It appears that Zynga and its FarmVille franchise have drawn middle-aged mothers' eyes from the TV set to the computer screen. AdWeek reports that ABC's imminent closure of both All My Children and One Life to Live is thanks to Zynga's 259 million fans of games like CityVille and FrontierVille. Both shows have been doomed to enternal rest this coming Sept., while Mark Pincus and crew have experienced record turnouts that blow these lunchtime serial dramas away.
AdWeek cites that between 2007 and 2011, the ratings for these two decades-old programs plummeted in the 25 to 54-year-old demographic. (Does that sound familiar?) All the while, the monthly player base for FarmVille peaked at 80 million in early 2010 and CityVille peaked at over 100 million players later that year. "Women at home used to have these virtual friends, these soap stars," Maria Bailey, author of Mom 3.0, said to AdWeek. "Now their virtual friends have come alive, and they don't need one-way conversations. I grew up on Susan Lucci, but Susan Lucci doesn't talk back to me."
While this is all, of course, speculation, the primary demographics for both soaps and social games do match almost exactly. Is it a coincidence that as Susan Lucci slowly drifted from the minds of mommies in their late 30s, a digital farm was there to fill the void? Possibly, but maybe ABC should have taken a cue from England's ATV.
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