Fact-checked by Grok 2 weeks ago

Myspace

Myspace is an American founded in August 2003 by and as part of the marketing firm eUniverse. The platform emphasized user-customizable profiles, friend connections, blogging, and music sharing, quickly gaining traction among teenagers and young adults for its emphasis on self-expression through customization and integration with emerging digital music culture. At its zenith in the mid-2000s, Myspace attracted approximately 75.9 million unique monthly visitors by late 2008, briefly surpassing and as the most-visited website in the United States and establishing itself as the dominant before the rise of competitors. Acquired by in July 2005 for $580 million, Myspace's growth stalled amid technical debt, spammy user experiences, and failure to innovate against Facebook's cleaner interface and broader appeal to diverse demographics. The site's decline accelerated post-acquisition due to corporate mismanagement, including inadequate upgrades to its outdated codebase and inability to curb predatory interactions and ad overload, leading to a mass user migration by 2008–2009. sold Myspace in to Specific Media (now Viant) for $35 million, marking a stark devaluation from its purchase price. In subsequent years, Myspace pivoted toward a niche streaming and , retaining a small user base focused on content discovery rather than broad social networking, with ongoing operations as of 2025 but minimal cultural relevance compared to its former dominance.

Founding and Early Development

Launch and Initial Growth (2003–2005)

Myspace was founded by , , and Jon Hart in August 2003 as a social networking designed to overcome the technical glitches, slow performance, and strict content policies of , which had frustrated early users seeking more flexible online connections. The trio, working out of eUniverse's offices, prioritized features like friend lists, messaging, and highly customizable profiles to foster personal expression and community building. Launched publicly on August 1, 2003, the site initially appealed to young adults and fans by allowing bands to upload tracks directly to profiles, enabling grassroots without traditional gatekeepers. A core innovation was the permission to embed and in profiles, letting users alter layouts, backgrounds, fonts, and embedded media—capabilities Friendster curtailed to prevent server overloads. This user-centric design, combined with minimal moderation, spurred organic virality as profiles became digital extensions of , particularly for Los Angeles's creative scene where local musicians and event-goers shared content freely. Early adopters, drawn from 's dissatisfied migrant users, leveraged the platform's lax rules to build expansive networks, contrasting Friendster's rigid verification processes that stifled growth. By mid-2004, Myspace had amassed several million registered users, fueled by word-of-mouth among teens and young adults who valued its integration—such as auto-playing profile songs—and ease of friending without mutual approval hurdles. This momentum accelerated into 2005, with monthly reaching approximately million by , as the site's scalability improvements and focus on entertainment content outstripped competitors through network effects where each new profile amplified visibility for bands and peers. The emphasis on over polished interfaces established Myspace as a cultural hub for self-expression, setting the stage for broader adoption before corporate influences altered its trajectory.

Rise to Prominence

Peak Usage and Cultural Integration (2005–2008)

During this period, MySpace achieved its zenith in user engagement, reaching its 100 millionth registered member on August 9, 2006, with approximately 75 million total users and 15 million daily unique logins reported earlier that summer. In the , the platform drew 50 million unique visitors in May 2006 alone, accounting for a substantial share of social networking traffic and briefly surpassing as the most visited website domestically. This scale reflected its role as the primary online hub for teenagers, where over 90 percent of adolescents engaged with social networks like MySpace by mid-2007, often for peer communication and event coordination via built-in RSVP tools that bridged digital and physical social activities. MySpace's features fostered deep cultural integration, particularly through customizable profiles that emphasized self-expression and social hierarchies. The "Top 8" friends list, allowing users to publicly rank their closest contacts, became a flashpoint for interpersonal dynamics, generating excitement, rivalries, and real-world conflicts among youth as inclusions or exclusions signaled status. Celebrity profiles amplified this, with figures like Tila Tequila leveraging the platform to amass millions of friends and over 31 million profile views by April 2006, transitioning from online notoriety to mainstream media deals without traditional gatekeepers. In music, MySpace democratized discovery by enabling free song uploads and direct fan interactions, propelling independent artists past label barriers. , for instance, posted self-produced demos and mixtapes starting in November 2005, rapidly building a following that secured her major-label deal and chart success, exemplifying how the site's algorithm and sharing tools created viral pathways for unsigned talent. This ecosystem not only integrated MySpace into pop culture rituals—like playlist curation and band promotions—but also influenced broader trends in digital self-promotion and community formation during the mid-2000s.

