Home / Poker News July 2012 / The Poker Grapevine – Zynga Mulling Real Money Gaming?
The Poker Grapevine – Zynga Mulling Real Money Gaming?
Posted by: James Carter. - Tue, 2012-07-24 15:35
Online gaming giant Zynga has for years stuck to a policy of free gaming and revenue-generation through ads and in-game micro-transactions of virtual goods. Their position has changed when it became clear that the legalization of real money
online poker and possibly even gambling was a ‘when’ question rather than an ‘if’ one. They haven’t exactly made a secret of the fact that they were indeed interested in offering their players the possibility to play online for real money and all their recent moves seem to point to the fact that they are indeed zeroing in on the objective. The company has recently distanced itself from Facebook, where its free-to-play social games had earned it much popularity, and it apparently began mulling over the purchase of an online poker network.
The Ongame network seems like the perfect prize for Zynga, and indeed, rumor has it that following the failed acquisition of the company by Shuffle Master, Zynga are among the front-runners in a group of companies interested in picking up the bwin.party asset.
Other companies apparently interested in working with Zynga are Playtech and GTECH G2. While acknowledging that real money online gaming would indeed fit Zynga like a glove, the company stopped short of confirming any sort of interest in Ongame or in working with any of the above said real money gaming platform providers.
In other news: Elisabeth Hille was the woman who almost made the 2012 WSOP Main Event final table. She got knocked out on the bubble, in 11th place, after she put in a rather dominating performance through the previous days. She picked up $590k for her efforts, and it now looks like that wasn’t her only reward. The Norwegian amateur who apparently worked as a waitress before the WSOP, will become a Betfair Poker pro, representing the brand in her home country. She will join John Tabatabai and Peter Eastgate onboard.
