Myspace

MySpace

MySpace logo File:MySpace screenshot.png Typical MySpace profile (MySpace founder Tom Anderson's profile shown here)
Type of site	social network service
Owner	News Corporation
Created by	Tom Anderson
Commercial	mixed
Registration	yes

MySpace is a social networking website offering an interactive network of photos, blogs, user profiles, groups, and an internal e-mail system. As of March 2006 it is the world's fifth most popular English-language website and the eighth most popular in the world (according to Alexa Internet). Note that this is based on exceptionally intense usage by a relatively limited number of visitors, many more than five English language sites have a higher "reach" measurement, that is they are visited by more different people each day. MySpace has outstripped competitors such as MSN Spaces, Friendster and LiveJournal to become the most popular English-language social networking website with higher traffic and over 72.2 million registered accounts. It has become an increasingly influential part of contemporary teenage culture, especially in the Anglosphere.

History

Prior to the creation of the currentsocial networking website the MySpace.com domain name was registered in 1998 to an online storage and file sharing firm. Registration was free and users were able to obtain a small disk quota which would gradually increase if they referred new members to the site. Due to slow service and a lack of revenue, the site shut down and sold all of its users' information in 2001 .

Prior to that use, MySpace.com was home to a web design firm.

The current MySpace service was founded in July 2003 by Tom Anderson (who is an alumnus of both UC Berkeley and UCLA), the current president, Chris DeWolfe (a graduate of USC's Marshall School of Business), the current CEO, and a small team of programmers. It was partially owned by Intermix Media, which was bought in July 2005 for $580 million by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation (the parent company of Fox Broadcasting and other media enterprises) . In January 2006, Fox announced plans to launch a UK version of MySpace in a bid to "tap into the UK music scene" .

The creators of MySpace have hosted many parties in Hollywood, Jacksonville, Miami, Orlando, New York City, Chicago, Boston, San Francisco, Seattle, Hawaii, and McAllen, Texas to support the site.

MySpace is also home to various independent musicians, who post songs directly on their profile. These songs can also be uploaded onto other profiles. Because of the high popularity, mainstream musicians have entered this trend as well. CDs of independent music are sold in various establishments.

In February 2006, amateur filmaker David Lehre released a short film entitled MySpace: The Movie, which has quickly become an Internet phenomenon, registering over 6 million hits in the first three months following its release. (See The MySpace Movie). It was also featured in a popular internet show, Pure Pwnage, where in episode 10 the main character Jeremy loses his girlfriend and logs on to MySpace in an attempt to rationalise the world's pain. (The entire piece of the show features a song called "Get out of MySpace", and the entire piece is used as a stab against MySpace users)

Also in this month, most of the BBC Radio 1 DJs have set up a profile and are mentioning it very frequently. This is somewhat controversial as the BBC usually avoids any mention of individual companies.

Contents of a MySpace profile

Each profile contains two standard "blurbs": "About Me" and "Who I'd Like to Meet." Profiles also can contain sections about standard interests, such as music, television, books, and movies, as well as specific personal details, such as marital status, physical appearance, and income. Profiles also contain a blog. A part of customizing one's MySpace is uploading images onto their site. One of the images can be chosen to be the "default image," the image that will be seen on the profile's main page and as the image that will appear to the side of the user's name on comments, messages, etc. MySpace has also recently added the option to upload videos.

There is also a count of the friends the user has. A total of eight friends, or the "Top 8," are shown directly on the profile, with a link to a page which lists all of the user's friends. The "Top 8" became vigorous as people lost or gained friendship, because they were to be seen on someone else's. Below this is the "comments" section, wherein the user's friends may leave comments about the user for all viewers to read. Most users tend to leave comments that are viewed by all to be personal, leaving the whole MySpace network to read their business.

MySpace profile layouts can have the entire look changed with many different editors available from other websites. For example; one can change their "Top 8" to show any number of friends, or hide the feature. Using HTML and CSS, the colors, background and foreground images, table style, scroll bar style and color, could be changed to suit their preference. One can also add music to their profile either by visiting an artist's page and choosing a song from MySpace's music player, or using a customized music player or embedded media file.

Criticism of MySpace

Accessibility

There are often accessibility problems on users' profiles, stemming from the fact that MySpace is set up so that people can customize the layout and colors of their profile page with virtually no restrictions. As most MySpace users are not skilled web developers, this sometimes causes some problems. Poorly constructed MySpace profiles have been known to freeze up web browsers due to malformed CSS coding, or as a result of users placing many high bandwidth objects such as videos and Flash in their profiles.

Servers

MySpace servers are frequently down and millions of profile go out at once much to the frustration of those online.

MySpace in educational settings

Many schools and public libraries accross the US and the UK have begun to restrict access to MySpace because it has become "such a haven for student gossip and malicious comments". Some private schools have even attempted to ban their pupils from accessing MySpace at home.

MySpace and professionalism

Chicago Tribune's RedEye printed an article concerning MySpace and an individual's search for employment. It was argued that young college graduates compromise their chances of starting careers because of the content they post on their accounts. For instance, a visitor does not need an account to browse for users using information that is readily available on resumes and applications, such as a zip code and age. A potential employer can use information provided by the applicant on MySpace's browse component. Thus, the employer may not hire a highly qualified candidate because he or she maintains an account suggesting rambunctious behavior. Moreover, employees were said to be putting their careers at risk because they maintain blogs that criticize their respective companies and organizations.

MySpace and business

There are many people who are making careers out of promotion on MySpace.com. From bands, to celebrities, to exotic car dealers, many people have found MySpace to be an invaluable tool for advocating their goods and services. There are automated tools known as bots to help aid in increasing ones reach on MySpace, such as the one at iwalton.com, which have proved to be very effective, yet very annoying for some less commercially focused MySpace users.

See also

• List of social networking websites
• MySpace Records
• The MySpace Movie
• web 2.0

External links

• MySpace.com MySpace Homepage
• How MySpace Works HowStuffWorks
• Interview with MySpace.com co-founder Tom Anderson
• MySpace Invaders — a radio segment from WBUR in Boston's "Here & Now"
• The MySpace Generation Business Week Online
• MySpace: Design Anarchy That Works Web Design Commentary
• "Filling up MySpace" on MercatorNet, Feb 25, 2006
• MyCrimeSpace Chronicling the MySpace related crimes
• {http://www.mydeathspace.com/ MyDeathSpace] A database with links to profiles of deceased members