Corporate Acquisition and Internal Challenges

News Corporation Ownership and Strategic Shifts (2005–2011)

In July 2005, News Corporation acquired Intermix Media, the parent company of MySpace, for $580 million in cash, integrating the platform into its newly formed Fox Interactive Media division. This move was intended to leverage synergies between MySpace's user base and News Corp's media assets, with early announcements emphasizing expanded features like video downloads and instant messaging enhancements to drive growth. However, the acquisition quickly introduced corporate oversight that prioritized short-term revenue generation over the platform's organic, user-driven evolution, leading to executive overhauls and a reorientation toward aggressive monetization. A key strategic shift occurred in August 2006, when MySpace secured a multi-year and search deal with , guaranteeing at least $900 million in revenue sharing from 2007 to 2010 for providing query results and display ads across the site. While this bolstered immediate financials—contributing to peak ad revenues exceeding $470 million by —the influx of Google-served ads increased site clutter, detracting from the customizable, community-focused experience that had fueled MySpace's appeal. Internal analyses later attributed early user retention challenges, including a slowdown in unique visitor growth amid rising competition from cleaner interfaces like , to this ad-heavy pivot, as corporate mandates emphasized advertiser-friendly placements over streamlined user navigation. Further illustrating profit-driven interventions, MySpace pursued acquisitions to bolster its music features, such as an unsuccessful bid for around 2008–2009, which former executives described as a failed effort to secure streaming capabilities amid label licensing costs exceeding $10 million annually for hosted . Instead of fostering internal in tools, resources shifted toward licensed media partnerships and deals, diluting the platform's emphasis on user-generated profiles and that had defined its pre-acquisition trajectory. These decisions, enforced by News Corp's layered management structure, correlated with strategic missteps like delayed site redesigns until 2010, by which point ad revenues had begun declining to projected $184 million for 2011, reflecting diminished advertiser confidence tied to eroding user engagement.

Onset of Decline and Operational Failures (2008–2011)

MySpace's unique monthly visitors peaked at approximately 75.9 million in early 2008 but began eroding steadily thereafter, dropping by about one million per month through 2010 amid intensifying competition from . By June 2011, the platform's user base had contracted to roughly 60 million following a sharp exodus, reflecting failures in retaining core demographics like students who favored 's streamlined, less cluttered . MySpace's tolerance for , ad-saturated profiles, and unmoderated content further alienated users seeking a cleaner experience, accelerating defections as enforced stricter and usability standards. Technical debt severely hampered scalability, with the platform's codebase described as a "massive spaghetti-ball" of legacy code accumulated during rapid early growth, rendering updates and feature additions inefficient. This architectural rigidity, often termed a "Big Ball of Mud," prevented agile responses to surging traffic demands and contributed to frequent outages, while MySpace lagged in mobile optimization as adoption rose post-2008. News Corporation's ownership exacerbated these issues through resource misallocation, including expansions into video services like MySpaceTV, which aimed to rival but yielded minimal user retention amid high operational costs. A pivotal 2010 redesign, version 4.0 launched in December, prioritized a , entertainment-focused layout over user —a hallmark of MySpace's appeal—prompting backlash from musicians and long-time users who found the changes disruptive and less expressive. Prior redesign attempts in –2008 had similarly confused users by altering navigation without resolving underlying clutter, failing to stem the tide of migration. Internally, leadership instability compounded operational woes: co-founder and CEO departed in April 2009 amid stalled growth, replaced by Owen Van Natta from , while co-founder stepped down from his presidential role shortly thereafter. responded with aggressive cost-cutting, including a 30% staff reduction in June 2009—from 1,420 to 1,000 employees—and a further 47% cut in January 2011, signaling short-term profit fixation over long-term innovation. These moves, coupled with $431 million in operating losses for fiscal 2010, underscored 's misalignment with the platform's organic, user-driven ethos, prioritizing monetization experiments that diluted its competitive edge.

Ownership Transitions and Restructuring

Sales and Time Inc./Meredith Era (2011–2019)

