Mark Pincus, head of FarmVille and Mafia Wars maker Zynga, is about to be cast as the gaming industry’s latest pantomime villain. Speaking to SF Weekly, an ex-Zynga employee has revealed how Pincus told him:

“I don’t fucking want innovation. You’re not smarter than your competitor. Just copy what they do and do it until you get their numbers.”

Interviews with numerous former Zynga workers have lifted the lid on how stealing ideas from other companies was a widely held practice at the FarmVille developer.

If you’re at all familiar with games, you’ll already know that FarmVille has borrowed (to put it politely) from other games – it’s no great revelation. That said, it’s interesting to see just how embedded the culture of copying ideas has (allegedly) become.

The ex-employee also revealed Zynga’s unofficial company motto was “Do Evil”, a twist on Google’s “Don’t Be Evil”, adding:

“I would venture to say it is one of the most evil places I’ve run into, from a culture perspective and in its business approach. I’ve tried my best to make sure that friends don’t let friends work at Zynga.”

[Via SF Weekly]

FarmVille boss: “I don’t f***ing want innovation, just copy your competitors” is a post from: The Inquisitr

A Philadelphia newspaper has warned its readers that videogames are becoming more and more “satanic.” According to The Bulletin, there has been “a rise in the number of satanically-themed video games that target God and Christianity, invite players to make pacts with the devil, and elevate Satan to hero status.”

To prove its point (or not), the newspaper consults Lance Christian (a name, not an instruction), a “32-year-old Christian and avid gamer.” Because he’s already a gamer, his views CAN’T POSSIBLY be biased, y’see? We gamers can take Lance seriously, for sure. Here’s his totally balanced take on the matter:

“This has been going on for the last 10 years, but especially in the most recent games. I feel that the devil has a new tool to work with in this age of technology, and the majority of adults in a position of responsibility are left in the dark.”

After that, the paper attacks numerous recent titles for promoting Satan, including Shadow Hearts, Dragon Age: Origins, Dante’s Inferno (a pretty ironic target if you ask me), Devil Summoner, Bayonetta, Darksiders and Guitar Hero (yeah, seriously – I assume this is because Satan is an unlockable character in the game, but if I remember rightly, the player actually has to beat him).

If there’s one thing I hate more than the media getting frothed up on behalf of the silent millions (many of whom are secular, like myself), it’s the way religion has a right not to be offended.

Theists, I’ll never question your right to worship whichever invisible skyface you follow. In return, I’d quite like the right to see a joke or two made at religion’s expense from time to time.

[The Bulletin, via Eurogamer]

Here we go again: Christian paper blasts “satanic” videogames is a post from: The Inquisitr

It there is one constant in our society it is that as soon as something new is created or invented someone, somewhere, will screw with it to benefit themselves. Nowhere is this more apparent than in our world of technology and the Web.

Barely a day goes by without one hearing about some network breach, some new malware or some social media service getting hacked. Yet after some minor bitching and OS flamewars we all return to business as usual. From consumers to developers we talk up a storm about security but when push comes to shove we all carry on as if nothing happened.

I’ve talked about this in the past at my home blog starting back in 2007 with this little tidbit

Facebook is taking further steps to curb abuse of their users by folks that want to screw with them. What took them so long? Did they really think that just because Facebook is the cool place to be that they wouldn’t get messed with?

Jeez.

Well here’s a hint you Starbucks latte drinking startups – get evil.

Really.

How anyone of you ever got past Web 1.0 without realizing that there are bad people out there who will do bad things so that they can benefit need a good smack in your PHP. I’m sorry but any Web 2.0 product that goes live without first having been trampled through by some evil people deserves everything it gets – including the bad press.

The thing is the situation hasn’t changed in the intervening years. Twitter gets hacked, malware spreads through Facebook and as soon as some new service gains in popularity they find themselves a victim.

I was reminded of this when reading an interesting post by Bill Thompson at the BBC Online where he was looking to the future and how potential technology will end up being hacked with potentially deadly effects.

I am confident that at some point around 2020 we will all be distracted by early reports that the latest display technology using smart contact lenses that draw images directly onto the retina using low-powered micro-lasers are being hacked into by unscrupulous criminals.

They will be replacing paid-for adverts with ones for their own illicit services while using the augmented reality data feeds that the lenses offer to steal personal data and infiltrate company networks.

While the idea of having your digital lenses being hijacked might not seem all that bad it is a different matter when it comes to thing like medical devices.

And in March 2008 researchers at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst demonstrated that you could snoop on the radio signal coming from a combination pacemaker/defibrillator and reprogram it to deliver a potentially lethal electric shock to a patient.

Their experiment required several students and some expensive equipment to monitor and decode the signals from a Medtronic Maximo pacemaker, but it prompted significant concern within the medical profession because of the danger it exposed.

The reason that this was even possible was because the manufacturers never even thought the idea of someone wanting to hack into that kind of signal was something that would happen. They never thought anyone would have a reason to hack a person’s Pacemaker.

Medical device manufacturers are rushing to incorporate as much web technology in their products but as with much of the companies finding ways to use the Web as a part of their business they ignore the lessons of the past.

The lesson being that there are people out there who will try and succeed to do evil things with their technology. It is inevitable especially when we make it so easy for them.

Will we ever learn that people will do evil things? Probably not. is a post from: The Inquisitr

19 year old Ciara Sauro from Pittsburgh suffers from pancreatitis, needs an islet cell transplant and is hospitalized weekly. She lives with her single mother, who earns minimum wage.

The background narrative may not excuse them necessarily from the case, but here’s where it gets interesting. They couldn’t afford to defend the case, so a Federal Judge ruled her guilty in absentia and imposed an $8000 fine, which she can’t afford to pay either, due to hospital bills. The amount of songs allegedly shared: 10.

Sauro denies the claim: “Look and see where it (the downloads) came from, and look and see that it’s not me. It’s not fair to do to me.” Better still, the Internet account in the lawsuit was opened by her estranged father, who doesn’t live at the same address.

It’s really a sad state of affairs when the seriously ill can be hounded like this without any affordable legal recourse. The law is for the rich, so they say. The good news according to a local report, Pittsburgh Attorney James Brink has offered to represent the Sauros for free and will ask a judge to reopen the case.

RIAA’s latest target: seriously sick teen is a post from: The Inquisitr

This pic did the rounds earlier in the week, but for those who missed it, it’s still brilliant.

Via JPG, She’s just an innocent bystander. Or is she?

Firestarter is a post from: The Inquisitr