FarmVille: Inactive "mutual friends" pop-ups cause annoyance for farmers

Zynga has launched a new set of pop-ups and wall posts in FarmVille apparently in an attempt to bring players back to the farm (that is, those players that have become inactive because they haven't played the game over an extended period of time).

Now, when visiting a friends' farm, if you have any mutual friends with that person that also plays FarmVille, you will see a pop-up like the one above, asking you to help bring that lost, inactive player back to the game. Clicking on "Accept" shows you a wall post like the one below, where you can post to that neighbor's wall, saying that you miss seeing them playing the game, and speaking for your friend in the process.
As you might expect, the hassle of seeing new pop-ups each time players visit neighbors hasn't been sitting well with friends, and a forum thread has started on the official FarmVille forums to protest its inclusion. While players are annoyed that they have to skip another pop-up just to get back to playing, the entire situation is compacted due to the fact that sometimes, users are being told to post on walls of currently active players, meaning that Zynga's algorithm for determining inactive players is apparently bugged.

Players like DesertRain seem to sum up the concerns nicely:

    I don't like it. There's a reason the one person isn't playing and now I am supposed to spam them back into the game? To me this is wrong on so many levels.


DesertRain has a point. Players aren't going to stop playing FarmVille simply because they forget the game exists. There has to be a reason for them to stop playing, whether that be the fact that they simply aren't having any fun, the fact that they don't like a particular feature or way certain in-game elements are handled or so on. That being the case, it will be interesting to see if this method actually works to bring back any players whatsoever, but I guess we'll give Zynga the benefit of the doubt for at least trying.

What do you think of this new system? Do you see a purpose in finding out who your inactive neighbors are? Do you think anyone who receives these wall posts would actually come back to the game?