In June 2011, News Corporation sold MySpace to Specific Media, an online advertising firm, and musician Justin Timberlake for $35 million in cash and stock. This transaction marked a substantial devaluation from the $580 million paid for the platform in 2005, reflecting its diminished market position amid competition from Facebook and other networks. Specific Media sought to reposition MySpace by emphasizing its music-sharing capabilities and integrating advanced advertising technologies to monetize remaining user engagement. Specific Media rebranded as Viant Technology in January 2015, further pivoting MySpace toward an ad-tech model that utilized historical user data for targeted digital marketing campaigns, rather than broad social networking. In February 2016, Time Inc. acquired Viant for approximately $87 million in assets, gaining control of MySpace primarily to bolster its own advertising ecosystem with Viant's data analytics and programmatic ad tools. Meredith Corporation completed its acquisition of Time Inc. in January 2018 following a 2017 agreement, incorporating MySpace into its portfolio of media and lifestyle brands, though operational focus remained on Viant's ad revenue streams. These ownership shifts underscored a strategic emphasis on backend data monetization over user growth, as MySpace's active audience contracted to a niche of music enthusiasts and legacy users. A significant setback occurred in May 2016 when MySpace disclosed a affecting nearly 360 million accounts, exposing usernames, passwords (primarily from logins between 2008 and 2013), and other personal details that had been compromised years earlier and later surfaced for sale on markets. Despite attempts to reorient the platform as a dedicated music discovery hub—building on post-2011 redesigns that prioritized artist profiles and streaming integration—these efforts failed to reverse of users to more modern alternatives, leaving MySpace with steadily declining traffic. In March , MySpace announced the inadvertent deletion of all user-uploaded photos, videos, and audio files predating 2016 during a botched server migration, resulting in the permanent loss of over 50 million songs from approximately 14 million artists and severely undermining its music-centric . The incident, which had gone unnoticed for over a year, highlighted ongoing technical vulnerabilities and resource constraints under the era's ownership, further eroding any residual cultural relevance.

Viant Technology Ownership and Recent Developments (2019–Present)

In 2019, spun off Viant Technology Holding Inc., which assumed full ownership of Myspace as part of its ad technology portfolio, following a buyback led by co-founder Chris Vanderhook. This transition positioned Myspace primarily as a asset for Viant's programmatic platform, leveraging its historical user profiles—estimated at over one billion—to enhance targeted ad campaigns across the open web rather than revitalizing it as a standalone . Under Viant, Myspace has sustained operations centered on discovery and streaming, including pages for uploading tracks, personalized playlists, and partnerships for content promotion, while retaining basic profile customization tools like layout edits and embedded audio players. The platform's monthly traffic hovered around 2.25 million visits as of September 2025, reflecting a user base well under 10 million active accounts, a fraction of its historical peaks and indicative of niche appeal among nostalgia-driven users rather than broad resurgence. From 2023 to 2025, developments emphasized residual features over networking revival, such as hosting events, featuring award nominees like and , and enabling customizable profiles with retro elements to attract music enthusiasts. These updates targeted sentimental engagement without significant infrastructure overhauls or user acquisition pushes, prioritizing Viant's B2B ad —where Myspace profiles inform programmatic bidding and audience segmentation—over competing in consumer . This ad-centric model has enabled longevity by decoupling viability from viral user growth, unlike prior consumer-focused redesigns that accelerated decline through mismatched features and competition from platforms like .

Core Features and User Experience

Profile Customization and Social Networking Tools

Users could extensively customize their MySpace profiles by embedding and directly into profile sections, enabling modifications to layouts, backgrounds, fonts, colors, and embedded elements such as images or widgets. This freeform editing, available from the platform's early days in , empowered self-expression and , allowing users to craft unique digital spaces that reflected personal aesthetics without predefined templates. However, the lack of strict validation led to widespread visual inconsistencies and clutter across profiles, as users often overloaded pages with competing elements like flashing graphics or dense tables, compromising overall site navigability and contributing to perceptions of chaos. A key social feature was the "Top 8" friends list, where users publicly ranked and displayed their eight closest connections on their , a mechanic introduced to highlight relational priorities and changeable at will. This tool prioritized user-driven curation over algorithmic suggestions, fostering organic social hierarchies but also enabling interpersonal conflicts, as exclusions or rank demotions publicly signaled relational shifts and sometimes incited or exclusionary drama among adolescents. Friend additions operated on a simple request-and-approval model, emphasizing mutual consent for connections without automated matching, which supported authentic network growth based on direct invitations rather than data-driven recommendations. Additional networking tools included bulletins, which functioned as broadcast messages sent simultaneously to all friends, akin to early group notifications for sharing updates or surveys en masse. Private messaging allowed one-on-one communication, while event creation and invitation features enabled users to organize and promote gatherings by notifying selected directly. These mechanics collectively favored unmediated, user-initiated interactions, granting high agency in curating social experiences but exposing trade-offs: the emphasis on manual customization and visible rankings amplified personal expression at the expense of streamlined and reduced against relational harms.

