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Interview with Sebastien de Halleux, Playfish

Posted: 12 Aug 2008 04:10 PM CDT

This afternoon I had the opportunity to speak with Sebastien de Halleux, the Chief Operating Officer and Co-Founder of Playfish, one of the top social gaming companies currently out there. The company also has some of the most engaging gaming applications currently on Facebook. Sebastien also discussed plans to expand beyond Facebook to other social networks as well as the iPhone.

I also had the opportunity to ask Sebastien whether he thought social gaming deserved the separation from casual gaming. Sebastien argued that it does deserve a clear distinction and that the term means baking social into the game design and making the game an object of social interaction. The games also get incrementally more fun as you add more friends to the game.

The social gaming space has been heating up most recently with Zynga’s $29 million round of funding. Currently the cost of social games has been low in comparison to traditional video games which have budgets in the six and seven figures as Sebastien points out. It’s an exciting time to be part of the social gaming space and Playfish is definitely one of the leaders. To learn more about Playfish and Sebastien’s thoughts on the social gaming space, listen to the podcast!

This posting includes an audio/video/photo media file: Download Now

Are Special Events In a Bubble?

Posted: 12 Aug 2008 02:21 PM CDT

Over the past few years there has been a rapidly emerging industry around events catering to the technology space. When the first bubble burst, the industry was left with a big void. No more lavish parties that were partially to blame for the Web 1.0 hype. As industry professionals young and old have begun to adopt social technologies it has become easier than ever to promote an event and attract hundreds and occasionally thousands of people.

The Internet Helps Connect People Offline

Following the collapse of the bubble, many were left to reflect what had happened and what should be done differently this time around. There was also a fear present that the internet was going to pull people apart and create disjointed communities instead of bringing people together. Around this time (2002) Meetup.com was founded and there was a resurgence in locally oriented events (there were other sites that were used as well, Meetup.com was one of the primary sites at the time).

It was surprising for many people that the internet would actually be used as a way to help people connect offline. Around the same time, a new type of media began to emerge: blogs. If you view the Wikipedia article on blogs as an accurate source of the history of blogs, 2002 was the year that blogs began to attract mainstream attention. This is due to “coverage for their role in breaking, shaping, and spinning news stories”.

The mainstream press began to realize that many blogs were relevant and could be used as a tool for spreading information. This would ultimately be a turning point for many of the mainstream media outlets but that’s for another article. What’s important is that soon enough there was the emergence of extremely powerful blogs that would soon begin leveraging that power to help congregate people.

A New Wave of Events Arrives

Prior to the rise of new media, there were a large number of event focused organizations that were used to spread information within industries. For example there was (and remain to be) a plethora of trade organizations that helped people stay in the loop on what’s taking place in an industry and help connect the people in those industries. The new media organizations (primarily blogs in the tech industry) are replacing what were once referred to as “trade organizations”.

I would argue that many of the popular blogs are becoming a new type of trade organizations. They help people stay up to date on what’s going on in the industry and they are also helping people connect offline through events. There is also another reason that the influential blogs get involved in events: they have a much higher margin.

While well read blogs can attract high advertising rates (typically measured by “Cost per Thousand Impressions” or CPM), it is still hard to run a large media company based solely on website ad revenue today. Just look at the large news organizations (Washington Post, New York Times, etc), they are all struggling to survive in the current environment. Many even wonder if they will survive (see Adage Special Report on Newspapers Future).

As a result of the challenges facing these new media companies, we are witnessing blogs large and small enter the events business.

Tension Emerges

Over the past year, technology events hosted by both blogs as well as strictly events production companies have become ubiquitous. Some events, like SXSW and CES, now attract thousands of attendees, while other events are targeted toward hundreds. The events also range from happy hour networking events like Tech Cocktail to Twiistup to full scale conferences like SNAP Summit, Graphing Social Patterns and our own Social Ad Summit.

Each type of event has different goals and targets a different group of people but within a short period of time there was the emergence of technology events hosted in cities around the world. Why has this happened? I would argue that there are three primary factors contributing to this boom:

Social Technology - If it weren’t for social technology, event promoters would have to rely on traditional techniques to attract attendees to events. Now thanks to Facebook, Meetup, Upcoming.org and other online event services, it has become easier than ever before for individuals to set up an event in minutes.
Increase in Self-Promoters - Generation Y and the tail-end of Generation X have realized the power of self-promotion. Whether it’s the books or blogs we read, seeing self-promoters become national celebrities who also attract wealth has encouraged many to become ruthless self-promoters. Call them narcissistic, call them egoists, call them conceited. Whatever you call them, we now live in a world filled with them. Perhaps the absolute number hasn’t increased, it’s just that social technology has made this group more apparent.
Sound Business Model - Events make money! Yes, event promotion can generate significant revenue. Whether local networking events or large conferences, all have their own model of generating money.

These three things have combined to create a boom in events. Whether it’s an unconference or a “real conference”, a happy hour or a networking event, everywhere you look now there is an event. This is beginning to generate some tension among the ranks on a local level as well as a national level. Just yesterday we saw this result in Mike Arrington’s public lashing of DEMO for false accusations.

On a local level we are seeing the emergence of competing events. While I was in New York City this weekend I learned that there is now two Facebook Developer events: one is officially “sanctioned” by Facebook, the other is a spin-off. Both attract a lot of people.

Bubble’s Growing, Will it Burst?

