If so, you might be eligible to join a $5M class action lawsuit against Zynga, the high profile social gaming website that hosts virtual games such as Mafia Wars. Offer-based ads are simply a clickable advertisement with a discount/offer for a product or service and are considered to be the secret to monetizing social games. As a result, they are considered to be superior to standard banner ads. However, Zynga has come under fire for"scamming" its users through these offer-based ads (which isn't a surprise considering that Zynga's CEO, Mark Pincus, has been quoted as saying that the company has "done every horrible thing in the book" to generate revenue). It seems that Zynga's offer-based ads have "scammed" users into paying for things that they did not want and giving up their personal info. In several instances, users have been hit with unauthorized credit, debit, or mobile charges.
The initial lawsuit was also going after Facebook since the company made nearly 10 to 20% of its revenue from Zynga's games. The lawsuit accused Facebook of actively promoting Zynga's games despite knowing about the misleading offer-based ads that the games contained. Facebook has since been dropped from the lawsuit without explanation.
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