Music Discovery and Integration

Myspace enabled users, particularly musicians, to upload up to five free song files directly to personalized profiles, allowing for autoplay music players that streamed tracks upon profile visits. This feature, introduced shortly after the site's launch, facilitated playlist-like sharing through profile embeds and friend connections, bypassing traditional gatekeepers like record labels. profiles included customizable elements for gig listings, photos, and , fostering fan engagement without initial monetization barriers. These tools propelled several artists to prominence, notably the , whose 2005 demo tracks like "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor" amassed hundreds of thousands of plays on their Myspace page, leading to a Domino Records deal and their debut album topping charts in early 2006. Similarly, acts such as and gained viral traction via self-uploaded content, with Myspace serving as the primary discovery platform before major label involvement. By mid-2006, the platform hosted millions of user-generated tracks, positioning it as a hub for emerging talent amid the surge in and beyond. Myspace's music integration drove high user engagement, with features central to its appeal; by , it had become a primary tool for new artists, contributing to the proliferation of outside label-dominated channels. This flexibility empowered direct fan-artist interactions, such as comment exchanges and tour coordination, which democratized access and reduced reliance on radio or print promotion, enabling niche genres to build dedicated followings. Unlike rigid industry structures, Myspace's open upload policy allowed unsigned bands to gauge demand empirically, influencing a shift toward user-driven discovery that prefigured later platforms. However, the system faced criticisms over copyright enforcement and artist rights; sued Myspace in November 2006, alleging infringement on thousands of copyrighted works via unauthorized uploads. Musician protested in July 2006 by removing his tracks, arguing Myspace's terms granted the site perpetual, royalty-free licenses to user content, potentially undermining artist control. In response, Myspace adopted audio fingerprinting technology in October 2006 to detect violations and block infringing uploads, though royalties remained minimal or absent for most user-hosted tracks. Despite these issues, the platform's emphasis on unmediated connections arguably advanced causal pathways for success by prioritizing empirical fan metrics over institutional curation.

Video Services and Media Features

MySpace introduced video capabilities early in its growth, allowing users to embed third-party videos, such as those from , directly into profile pages to enhance and expression. This feature, available by at least 2006, integrated seamlessly with the site's social networking core, enabling users to showcase dynamic content alongside static profiles and contributing to higher page stickiness during peak usage periods. In June 2007, MySpace launched MySpaceTV on June 27 as a dedicated video platform to rival , which had debuted in 2005. MySpaceTV supported user-generated uploads, personalized channels linked to individual profiles for displaying and curating videos, and a mix of amateur and professional content. Partnerships bolstered its offerings, including deals announced on May 16, 2007, with , , and for premium visual content via branded channels, and an August 8, 2007, collaboration with for video integration. These initiatives peaked amid MySpace's dominance, capturing 76% of U.S. social networking traffic in 2007, though specific attribution to video features remains unquantified beyond overall multimedia enhancements. Direct video uploads to MySpace servers were limited initially, with users relying on embeds until , , when the platform enabled native uploads up to 512 MB per file to accommodate longer-form content. Efforts to improve quality included February 2007 trials of video-filtering technology to detect copyrighted material automatically. However, MySpaceTV lagged in adoption due to delayed rollout, inconsistent moderation, and proliferation of low-quality or infringing uploads, exacerbating broader platform issues like and that deterred users. campaigns targeting video sections drew legal action, including a May judgment awarding MySpace $230 million against operators flooding profiles with unsolicited video-linked ads for and . While MySpaceTV added to engagement by extending profile interactivity, it diverted resources from core and music functionalities, contributing marginally to 2007 traffic surges but failing to stem competitive erosion from cleaner platforms like . Experimental features, such as mobile video streaming launched December 3, 2008, saw limited uptake amid declining user base. Post-2008 decline, video services were de-emphasized; MySpaceTV elements were phased out in platform redesigns, with much legacy content lost by 2019 server migrations.

Technical and Platform Architecture

Developer Tools and API

MySpace introduced the MySpace Developer Platform (MDP) on February 5, , to enable third-party developers to create applications and widgets integrated into user profiles, such as games and interactive tools, in an effort to spur innovation and compete with emerging platforms like . The platform provided access to public profile data via supporting , , and for Flash-based content, while incorporating standards for cross-platform compatibility and tools like Google's Caja for sanitizing to mitigate risks. Privacy controls allowed users to manage app permissions, and all applications required adherence to MDP with built-in features. Despite these provisions, MDP imposed restrictions including a mandatory pre-launch process for all apps, which delayed deployment and deterred developers seeking rapid iteration. This proprietary oversight, combined with MySpace's legacy emphasis on controlled customization to curb prior and issues from user-generated code, limited extensibility compared to Facebook's more permissive launch that facilitated hits like social games. In practice, MDP enabled some basic widgets and integrations but failed to cultivate a robust third-party , as evidenced by the of widely adopted apps and MySpace's subsequent reliance on internal features rather than external developer-driven . Later enhancements, such as 2009 real-time APIs for status updates and mood feeds developed with partners like and OneRiot, aimed to bolster integration for external sites but saw limited uptake amid MySpace's declining user base and competition from more open alternatives. The platform's closed architecture, prioritizing over agility, acted as a causal barrier to , contributing to MySpace's inability to match the app-driven virality that propelled rivals forward.

