Google‘s recent 100$ million investment in zynga has got the dregs of the internet flapping over Google trying to muscle in on Facebook‘s market share of the social gaming portion of the internet.
Google suck at Social, and probably always will. This is because even though the line between our work and play is often merged we have to actually pro-actively try to keep the two separate. Google Me will suck, Google Buzz sucked, Google Wave sucked. Why? Because we are human. Google can’t break/fix that. My advice: Launch Google Me, very quietly.
Zynga have maybe 20 games available, yes they are huge on the platforms they run on (facebook/twitter etc) but there are 1500+ educational games available that have nothing to do with Zynga that wont even be affected by Google… Unless..
The fact is….
Google didn’t invest in Zynga for Zynga’s games. They invested in Zynga to get the expertise of providing massive web based games to create social networks. I can see Google going off to places like Armor games, bitbitallion etc. and trying to get them on board. Let’s face it, Google know how to write a well documented, easy to use API so if they can persuade other vendors to monetize their content and improve their games by using Google then why not? (See Adsense/Adwords).
I wrote an abstract piece on this and began building an open platform that is similar to Xbox Live. I called it XPArena and it is very private closed beta. I’m still working on it.
So how does this affect education?
The way I see it Google have enough capital available in Zynga to create an open platform for social game integration. This platform would operate in a similar way to XPArena or XBox Live, allowing pupils to share educational games, show off their high scores, compete with friends, collaborative with friends. Teachers could review pupils work and assess their progress. Google could potentially also work on a recommendation engine that recommends games based on what a pupil likes to learn by playing.
How can Google make this work? Google should create a platform, not a service. Allowing third parties to leverage their technology and keeping the Google Brand away from the learner/consumer. PLEASE Google don’t tie this platform into Google Me or Wave etc..
Some questions/answers
Will you need a Google account to play a vast array of online games in the future? No.
Will you need a Google account to share your gaming experience on Zynga games in the future? Yes.
Are Zynga making any education games? No. But if you look hard enough you can find SOME educational value in the odd game.
Will Google use Google Checkout for Zynga games? Yes.
Will Google remove Zynga games from Facebook when they launch Me? No. It would damage Zynga’s revenue stream too much and would see a flurry of angry farmville players switch from Google to Bing for search.
Will Google place their own Ads on Zynga games in that annoying way they do? Yes. Even if you are paying you will see ads.
Will it suck if Google just invest without any outward reaching goals? Yes. If they focus purely on social networks it will be a waste of money.
Is the internet crying out for a good social gaming platform that is away from main stream social networks? Yes!
Did Google purchase Zynga to make their shareholders happy? No. They are already happy, see the index.
Do I want a job at Google Games? Sure if they can afford me 😉