Zynga, makers of wildly popular Facebook games like Mafia Wars and FishVille, will be selling candy cane seeds to users of FarmVille for two weeks starting on December 1. 100 percent of the proceeds are going to be donated to the University of California, San Francisco, which is gathering pledges to build a new children's hospital.

This is a proven way for Zynga to raise cash for charity. They have, for example, raised $3 million for Haiti over two campaigns. And our understanding is that Zynga has ditched their occasional and controversial policy of keeping a percentage of proceeds from sale of charitable virtual goods.

We've also suggested to Zynga that they consider building a virtual children's hospital as well to deal with childhood obesity, diabetes and other medical issues that may pop up from all of this candy cane growing. They didn't seem to think that joke was funny.

The winner of the challenge will be given the right to name "The Link," a children's activity space for learning play and discovery in the new Hospital. I asked Zynga what they'll name it if they win. I don't think they've decided.

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