As the tension emerges, the only question that remains is what’s the end result? Will we have thousands of competing events locally and nationally? Probably. Will they all experience windfall profits? Probably not. In my opinion, all this means is that we have a healthy market. The people are the ones that will decide who succeeds, not the event promoters.

My guess is that we are going to start seeing a large number of event promoters that begin to overextend themselves. This will result in a loss of money for some and occasionally a loss of hope. There’s risk involved in business, so if you plan on hosting that next event, just keep in mind that there’s no guarantee about anything.

One thing that’s perfectly clear: the internet is not going to isolate humans, it’s going to bring us together, online as well as offline.

Is the GPhone About to Take on the iPhone?

Posted: 12 Aug 2008 11:45 AM CDT

According to TmoNews, reports of the GPhone being delayed may not be accurate and Google may still be planning to release their new phone in September. I’ve spoken to a number of people connected to the company and t least one has suggested that rumors of delays until next year are unfounded. If the OS is being released on the rumored HTC Dream (embedded below), Google may have a shot at taking on Apple.

The new phone resolves one of the primary issues with the iPhone: the lack of a keyboard. There are few other details but TmoNews does claim that the G1 (the name of the Google Phone) will cost $399 but T-Mobile customers will be able to grab it for $150 when it’s released. The battle is on to offer the most open platforms as Apple has done for mobile platforms what Facebook did for social platforms last May.

The coinciding reports about the GPhone release and T-Mobile’s rumored application directory which will compete with iTunes suggests that something is likely to happen in the near future. We are rapidly beginning to see the creation of a digital-mobile economy but in comparison to the Social Web Economy where ad networks are substantial players, ad networks may be less relevant.

The primary reason is that many of these applications already have monetization models based on software sales. Whether or not Google is about to enter the market immediately, it’s clear that the mobile industry has been shaken up by the launch of the iPhone. The next 12 to 24 months will be exciting as competitors race to adapt to the rapidly transforming market.

North American Social Network Growth Levels Off

Posted: 12 Aug 2008 11:10 AM CDT

According to a study out today by comScore, social networking growth is beginning to level off. In comparison to the average worldwide growth in social networks of 25 percent, North America is growing at only 9 percent. This may also suggest that the huge shifts we saw of users from Friendster to MySpace and finally to Facebook may also begin to slow as users begin to settle into their favorite sites.

The largest source of growth abroad appears to be the Middle East and Africa which grew at a rate of 66 percent over the past year, growing from 18 to approximately 30 million users in June. Facebook also continued to expand its dominant position, growing 153 percent over the past year to attract over 132 million users in comparison to MySpace which attracted only 117 million users.

Another interesting statistic revealed by comScore’s release of June statistics is that Facebook has been growing phenomenally abroad. In Latin America the site has grown over 1,000 percent over the past year. The site has also grown more than 300, 400 and 458 percent in Europe, the Middle East and Asia respectively. Facebook is on the fast track to becoming the global social networking leader by a significant margin.

MySpace was only able to 3 percent worldwide growth over the past year. These statistics highlight the ongoing global competition for social network audiences. The discussion of monetization may still be premature for many as the battle for global leadership is ongoing.

Virginia-Based My.com Launches Social Network

Posted: 12 Aug 2008 10:07 AM CDT

While the timing may not be perfect, the domain couldn’t be much better. My.com, a Virginia-based company started by Tip Powers, has launched another social network for you to play around on. Who is the site targeted toward? I’m guessing that it’s for those that haven’t yet caught on to the social networking craze which started a few years ago. Tip has an eye for names though as he was the one who suggested launching “Social Times”.

Currently My.com receives a fair amount of traffic just based on the URL. This will help them catch a fair number of users without any promotion. Will it be enough for the site to gain traction? Not totally sure. There are some traditional promotion techniques that the site is using to try to attract new users. For instance, the company is giving away free My.com email addresses that are powered by Gmail.

Currently the site doesn’t have any additional features beyond what is currently provided by mainstream sites like Facebook and MySpace. This will make it challenging to attract the early adopter crowd. As such we will simply have to standby while the site attempts to attract a critical mass. If anything My.com is a great domain name.

The real question is if the company can build a site worthy of such an incredible URL. Check out My.com and let us know your thoughts. Do you think the site can catch on? What type of service would you build on top of the My.com domain?

OMG! Twitter Places Follower Restrictions!

Posted: 12 Aug 2008 07:41 AM CDT

Last night, it was revealed that Twitter was beginning to place restrictions on the number of users one could follow on Twitter. Apparently the limit was set at 2,000. Robert Scoble didn’t appear to have the same problem though and said that the limit may only be for new users. Another theory? Twitter is throttling the rate at which people add new followers.

While it’s cool to watch a continuous stream of tweets from more than 2,000 users, the real question is there is any use to following this many people. Based on what other people I’ve spoken to have said, following any more than 400 or 500 users is absolutely ridiculous because there is no way to track what is going on. Then again, placing restrictions on what users can do due to theoretical limits doesn’t make much sense either.

Who’s to say that there aren’t more than 2,000 people that I’d like to hear what they have to say? Facebook places a limit of 5,000 friends but even Facebook has suggested that this is due to technical limitations. When you develop a platform, the system should work at all sizes. While most people probably shouldn’t be following the 21,000 plus people that Robert Scoble is, it doesn’t mean you should be able to.

Do you think Twitter should be placing follower restrictions? Do you think these restrictions are a unacceptable as Apple’s iPhone application “off switch” which Steve Jobs confirmed yesterday?