Infrastructure Scalability and Redesign Efforts

MySpace's early infrastructure, built on a technology stack including and SQL Server, encountered severe challenges as user numbers surged past 100 million active accounts by mid-2006. Rapid growth outpaced server procurement and deployment, with executives later recalling delays in acquiring sufficient to handle spikes, leading to frequent outages and slow page loads. The platform's architecture lacked staging environments, source control, or processes, forcing direct deployments to production servers, which exacerbated instability during peak usage. Compounding these issues was the platform's "spaghetti-ball" , a accumulation of legacy code resulting from hasty development and unrestricted user customization via , CSS, and . This , while enabling personalization, created security vulnerabilities, bloated page sizes averaging over 1,000 lines of code per profile, and rendered systematic refactoring nearly impossible, directly contributing to chronic performance degradation and crashes. In 2006, these technical gaps manifested empirically when MySpace banned over 29,000 accounts for disseminating and , underscoring inadequacies in automated moderation and content filtering tools amid the site's . Efforts to address these foundational problems included a 2009 redesign under ownership, which standardized profile templates to reduce custom and improve load times by enforcing cleaner, server-side rendering. However, this shift curtailed users' editing freedoms, alienating a core demographic accustomed to extensive and accelerating migration to competitors like with more flexible yet performant systems. A subsequent overhaul, following the sale to Specific Media, further streamlined the backend for better , incorporating modular designs to mitigate legacy entanglements, though persistent code debt limited full modernization and failed to reverse user decline. These interventions highlighted a causal tension: while simplifying the enhanced reliability, they disrupted the platform's original appeal rooted in unstructured creativity, without resolving underlying architectural rigidity.

Mobile Evolution and Applications

Myspace's early forays into mobile applications predated the 2013 relaunch but were rudimentary and insufficient to counter emerging competitors. In October 2008, Myspace released an app enabling basic features like instant photo uploads and profile access, coinciding with the platform's initial Android market entry. support lagged similarly, with limited functionality focused on core social networking rather than optimized mobile experiences. These efforts reflected a desktop-centric bias, as Myspace's architecture prioritized customizable profiles ill-suited for touch interfaces and constrained . The 2013 platform relaunch under Specific Media ownership introduced more robust mobile capabilities, including an app launched on , offering free, unlimited radio streaming integrated with user profiles. Users could create personalized radio stations from a catalog of over 42 million tracks, blending discovery with social feeds, and access artist-curated stations for genres or moods. apps expanded availability globally, though rollout emphasized U.S. markets with features like live concert streams and support, yet suffered from inconsistent performance across devices. This delayed pivot to —arriving after Myspace's user base had eroded from 75 million monthly actives in 2008 to under 30 million by 2011—exacerbated its decline, as post-2010 surges in traffic (surpassing 8% of total by and accelerating thereafter) favored platforms with native, intuitive apps. Myspace's apps, while incorporating music-centric tools like radio, lacked the seamless integration and rapid iteration of Facebook's mobile ecosystem, which captured users seeking frictionless access amid rising adoption. The platform's U.S.-heavy focus further limited international traction, contributing causally to its marginalization as mobile-first behaviors dominated social networking.

Business Operations and Monetization

Revenue Models and Advertising

MySpace's initial centered on display advertising, including banner ads placed on user profiles and pages, which capitalized on the platform's rapid user growth to attract advertisers targeting young demographics. This approach generated income without user fees, as the site offered free access and profile customization to build a massive audience for ad impressions. In August 2006, MySpace secured a major advertising agreement with , guaranteeing at least $900 million over three years for providing search functionality and contextual ads across the site and affiliated Fox Interactive Media properties. By the , these strategies peaked at approximately $800 million in , driven largely by ad sales amid over 100 million monthly active users. However, under News Corporation's ownership following its 2005 acquisition, aggressive expansion—including heavy hiring and infrastructure investments—escalated costs, resulting in substantial operating losses despite ad income, as the company prioritized scale over sustainable profitability. Critics attributed user churn, particularly the shift to competitors like around 2008, partly to increasingly intrusive advertising formats, such as pop-ups and sketchy redirects that degraded the platform's and cluttered personalized profiles. These tactics, while boosting short-term ad revenue, correlated with declining engagement, as users sought cleaner interfaces elsewhere. Following its sale to Specific Media (later Viant Technology), MySpace's monetization evolved toward programmatic advertising and data utilization, where user data from the platform informed targeted ads across the open web rather than direct site placements. This shift emphasized sponsored content and audience insights sales to advertisers, leveraging residual MySpace data assets for efficiency in broader digital campaigns, though the site's own ad load diminished amid reduced traffic.

