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Topic: Social Enterprise

MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

Summary: Latest figures show MySpace had lost 10 million users in the space of a month. Could the site be killed off by the end of this year?

Zack Whittaker

By for iGeneration |

The latest statistics suggests that MySpace is on its way out, as one of the longest serving social networks on the web.

comScore figures show that MySpace losts 10 million users last month. As the cornerstone to the younger days of the Generation Y, the site is facing dark days after it had lost nearly 50 million users from over the course of last year.

Since the site moved away from 'traditional' social networking to a more music based site, MySpace chief executive Mike Jones conceded defeat to Facebok, arguing that the site is "no longer a social network anymore", and that it was now a "social entertainment destination".

Since News Corp. bought the company for $530 million in 2005, MySpace cuts to jobs with over 500 staff worldwide being forced out of a job.

But if MySpace is losing so many in such a short space of time, could the site be offline come the end of the year?

MySpace is supported by a few notably large music groups, like the Arctic Monkeys and Lily Allen. But it's largely a one way street, with music artists seeing the site as a conduit for either better communication with fans and listeners, or a larger scope for potential sales.

However, if comScore figures are anything to go by - then it will not be long before artists cancel or fail to renew their contracts with the site, once they realise that there are better and more viable alternatives for users to take to.

While Facebook may not be the greatest place for a musician or artist to take to, YouTube is and has been a suitable alternative. With combined music and video, plus an interactive format that is keeping up with its userbase, it is a far more 'liberal' atmosphere. Though, granted, YouTube suffers from an excessive flamebait war problem, it is nevertheless an ideal, passive and 'non-sign-in' needed place to go to access reliable and interactive content.

News Corp. has failed MySpace by not allowing the site to keep up with the times. Perhaps it was used to access the numbers of users required to boost other sites, in a 'human shield' like defence? Either way, I would be surprised if MySpace survives the year.

It would be a shame to let it go, but there's only so many times one can transplant a new organ to an already dying body. 

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Topics: Social Enterprise, Collaboration

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21 comments
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  • I love how people overanalyze

    What you are describing with MySpace has happened to almost every other "It" phenomenon on the internet. Sites spring up, get popular, get superseded, and then die off. The people who are gambling their retirement on Facebook, Twitter, Tumblr and the rest should do a little historical reading. Even YouTube is starting to show strain as more restrictions and over-aggressive copyright policing are encouraging people to defect to alternative sites.<br><br>Social sites often succumb to one of a small number of diseases: over-commercialization, heavy-handed moderation or intervention, and plain old boredom. As with many other forms of technology, users assume that "newer is better" and are willing to jump to new sites with few qualms. Especially when it's so easy to post the link to the new hottest place as your last entry.

    Excuse me while I go update my GeoCities site, oh wait ...
    terry flores
    Reply Vote

    • Sweet memories

      @terry flores

      Geoworks on my 286. Wow, that was something.
      Economister
      Reply Vote

    • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

      @terry flores

      Ah yes, GeoCities. One of the best. Until Yahoo took them and gutted them of their best features. It went downhill from there :(.
      CobraA1
      Reply Vote

    • Do Not Trust News Corp!!!

      @terry flores

      Open Letter To News Corp:

      Dear Rupert, Chase, and Jonathan,

      Bet you never thought your mistakes, as well as your practice of lying to people, would ever become public did you?

      Would assume it is hard to dispute the facts when there are correspondences and audio recordings of all communications that support said representations as it relates to the conduct and activities by, and/or on the behalf of, News Corp, MySpace, and its representatives.

      If Chase, Jonathan, or Rupert would personally, and on behalf of News Corp and MySpace, provide authorization and permission to release all correspondences and recorded telephone conversations related to this matter. We would be willing to accommodate that request by providing to several media outlets, including Fox News, all related materials so that a ?fair and balanced? determination could be made as to how News Corp does business.

      This shall also allow outside individuals, parties, media and the pubic to determine how badly Carey and Miller, through their activities and conduct, destroyed MySpace and drove it from a success to a complete failure.

      As a result of their unwillingness to further discuss and initiate a process that would have generated the stated revenues and results as referenced due to their egos and the greed obstructing their ability to apply common sense and to utilize their brains. They have effectively destroyed MySpace and drove its value down more than any other reasons for the decline and eventual failure of MySpace.

      We shall see if Carey, Miller, or Murdoch are willing to let the public in on the truth, and provide authorization so that the referenced material may be released, as well as all related documentation in support of the representations that have been made as they relate to this matter.

      Here are the facts; Carey and Miller were provided the opportunity to change the direction of MySpace last year with a proposal that would increase net profits of MySpace to 1.5 billion dollars by the third year.

      Based on our experience with News Corp, Carey, and Miller no one should trust any of them.

      They wanted us to disclose the plan to them without any written agreement in place. When that was refused, there were no further discussions. And for the record New Corp has a documented history of being given ideas and concepts and then incorporated said ideas or concepts. They later claim that they already had been developing that idea or concept, and effectively cut out the parties providing them with any such ideas or concepts. This knowledge not only comes from other such occurrences that were learned, but also from prior experiences in dealing with News Corp. Bottom line you can not trust News Corp if there is not an agreement and detailed documentation and records maintained when doing any business with News Corp.

      I would venture to guess anyone they claim to be offering more than 10 million dollars for MySpace would be another one of their lies considering the current state and condition of MySpace.

      It is believed that the damage that Carey and Miller have done to MySpace has brought the value of MySpace down to nothing.

      Anyone willing to pay the 50 to 200 million dollars for MySpace as News Corp alleges would mean one of two things. EITHER THEY LIED TO MYSPACE ABOUT WHAT THEY WERE WILLING TO PAY,,,,

      OR MORE LIKELY IS NEWS CORP, CAREY, AND MILLER ARE LYING AGAIN IN AN EFFORT TO DRIVE THE PRICE UP.

