The rise and fall of myspace

Week 3; Post 1

"It once promised to redefine music, politics, dating, and pop culture. Rupert Murdoch fell in love with it. Then everything fell apart" (Gillette, 2011)

MySpace was one of the world’s largest social networks, with about 125 million users.

Myspace was once the place to be on the internet, where millions of people connected every day. Artists and celebrity figures relied on its popularity to support their rise to fame. Artists such as 'My Chemical Romance' and Lilly Allen used it's vast network of connections and fans to grow a name in the music industry.

At it's peak, In december 2008, myspace attracted 75.9 million uniques users a month.

Myspace was originally inspired by, it's predecessor of sorts, 'freindster'. It provided users with the flexibility to customise and personalise their page and share their activities with the rest of the world.

However ultimately myspace's main and only source of revenue would be it's undoing, advertising. At it's peak the site brought in an average of $470 million soley from advertising.

Towards the end of myspace's rein, users could barely stand the sight of the pathetic and parasitic adverts that had found their way onto the site. With this major flaw in the network, owners News Corp made a desperate attempt to sell the site for a measly $100 million, meaning a $480 million loss from their initial purchase price. Ultimately, mismanagement, flawed mergers, hunger for money and poor strategies and implementation caused the accelerated collapse of the once great, popular and highly priced network. 

Finally myspace was basically forgotten, it's remnants scattered throughout cyberspace as memories and discontinued accounts, shadowed by the current giant of the social internet, Facebook. Now the question remains, what will Facebook do to screw-up?

Gillette, F 2011. The Rise and Inglorious Fall of Myspace, viewed 9th August 2011, <http://www.businessweek.com/magazine/content/11_27/b4235053917570.htm>

MySpace, viewed 9th August 2011, <http://www.crunchbase.com/company/myspace>