Key Acquisitions and Partnerships

In December 2009, MySpace Music acquired certain assets of the struggling music streaming service Imeem in a firesale transaction valued at less than $1 million, aiming to migrate Imeem's 16 million monthly users and bolster MySpace's on-demand audio offerings amid competition from emerging platforms like Spotify. This move provided a short-term influx of playlists and user data, with MySpace resurrecting select Imeem features by January 2010 to enhance music discovery, but integration proved challenging as Imeem's core contracts and technology were not absorbed, leading to redundant systems and failure to create a cohesive streaming experience that retained users long-term. The acquisition diverted engineering resources toward patchwork solutions rather than foundational redesigns, contributing to MySpace's diminished music market share as rivals offered superior personalization and mobile compatibility. Earlier, in 2007, MySpace acquired , a photo- and video-sharing site, for $250 million in cash plus up to $50 million in earn-outs, to vertically integrate media hosting and reduce reliance on third-party embeds for profiles and sharing. While this initially expanded storage capacity and streamlined uploads—handling millions of daily media files—it imposed long-term maintenance burdens from legacy infrastructure mismatches, exacerbating scalability issues during peak traffic and ultimately prompting to sell a majority stake in Photobucket by 2009 amid broader cost-cutting. MySpace formed significant partnerships with major record labels to secure licensed content and revenue-sharing models. In 2008, it launched MySpace Music as a with , , and , valued initially at $2 billion, enabling ad-supported streaming of over 6 million tracks and artist pages with official embeds to differentiate from unlicensed uploads. These deals provided immediate legitimacy and exclusive promotions, boosting page views by integrating label catalogs directly into social feeds, but high licensing fees—tied to complex royalty structures—strained finances without proportional ad growth, as user engagement shifted to freer, algorithm-driven alternatives. Legal negotiations over further consumed time, with outcomes favoring labels' and limiting MySpace's flexibility in or bundling, which causal analyses attribute to stifled and the venture's eventual shuttering by 2016. For international growth, MySpace pursued localized partnerships, notably launching MySpace China in April 2007 as a majority Chinese-owned entity backed by MySpace Inc., IDG Venture Capital, and a local fund, to navigate regulatory hurdles and compete in the world's largest internet market. This structure allowed tailored features like Mandarin interfaces and regional music integrations, yielding initial user sign-ups in the millions during beta testing, yet it faltered against entrenched locals like Renren and QQ, with cultural mismatches and censorship compliance eroding core social networking appeal; the effort spread operational resources thin without achieving scalable monetization, mirroring broader international flops in markets like Korea and India where similar joint ventures underperformed. Overall, these acquisitions and partnerships yielded tactical content expansions but imposed strategic costs through unintegrated technologies and escalating expenses, hindering MySpace's pivot from social networking to a viable media ecosystem.

Controversies and Criticisms

Privacy Violations and FTC Actions

In May 2012, the charged Myspace with deceiving users by misrepresenting the extent to which it protected their from sharing with third-party advertisers. Myspace's privacy policy stated that it would not share personally identifiable information with advertisers except as explicitly described, yet the company disclosed users' unique Friend IDs—internal identifiers linking to profiles containing names, locations, photos, and other details—along with age and gender data to ad networks via embedded tracking mechanisms. Advertisers could then cross-reference this data against Myspace's public profiles to de-anonymize users, affecting millions who believed their information was safeguarded per the policy's assurances. Myspace settled the charges without admitting wrongdoing, agreeing to implement a comprehensive program, undergo biennial independent audits for 20 years, and refrain from future misrepresentations about data protection practices. The settlement imposed no monetary fine, reflecting the 's emphasis on behavioral remedies over penalties in early enforcement actions, though critics argued it underscored tensions between user expectations and the platform's reliance on for revenue amid declining user growth. Proponents of Myspace's practices highlighted that such enabled innovative ad that sustained free access for users, weighing against stricter requirements that could have hindered effects in an era when social platforms prioritized rapid scaling over granular controls. Earlier Myspace privacy policies, dating to its launch, permitted broad visibility of user profiles by default, including friend lists and content, which facilitated networking and discovery but exposed to unintended third-party scraping or vendor access without robust opt-in mechanisms. This lax approach, while not involving unauthorized hacks prior to , prioritized user growth and over default restrictions, leading to documented instances of advertisers exploiting data streams in ways that policy ambiguities failed to fully disclose. Although exaggerated claims of widespread from these defaults lack empirical substantiation, verified vendor overreach—such as unpermitted profile aggregation—illustrated real risks balanced against the platform's role in democratizing online expression.

