• The New York Times, Tuesday, January 15, 2008 11:16 AM

Serial entrepreneur Mark Pincus believes that social networking provides the perfect platform for casual gaming. His new company, called Zynga, has spent the last several months creating simple card and board games that social networking users can add to their profiles and play with their friends. Considering that casual games have a tremendous reach across all demographics and social networks like MySpace and Facebook reach hundreds of millions of Web users, Pincus' plan seems like a lay-up. But the opportunity has only recently presented itself as social networks opened their platforms to third-party software developers like Zynga.

Under those deals, application developers can keep any ad revenue they generate. However, it's still unclear whether companies like Zynga, Rock You and Slide can rake in significant ad dollars. But application usage is ramping up. On Facebook, the first to open its doors to third-party developers, more than 7,000 applications have been created and more than 80 percent of its users have added at least one application to their profile.

Casual games could be a major play for Zynga. For Pincus and co., the idea is that casual gaming becomes more enticing when people know who they're playing against.

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