Zynga

Zynga is a video game making company, and is considered to be "The Most Profitable Company Ever" (businessinsider.com), and the new face of video games. Specializing in creating virtual operant conditioning chambers instead of real games, Zynga has succesfully created multiple video games with the sole purpose of being highly addictive and profitable. In fact, there have been several deaths that have been linked to Zynga, but only one ever confirmed, the case of Alexandria Tobias, where the woman shook her toddler to death after his cries interrupted a playing session of FarmVille. Zynga has also created the world's most popular online poker game, Zynga Poker. All of the games are purposed to be the most addictive games on the internet, which allows Zynga to have a circumstance so that it "(relies) on a small percentage of (its) players for nearly all of (its) revenues".

Considering its revenues of more than 850 million dollars in 2010, they must be pumping quite a bit of money per person. Why are they succesful? Playing the game is free, so how do they generate revenue? By using B.F. Skinner's Variable Reward Schedule inside their games, Zynga has been able to persuade users to pay real money to partially reset the ratio of the VRS, meaning that, in exchange for money, the rewards will become easier to achieve.

But this also means that Zynga is penetrating the subconscious-conscious threshold and interfering with the user's decision on a level that they are unable to control. Some have compared it to brainwashing.