Security Breaches, Spam, and Predatory Risks

Myspace's allowance of custom and CSS in user profiles facilitated both creative self-expression, such as personalized layouts and graphics, and vulnerabilities to and propagation. In 2005, the Samy worm exploited (XSS) via profile code to infect over a million accounts within hours, adding itself to visitors' friend lists and demonstrating how could amplify attacks. Phishing schemes also leveraged custom profiles to mimic login pages, tricking users into revealing credentials, with incidents reported as early as where attackers created deceptive profile URLs to host fake forms. In response to escalating , Myspace banned over 29,000 accounts in for disseminating junk messages or , often through automated friend requests or embedded scripts. A significant security breach occurred in 2016, when data from approximately 360 million inactive accounts— including usernames, email addresses, and weakly encrypted or plaintext passwords from logins between 2008 and 2011— was exposed and offered for sale on a dark web market. The incident stemmed from inadequate archiving and security practices on legacy servers, allowing unauthorized access years after the data was collected, rather than a live system compromise. Myspace, then owned by Time Inc., notified affected users and invalidated remaining passwords, but the breach highlighted causal failures in data retention protocols amid the platform's rapid early growth. Predatory risks arose from the platform's public profiles, which enabled detailed personal disclosures including ages and locations, drawing scrutiny for facilitating child grooming. High-profile cases included the arrest of serial offender Andrew Lubrano, identified via Myspace searches for underage contacts, and multiple convictions of predators using the site to solicit minors. Myspace proactively removed around 90,000 registered sex offenders between 2007 and 2009 through partnerships with and background checks, agreeing in 2008 with 49 state attorneys general to enhance age verification and tools. However, empirical studies indicate online-facilitated child sexual offenses represent a minority compared to offline by known acquaintances, with no evidence of disproportionate incident rates unique to Myspace versus real-world interactions; critics have characterized some alarms as moral panics exaggerating digital risks relative to broader societal predation patterns. The platform's open design prioritized user freedom, inadvertently amplifying both expressive potential and targeted exploitation until mitigation efforts curtailed such features.

Data Loss Incidents and Technical Mismanagement

In March , MySpace disclosed the permanent loss of all user-uploaded photos, videos, and audio files predating 2015, encompassing over 50 million tracks uploaded by approximately 14 million artists from 2003 to 2015. The deletion stemmed from a server project conducted around 2015–2016, during which the files became corrupted and irretrievable, rendering an estimated 12 years of platform-hosted content inaccessible. MySpace attributed the failure to technical corruption during the transfer process, stating that recovery attempts proved unsuccessful due to the extent of the data degradation. This incident exposed broader technical mismanagement, particularly inadequate backup verification protocols prior to migration, which allowed corrupted data to overwrite originals without redundancy checks. Following MySpace's post-2008 decline in user base and revenue, resource allocation shifted away from robust data preservation infrastructure, contrasting with earlier investments in scalability during peak operations; critics argued this reflected deliberate cost-cutting over proactive archival strategies, rather than unavoidable technical constraints. MySpace maintained that the corruption was an inherent migration risk, but independent analyses highlighted negligence in failing to implement verifiable backups or phased testing, practices standard in enterprise data handling to mitigate such irrecoverable losses. The data purge inflicted lasting damage on history, erasing unique artifacts from MySpace's role as an early democratizing platform for unsigned artists, many of whom lacked alternative storage. Partial mitigation occurred through third-party efforts, such as the Internet Archive's "MySpace Music Dragon Hoard" initiative, which recovered about 1.3 terabytes of files from cached sources, though this represented a fraction of the total lost material. Overall, the episode underscored causal failures in stewardship, where deferred maintenance and underprioritized redundancy post-peak viability enabled a preventable erasure of cultural data.

