Money From Google Crimping MySpace's Style

from the caught-in-the-crossfire dept

Wed, Feb 7th 2007 8:19am — Joseph Weisenthal

Last summer, News Corp. seemed to vindicate its purchase of MySpace when it signed a $900 million advertising pact with Google. Now News Corp. may be wondering whether it got more than it bargained for when it signed that deal. The Wall Street Journal is reporting that finalizing the paperwork has hit a snag as News Corp. is concerned that the terms of the deal may prevent it from exploring other partnerships. In particular, the company is said to be in talks with eBay to bring "peer commerce" to its social network. It's not clear whether it makes sense to bring eBay-style auctions to the social networking site, but either way, Google isn't thrilled about letting its rival have this opportunity; its $900 million payment was in part a defensive measure to prevent other companies from getting at MySpace's base. Meanwhile, MySpace, which had hoped to play the role of kingmaker by awarding its traffic to the highest bidder, may be feeling a bit like a pawn stuck in the middle of a larger battle.

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Jeremy Boyd, 7 Feb 2007 @ 9:12am

"Meanwhile, MySpace, which had hoped to play the role of kingmaker by awarding its traffic to the highest bidder, may be feeling a bit like a pawn stuck in the middle of a larger battle."

I think this is a key point. MySpace is a small fish compared to a lot of more proven companies and business models out there. Sooner or later, advertisers are going to realize that the site is hideous to explore, completely unusable at times, and riddled with threats to the average web surfer. Like GeoCities before it, it will tumble.

Meanwhile, Google, Yahoo!, and eBay seem likely to carry on long after MySpace's demise. MySpace is just a tool in their larger battle. Is this surprising? Did anyone REALLY think a community of children with emotional problems would out-capitalize some of the better tech companies in the world?
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Wyatt, 7 Feb 2007 @ 9:28am

I would agree that myspace has a multitude of issues, but the user base is what’s important. No matter how messed up the site is or gets, it will still have a massive user base who are afraid to go anywhere else because they would have to start over with there friends list and customizations. The best thing for these companies to do is to upgrade or enhance the site. Keeping in mind the goal of the site and close to the original design. Hell, there is screwed up people everywhere, why not take advantage of the ones on myspace.

The model is, find the users and push content.
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arrg, 7 Feb 2007 @ 10:25am

Anyone who thinks myspace is just for kids
Hasn't been paying attention. I have an account with 111 friends, 3 of them are under 22 (my son, and my brothers kids) the rest are old friends from high school, college, and current people I know.

I use myspace as a way to keep in touch with people I don't talk with or see often. It's more interesting than email simply because I can pop on to my friends site and get a feel for what has been happening in their lives. The bulletins are great for making general announcements instead of emailing everyone, and there is always the pictures and music.

I have no interest in changing to some other site because of the base I've created and the site always works fine for me. I should also point out I joined netflix because of an ad on myspace showing a free trial, so advertising does work there...
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PhysicsGuy, 7 Feb 2007 @ 10:33am

Re: Anyone who thinks myspace is just for kids
myspace isn't just for kids, it's for egotistical douche bags of all ages.
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Anonymous Coward, 7 Feb 2007 @ 11:25am

Hey PhysicsGuy, is it egotistical to have friends?
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anonymous bum, 7 Feb 2007 @ 11:54am

Firewall vendors and old AOL users
All the firewall and spyware vendors that advertise on the local am station in my area love to say how they can block myspace.com for you to protect your children.

What does that say about the site?

People are concerned that all there are is a bunch of pedofiles looking for children there, which is not quite true. It is just a bunch of peeps that don't know how to really use the internet since they left AOL.
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Justin, 7 Feb 2007 @ 12:28pm

Re: Anyone who thinks myspace is just for kids
I actually agree with part of what you said. The part that said it's not just for kids. And that it's nice to browse their pages to see what's new (stalker-ish as it maybe.) It's nice to see new photos of someone you haven't seen in 10 years to see how much they have changed. We actually set up a reunion for my Highschool using myspace.

However... saying myspace is better then email is just... um... wrong. The bulletins I've all but stopped paying attention to because it's mostly usless random crap.

Those that think myspace is going away can just think about how long AOL has hung around.
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Witty Nickname, 7 Feb 2007 @ 1:13pm

MySpace Ads
I have a myspace account, and I use it occationally. I find their advertising scheme interesting. For example, myspace knows from my profile that I am a married male between 25-30. The biggest ads they show me are for an online dating site. At first I thought it was just a sad commentary on society until I saw one of the ads saying they do background checks to 'filter out marrieds'.

Seems to me myspace could make a lot more money showing even slightly targeted ads, instead of showing the exact same thing to (I assume) everyone.
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weebit, 7 Feb 2007 @ 7:00pm

kill the deal with ebay.
I do not want ebay on MYSpace. ebay has just too much fraud going on as it is. To permit it on MYspace would ruin the popular site. ebay is a auction site. It has nothing in common with MYspace except more people for the ebay fraudsters to con. This is one deal I hope never goes through. If it does I can see many leaving myspace just because it is no more than a penny grabbing vulture.
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Tesa, 18 Jun 2009 @ 11:48am

yes
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Tesa, 18 Jun 2009 @ 11:49am

yes
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