CHAPEL HILL, NC – Google may be talking to a handful of social game makers about a new social networking service that may challenge Facebook, which climbed to 500 million users recently, according to a report in the Wall Street Journal. Among the companies the WSJ said Google has talked with is Playdom.

Social games maker Playdom, which sold to Disney for $563 million in a deal disclosed Tuesday, operates a studio in Chapel Hill, NC. Playdom acquired NC-based Merscom in April.

The WSJ story says Google also talked to Electronic Arts Playfish and Zynga Game Network, in which Google has a stake.

Google may be planning a site to rival Facebook. It’s attempt to create a social networking site via Google Buzz seems to have fizzled. We don’t know anyone using Google Buzz regularly among our many contacts.

Playdom CEO John Pleasants will be one of many top Internet gurus addressing the 2010 Internet Summit Nov. 17-18 in Raleigh NC.

Related Stories:

• Google+ tops 20M users in 3 weeks, comScore says
• Microsoft adding social networking feature to Outlook
• Playdom buying NC social game developer, Merscom
• Yahoo adding Facebook Connect, Google inlcuding Twitter login option
• Google adding Google Buzz to Gmail

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Tags: Acquisitions, Disney, Internet Summit, Playdom Google