When Justin Timberlake & Specific Media LLC bought Myspace.com, reportedly at $35 million, I was really curious to know as to what went wrong with the company. After all, it had been acquired by News Corp. at a whopping $580 million only 6 years ago. Even that amount comes across as a paltry sum when compared with its peak valuation in 2007, a cool $12 billion!
gap
Since its inception in 2003, Myspace had been leading the social media sites pack till March 2008. The following month, Facebook overtook it in the number of unique world wide visitors. It took Facebook another year or so to overtake Myspace in the USA rankings. Since then, it has been a downward spiral with no sign of a turnaround for the company to which many a widget or accessories providers like YouTube, Flickr, Zynga, RockYou!, Slide.com etc. owe their successes to. In fact, now a days, one can access Myspace with a Facebook ID! They are trying to position themselves as a complimentary service to Facebook instead of being a competitor.
gap
So, what went wrong with the first real behemoth in the social media field?
gap
There are many explanations and counter-explanations. But, as an early user of both Myspace & Facebook, I have experienced the good, the bad and the ugly sides of both. Myspace came across as too dependent on music & entertainment, that too, probably heavily tilted towards the tastes of a USA-centric audience. While Facebook, which initially looked cumbersome, added newer features, games, better security etc. to provide the users a whole "social media" experience, Myspace chose to remain largely the same, without caring for innovations.
gap
Moreover, Myspace had tied up with Google for a consideration of $900 million which enabled Google to serve ads based on Google Ad-sense. While this provided cash inflow for Myspace, it actually resulted in further slowing down of the site. At the same time, Facebook had been providing a clean, fast loading home page, which added with the offerings from different widget providers, further enhanced its appeal. At the same time, Myspace decided to do everything themselves and in trying to do that, spread themselves too thin instead of developing around the core idea of social networking.
gap
Security vulnerability was another negative aspect. Myspace was viewed as less secured than Facebook, which indeed was true to a large extent. The publicised incidents of cyber stalking & identity theft further dented its credentials. Ironically, this can happen in any social networking site.
gap
Probably, the last nail in Myspace's coffin was hit by its targeted user groups themselves. The "Myspace parties", where adolescent users organized parties and chose to spread the news over Myspace, leading to creation of law & order situations & even death of a teenager, created an overall negative perception among the prospective users. Myspace was being viewed by many as a part of the underground social network. While Facebook has been successful in attracting users from all age groups - young and the old alike, Myspace could not attract the older users and its appeal was more or less limited to the 13 years to 24 years age group.
gap
All these factors, combined together, led to a downfall in the fortunes of the very first truly successful social networking site. While many others started with the Myspace model in mind and then gradually redefined and reinvented themselves depending on the market responses, Myspace failed to change itself with the changing times and ultimately, has become an also-ran today with a user base of around 30 million unique users. The way its fortunes have nosedived, it will be nothing less than a miracle if the present owners - piggybacking on Justin Timberlake's popularity, to some extent - can turn things around. Till then, its fate has been signed and sealed. Just like the Myspace User ID and Password, that I have forgotten over the years, it has been all but removed from the average users' memory.
gap
Since its inception in 2003, Myspace had been leading the social media sites pack till March 2008. The following month, Facebook overtook it in the number of unique world wide visitors. It took Facebook another year or so to overtake Myspace in the USA rankings. Since then, it has been a downward spiral with no sign of a turnaround for the company to which many a widget or accessories providers like YouTube, Flickr, Zynga, RockYou!, Slide.com etc. owe their successes to. In fact, now a days, one can access Myspace with a Facebook ID! They are trying to position themselves as a complimentary service to Facebook instead of being a competitor.
gap
So, what went wrong with the first real behemoth in the social media field?
gap
There are many explanations and counter-explanations. But, as an early user of both Myspace & Facebook, I have experienced the good, the bad and the ugly sides of both. Myspace came across as too dependent on music & entertainment, that too, probably heavily tilted towards the tastes of a USA-centric audience. While Facebook, which initially looked cumbersome, added newer features, games, better security etc. to provide the users a whole "social media" experience, Myspace chose to remain largely the same, without caring for innovations.
gap
Moreover, Myspace had tied up with Google for a consideration of $900 million which enabled Google to serve ads based on Google Ad-sense. While this provided cash inflow for Myspace, it actually resulted in further slowing down of the site. At the same time, Facebook had been providing a clean, fast loading home page, which added with the offerings from different widget providers, further enhanced its appeal. At the same time, Myspace decided to do everything themselves and in trying to do that, spread themselves too thin instead of developing around the core idea of social networking.
gap
Security vulnerability was another negative aspect. Myspace was viewed as less secured than Facebook, which indeed was true to a large extent. The publicised incidents of cyber stalking & identity theft further dented its credentials. Ironically, this can happen in any social networking site.
gap
Probably, the last nail in Myspace's coffin was hit by its targeted user groups themselves. The "Myspace parties", where adolescent users organized parties and chose to spread the news over Myspace, leading to creation of law & order situations & even death of a teenager, created an overall negative perception among the prospective users. Myspace was being viewed by many as a part of the underground social network. While Facebook has been successful in attracting users from all age groups - young and the old alike, Myspace could not attract the older users and its appeal was more or less limited to the 13 years to 24 years age group.
gap
All these factors, combined together, led to a downfall in the fortunes of the very first truly successful social networking site. While many others started with the Myspace model in mind and then gradually redefined and reinvented themselves depending on the market responses, Myspace failed to change itself with the changing times and ultimately, has become an also-ran today with a user base of around 30 million unique users. The way its fortunes have nosedived, it will be nothing less than a miracle if the present owners - piggybacking on Justin Timberlake's popularity, to some extent - can turn things around. Till then, its fate has been signed and sealed. Just like the Myspace User ID and Password, that I have forgotten over the years, it has been all but removed from the average users' memory.
