so far refused to release details of its advertising revenue insisting that it has no obligation to do so.
Should we be worried about this? Are our children going to become addicted? Or indeed are we going to become addicted, given that the majority of players are women over 35. It all seems initially very innocent – ploughing fields and buying sheep, but you can spend real money improving it and getting absorbed into competitive farming and then all it is is a proper common or garden gambling addiction.
December 6th, 2009 at 8:37 pm
Oh dear. I’m addicted to Farmville… it sucks you right in and often have to tend to my farm. Maybe I should try and kick the habit but I quite like it. xx
December 6th, 2009 at 9:34 pm
AHA look at that! Three confessions within the first 10 minutes of my post going out!! I wonder who else is prepared to confess all……Lx
December 6th, 2009 at 8:53 pm
I must admit I’ve only recently allowed my 12 year old to open a Facebook account. It is all a bit worrying….have to admit to going on Farmville myself the other day as I keep seeing all my friends ( all over 35) tending their crops etc. I couldn’t make head nor tail of it. Far too complicated for me. ;0)
December 6th, 2009 at 9:08 pm
Interesting post. God I am a stereotypical Farmville addict, how about that! I’ve never spent a cent nor has anyone I know, but I guess somebody somewhere must be. As games go it’s pretty innocent and I would happily let my children play it, if nothing else it might get kids to eat more greens!
December 6th, 2009 at 11:06 pm
My god these games are so sad. Go out and tend a real garden for crying out loud. Sorry – I just can’t understand the appeal. I like facebook but for the basics like sharing photos and wishing happy birthdays. My nephew who has just 13 added me as a “friend” and since then I have been more careful about how I update, etc. Already he has more than 200 “friends.” So far my niece has not been allowed to join, but once she does I can see her becoming very attached to these kinds of games.
Then again maybe I should just shut up, since I’m a complete blog addict. One way or another I think many of us are hooked on the internet and can’t imagine life without it anymore.
PUREST GREEN
December 6th, 2009 at 11:07 pm
PS – Sorry just posted a comment from Purest Green and for some reason it’s come up under my name. Just in case you’re a bit confused x
December 7th, 2009 at 12:29 pm
Oh dear (blush), I, too, am completely addicted to it. I’d like to say it’s because I’m a 10-year old boy and that’s what they do but I’d (obviously) be blatantly lying. I have, on occassion, had the sense of humour of one, though… if that counts? x
December 7th, 2009 at 8:08 pm
Given how addicted I’ve discovered I am to Twitter I reckon that Facebook could be equally so (but fortunately my friends were on that ages ago and have moved on …) – scary isn’t it
December 19th, 2009 at 4:00 pm
Thank you! I would now go on this blog every day!
December 29th, 2009 at 9:22 pm
Thank you! I would now go on this blog every day and check for new updates!
December 29th, 2009 at 9:46 pm
Thank you! I would now go on this blog every day and check for new updates!
December 29th, 2009 at 9:59 pm
Thank you! I would now go on this blog every day and check for new updates!
January 17th, 2010 at 9:28 am
Great post, thanks a lot
January 28th, 2010 at 10:31 pm
Sup, just found your site on google. You have some great posts
February 4th, 2010 at 11:49 am
Thank for this post, I will now go on this blog every day and check for new updates!
February 10th, 2010 at 4:02 am
Hi, nice post. I just found this blog, but I will definitely visit regularly. Take care.
February 18th, 2010 at 1:20 pm
Thank for this post, I will now go on this blog every day and check for new updates!
February 18th, 2010 at 1:45 pm
Thank for this post, I will now go on this blog every day and check for new updates!
February 18th, 2010 at 5:21 pm
Myspace poker chips tend to be truly comparable to nearly all other sorts of digital currencies on the web, merely way more popular. Zynga poker chips are utilized inside virtual texas holdem poker games found on social networking internet sites by people just about all over the earth from the Usa, to Paris, to Belgium. Participants grind away inside of the application subsequent to meeting up in numerous tiered poker rooms which are organized according to the number of facebook poker chips they have to have to buy in. They can easily play the game at tables with buyins as low as 100 facebook chips all the way up to hundreds of thousands and perhaps billions of chips.
February 19th, 2010 at 1:43 am
i was starting to believe that i could be the only guy which cared about this, at the very least now i learn i’m not loony
i’ll make sure to check out various different threads soon after i get a bit of caffeine in me, it is really very difficult to read without having my coffee, adios for now 
March 7th, 2010 at 5:50 pm
http://farmvillecheater.org
April 2nd, 2010 at 1:41 am
posting here is great!
April 2nd, 2010 at 5:45 pm
Yup, this is one of the things that makes CP so amazing.
April 4th, 2010 at 9:25 am
Farmville is a great game. I found an awesome strategy guide and I had a killer farm within 2 weeks. I am already dominating friends who have been playing Farmville for way longer than I have. If you wanna check it out head over to http://tinyurl.com/farmvilledom
April 8th, 2010 at 7:24 pm
Ahh Farmville …. you’re my favorite waste of time
April 10th, 2010 at 6:52 pm
Very interesting blog posts; ill certainly being coming back to read some more of your great text.
April 18th, 2010 at 2:27 am
Thank you for this exciting post! Furthermore, i possess a website and i’m thinking, how can i obtain like excellent theme similar to yours?
April 26th, 2010 at 7:34 pm
Thank you guys, I love this place, you have put a lot of work into it as I see, awesome… good work mods.
April 29th, 2010 at 3:33 am
You’re a awesome writer. That was an well thought out post.
May 17th, 2010 at 5:03 pm
Educational and entertaining. I’ve additional your internet log to my “reading substance. ” Progress me updated!. . . .
May 18th, 2010 at 6:15 pm
Thanks for taking the time to discuss this, I feel strongly about it and love reading more on this topic. If possible, as you gain expertise, would you mind updating your blog with more information? It is extremely helpful for me.
December 11th, 2011 at 1:55 am
It’s my story and I’m sticking with it.
December 11th, 2011 at 7:57 pm
Hey Hallo cooler Style schaut mal bei meinem Blog vorbei da gibts infos zu natürlichem Süßstoff na dan alles gute wünsch ich euch cheers Tschö