*Well, that's sure looking pretty ugly. And to think that blogs were supposed to look all creaky and old-fashioned compared to MySpace.
http://www.latimes.com/business/la-fi-ct-myspace17-2009jun17,0,6726077.story
(...)
"The history of social networks suggests that these sites have the fleeting popularity of a trendy nightclub. The site that's recognized as the birthplace of online communities, the Well, (((as in [email protected]))) gave way to the more broadly available America Online, which was eclipsed by Friendster – which itself became passe.
"'Each of these services supplants the one before. It takes the golden ring and everyone loves that, and they forget about the last one,' said Roger L. Kay, president of research firm Endpoint Technologies Associates. 'MySpace made sense at a particular date, that might have been 2003. At that moment, it was the place to be. . . . Now, they have to do some major spade work on the quality of the site if they want to maintain the eyeballs.'
(((So you might want to work for the new reformed MySpace if you're eager for a spade right in the eyeballs.)))
(((Cutting a third of the staff with no warning, then calling them "bloated," sounds like vindictiveness to me. Somebody's gotten angry... the craziness of the business has frustrated them and they've lashed out. I'm not naming any names here, but his initials are probably Rupert Murdoch.)))
(((Okay, forget the ailing "business model" – what kind of "business" is that in general? Why are social media a "business" at all? MySpace can't make money; Facebook has never had a business model in the first place; neither does Twitter. Should business just get out of this "business"? Who is happy in the MySpace story? The start-up team? The investors? The users? The staffers? Musicians? Rupert Murdoch? Is anybody happy about how this weird saga is playing out?)))
(((You can try the Chris Anderson business model – "actually, we don't make any money doing the things people really like us to do and want us to do – that good stuff is all given away for free, and we make our real money over here in the corner, secretly selling premier cottage cheese" – or whatever. But is that brilliant scheme gonna work when the "industry" itself is more volatile than a Tehran street crowd? How is that possible?)))
(((Look at the amazing fragility of these huge systems! It's like taking an entire music industry – which was, really and truly, a big solid industry – and turning it into a trendy nightclub. Which then catches fire and falls over every five years. I feel sorry for the global hordes of musicians who trustingly piled into MySpace. When are these hounded gypsy wretches gonna catch a break? It's like we're persecuting them when all they want to do is entertain us!)))
(((What are the MySpace contingent supposed to do with themselves when MySpace is in visible decline? The WELL is just fine – it costs about as much to run as a neighborhood grocery – but MySpace?! Are they supposed to Tweet their music at each other? How long before that platform succumbs, too?)))
(((I'm thinking we need a different model here, a social-good model. If we really want to spend all our time socializing on networks, and we don't want to spend any money doing that, and it isn't a profit center for anybody, and it only lasts five years tops, no matter how big it gets and how popular it gets... Then, really, these oughta be public services of some kind. And probably not American services. because the Americans are methodically destroying more wealth than most of the planet has ever seen, and American public services are lousy and tend to kill off the consumers.)))
(((Let Sweden buy MySpace and hire PirateBay to run it as a public utility. That oughta calm things down. Then we can run around in there at our ease, doing whatever it is we want to do to each other, without watching the whole thing melt faster than a polar icecap. Sweden can put a big Ikea logo on it and pretend to sell furniture if they want.)))
(((We're hurting ourselves in the way we do it. Talk about dead media – everything built in MySpace, and it's the play-labour of millions, for years – is in deadly peril right now. While the planet was burning we were in there shovelling sand, for the supposed benefit of a wicked mogul who could never make it work.)))
(((More:)))
http://www.technologyreview.com/wire/22883/page1/
"Earlier, Beverly Hills, Calif.-based MySpace decided against moving this month into a brand new 500,000-square-foot office complex in the west Los Angeles district of Playa Vista. It is still on the hook for a 12-year, $350-million lease, however, and is looking to sublet the space, according to building owner Lincoln Property Co."
(((Twelve-year lease, huh? Wow! I wonder if these precarious MySpace employees had health insurance and retirement plans.)))
