In recent weeks we’ve been hearing rumors about gaming giant EA (ERTS) looking to acquire social gaming companies–specifically Zynga and Playfish. Both social gaming companies have denied the rumors, so assuming there are no deals that are about to be inked and announced, here’s what appears to be going on.

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A variety of social network gaming applications are making lots of money from virtual goods. But could these services soon find themselves in trouble for allowing gambling — and get slapped with large fines or other punishment?

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Ever heard the phrase, “Why is everyone always talking about Twitter?” Well, here’s the reason, maybe. The micromessaging service is getting half of social network Facebook’s press coverage, according to Google Trends stats for both companies in the U.S.–even though searches for Facebook dwarf searches for Twitter. Why are there more searches for Facebook than for Twitter in the U.S.? Because Facebook has more than 46 million monthly active users here while Twitter gets an undisclosed, but certainly lesser amount of twaffic, I mean traffic.

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Facebook’s developer platform was a watershed. It gave outside companies unprecedented access to users of a major social network. But the platform, launched in May, has come under increasing scrutiny. Facebook has continued to change the technology and the rules governing what developers can and can’t do on the site. The issue is whether or not Facebook’s platform, including newly-launched “Facebook Connect,” is stable enough to justify other companies making the effort to use it.

Heralded last year as one of the most exciting new areas for investment, the platform has seen its hype diminish, even as it has gradually matured. But third-party applications are doing better than ever, Facebook says–especially apps built to make use of the redesigned interface the company introduced this fall.

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Mobile software operating system Android is coming soon, at least on one device–and that device will have a way for third-party applications to get access to users. The Google-led software initiative will offer a service called Android Market, a way to find, maybe purchase and download third-party applications (and maybe other content?). This is like what Apple’s App Store is for the iPhone and iPod. But there are some differences, according to the Android team post about it today.

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Tech bloggers and investors have come up with a new parlor game: Guessing Facebook’s “real” valuation. Nobody seems to believe the company’s official $15 billion valuation that it announced when it raised its most recent, not-yet-closed round from Microsoft and others.

The latest guess: A new study out today by VC Experts pegs the valuation at $12.5 billion, a number derived from the firm’s proprietary valuation-calculation methodology and based on numbers from numerous public documents. Take a look. This is perhaps the most well-researched guess yet, and includes lots of details like stock prices on the dates of various funding rounds.

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Facebook has finally started integrating its new redesign into its main site. The company is betting that what users want to do is publish more information about themselves, and see more about their friends activities. The thing is, do most Facebook users actually want to do those things?

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Movie, television and radio writers have been striking since last fall. Meanwhile, “American Idol”’s ratings dropped sharply versus this time last year, and that’s a show that doesn’t need writers. Why? Well, viewers are going online. YouTube traffic has gone up 18% over the last two months, and Sony’s Crackle (formerly Grouper) has doubled from 1.2 million to 2.4 million users over the course of last fall, according to Nielsen Online.

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On Dec. 14, Google’s RSS feed reader application, Google Reader, introduced a new way for Google-defined “friends” to see your “shared” feed items. At that point, the feature caused this reporter to blow a fuse, because I realized Reader was letting competing bloggers automatically see my shared feed items.

Then, only a couple of others wondered about the move. But this past week, more fuses have been blowing, as Reader users discovered that business competitors, politically sensitive relatives, ex-lovers and others were getting access to items that Reader users thought they were only sharing with selected confidantes.

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It’s been a little more than a month since the last rumors surfaced about social news site Digg trying to sell itself for at least $300 million. A reliable source just confirmed the company’s plans, noting the company has hired Allen & Company, a tiny but influential private investment firm, to help broker a deal.

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