      TIME WILL TELL!!!
      Lindsay LilHo
      Reply Vote

      • Assumes facts not in evidence

        @Lindsay LilHo It's clear the context that would help make sense of your comment is in your brain, but not in mine. What the heck are you talking about?
        caburlingame
        Reply Vote

    • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

      @terry flores
      Sites do not simply die. They are made obsolete by better sites, or they change in such a way that makes them less desirable to their existing customers.

      Youtube is in no danger of dying. It has changed with the times. If it keeps changing appropriately, it will be with us a long long time.
      Timhfl386
      Reply Vote

  • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

    Myspace failed because it was poorly written and crashed way too often... People were willing to do without the music if it meant the site would be up and stable when they wanted it to be.

    This service went balls to the wall on features and ended up being too much for their infrastructure to handle... Once people left, it started a vacuum where the users friends were no longer on the site so why keep the account? This resulted in many jumping to Facebook or Twitter.
    slickjim
    Reply Vote

  • Memories...

    I'll always remember MySpace for some of the very worst web pages I've ever seen. Terribly cluttered, randomly organized monstrosities with excessive animations and loud music blaring in the background. Not to mention my psychotic ex-gf getting mad at me for not logging in frequently enough to respond to her comments as quickly as she expected.
    BKGrila
    Reply Vote

  • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

    Excellent news, now to watch the rest of the Murdoch pay wall suffer the same fate.
    Alan Smithie
    Reply Vote

  • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

    Too much spam on that site. Good to see it dieing off.
    LP212
    Reply Vote

  • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

    Well if the people who ran the website would stop messing about with it, people wouldn't be closing their accounts!! MySpace used to be so user-friendly and now it is just so frustrating to use. I preferred the wonderfully simple format they had a couple of years ago when I joined. It was easy to create events, easy to invite people to your gigs and really easy to navigate your way around the site. Nowadays, you have to type in each individual person you want to invite to gigs (there are too many - I don't have time!!!) and, trying to create an event recently, I was faced with trying to communicate with the site in every language but my own (English)!! Come on MySpace, buck your ideas up, quit messing around with the site and bring us back the wonderfully simple site that we had 2 or 3 years ago!! LPLxx
    Lilprincessleia
    Reply Vote

    • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

      @Lilprincessleia
      It used to be way user friendly, things were much easier to find and navigate around then it just became not worth it. The more they change the less interested I became in it.
      I was one of the 10 million that cancelled their accounts last month.
      originalhandy
      Reply Vote

      • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

        @originalhandy I agree, what was once a fun site has now become almost unmanageable. Millions of people have pleaded for myspace to revert back to the way it was and only make needed changes and not the vast sweeping changes that it wanted to make that nobody on the site wanted them to make.
        cop911
        Reply Vote

  • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

    "Though, granted, YouTube suffers from an excessive flamebait war problem"

    Name me ANY open forum on the internet that doesn't -_-. That's par for the course.
    CobraA1
    Reply Vote

    • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

      @CobraA1
      "Name me ANY open forum on the internet that doesn't -_-."

      I agree. ZDNet often suffers similar problems from childish idiots.
      Restricted_access
      Reply Vote

  • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

    One day, Myspace will be studied in business schools as the perfect example of how to run your company into the ground. EVERY stupid mistake a company could make, Myspace is proudly making them, and not learning from their stupid mistakes.

    Good riddance.
    thombone
    Reply Vote

  • The simple fact is...

    The simple fact is that if you have a site that's around for a long time, you increase your chances of making a fatal mistake. That's all. They do not die out for no reason. Usually when a rival site pops up, the first site only dies because it panics and tries to do something drastic and clever. Then people like "the analysts" say "pah, it's dying, I knew it would," and it becomes a self-fulfilling prophecy. It's very easy to say that and look clever because it's a heck of a lot easier to die than it is to live forever, no matter how healthy you are.
    Naryan
    Reply Vote

  • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

    Myspace definitely has its problems, but in the end I'm not sure that two completely vanilla 'social' networks could have survived. The "network" effect means that there's more benefit the more people who join the site, so unless you have some other way to distinguish yourself (ala LinkedIn) you're sunk. Could MySpace have been the victor? Perhaps. But once Facebook gained the upper hand, MySpace didn't have much chance. <br><br>Now it's time to make fun of errors in the article. "Mike Jones conceded defeat to Facebok?" Facebok, the networking site for chickens? Come on, ZDNet, spring for a copy editor. I know, I know, the great thing about blogs is that they're 'immediate' and 'intimate'. But once you start conflating blogs and news, you should get at least an unpaid Intern or something!
    OvertlyPedantic
    Reply Vote

  • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

    Reminds me of the complete arse ITV in the UK made of Friends Reunited, or AOL flushing billions of $$ of Time Warner shareholder value down the toilet.

    However, give it 5-10 years, something else will come along and Facebook and Twitter will be going downhill too.

    To be honest nether of them seem to have banked any sustainable, credible, audtable bottom line profits, or shown a business plan for the future.

    Indeed, about the only people making decent money off the Internet are Amazon (though it took them almost 10 years, and it questionable whether they have paid back the initial start-up capital), Tesco.com (built on a foundation of retail store based internet fullfillment and van delivery) and Google. Microsoft haven't made any money out of the internet.
    neilpost
    Reply Vote

  • RE: MySpace lost 10 million users in a month; Close within the year?

    Isn't it the well known "Anti-Midas" Murdoch Effect? : Converting gold into any other worthless substance.
    raul62
    Reply Vote
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