Cultural and Societal Impact

Democratization of Music Promotion

Myspace facilitated the direct upload of tracks to profiles, allowing unsigned musicians to share full songs with users without intermediary approval from record labels or traditional gatekeepers. This feature, introduced shortly after the platform's 2003 launch, enabled creators to build audiences through friend additions, , and embedded players, contrasting with the era's dominant model of label-controlled radio play and physical . Notable successes included , whose debut album A Fever You Can't Sweat Out gained traction in after the band's Myspace page amassed plays and connections from high school fans, leading to a Decaydance Records deal and over 2.2 million U.S. sales by 2006. Similarly, ' early singles like "I Bet You Look Good on the Dancefloor" topped charts in , propelled by a dedicated fan page on Myspace that shared demos and built hype before any label involvement, marking one of the platform's earliest viral breakthroughs. Other acts, such as and , leveraged Myspace for initial chart entries, with Allen's 2006 debut Alright, Still benefiting from profile-driven buzz that bypassed conventional A&R scouting. Prior to YouTube's emergence, Myspace dominated online , hosting millions of profiles where users spent significant time streaming tracks—Nielsen data from the mid-2000s indicated -related activity as a core draw, with the site peaking at over 100 million users by , many engaging via artist pages. This open ecosystem empowered independent promotion, offering flexibility absent in systems that imposed creative restrictions and delays, though the lack of curation resulted in an influx of amateur uploads that sometimes overwhelmed discoverability for higher-quality work. The platform's model prefigured elements of later services like , where algorithmic discovery echoes Myspace's user-driven plays and shares, but without the same emphasis on personalized profiles for fan-artist interaction. By 2006, Myspace Records attempted to formalize this by signing platform-discovered talent on artist-friendly terms, though it ultimately struggled against established industry dynamics.

Influence on User Self-Expression and Social Dynamics

MySpace's profile customization features, which permitted users to embed code for personalized backgrounds, fonts, auto-playing music, and graphics, enabled unprecedented levels of individual self-expression during its peak from 2004 to 2008. This flexibility contrasted with later platforms' standardized templates, allowing users—primarily teenagers and young adults—to curate digital identities that mirrored offline personalities through eclectic, often garish designs reflecting subcultural affiliations or personal aesthetics. Empirical analyses of over 1.9 million profiles revealed that users frequently disclosed intimate details, such as relationship statuses and interests, fostering authentic representations but also exposing vulnerabilities in public view. The "Top 8" friends list, introduced as a prominent profile element, significantly shaped by compelling users to publicly rank their closest connections, often sparking interpersonal conflicts and reinforcing real-world hierarchies. This mechanic, limited to eight slots to balance visibility and manageability, incentivized deliberate curation over indiscriminate friending, as alterations were immediately noticeable and could signal relational shifts, leading to reported instances of , exclusion, and "" among peers. While critics noted its potential for toxicity—such as via demotions or omissions—the feature arguably promoted transparency in friendships, mirroring offline social prioritization rather than the illusion of universal equality in subsequent networks' expansive, unranked lists. MySpace facilitated the emergence of early internet celebrities and subcultural tribes through viral profile sharing and niche group formation, predating algorithmic feeds. Users like amassed millions of friends by 2006 via provocative, unmoderated content, exemplifying how raw self-presentation could propel ordinary individuals to fame without institutional gatekeeping. Platform dynamics encouraged tribal clustering around shared interests, such as or scenes, where users bonded via comments and reposts, contrasting modern platforms' heavier that prioritizes safety over unfiltered exchange. This environment, while prone to exclusionary cliques, valued authentic youth expression—often messy and hierarchical—over sanitized interactions, influencing customs like visible friend rankings in early and adaptations.

Broader Legacy in Social Media and Digital Culture

Myspace's innovations in user and content sharing laid foundational precedents for viral sociality on the , enabling individuals to embed , rank friendships publicly, and broadcast personal aesthetics to broad audiences starting in 2003. These mechanics facilitated early self-branding, where users treated profiles as digital billboards for curation, influencing modern influencer economies and platform designs that prioritize visual and auditory personalization. By fostering unfiltered expression, Myspace accelerated the formation of fandoms and subcultural tribes around and hobbies, predating algorithm-curated feeds and demonstrating how decentralized sharing could drive organic virality without centralized moderation. The platform's rapid ascent to 100 million users by exposed causal pitfalls in hype-driven growth, as legacy code accumulated into inefficient "" architecture that hindered performance amid surging traffic, underscoring the primacy of infrastructural realism over promotional exuberance. Management's post-2005 acquisition focus on aggressive alienated users seeking authentic connectivity, yielding lessons that enduring platforms must balance with seamless utility rather than assuming network effects alone suffice for retention. This trajectory illustrates how initial triumphs in democratizing presence can invert into obsolescence when execution lags , a pattern echoed in analyses of tech firm overreach. By 2025, Myspace's imprint persists in nostalgic recreations like , launched in 2020 as a privacy-centric emphasizing CSS-driven profiles and bulletin boards, which drew renewed interest amid backlash against data-extractive successors. Such revivals affirm the platform's causal role in normalizing customizable digital habitats that prioritize user agency over algorithmic control, while critiques of its era's and predation—though empirically elevated due to lax safeguards—are not outliers but precursors to pervasive risks in all networks, where raw free expression inherently amplifies both creativity and discord.

Key Personnel

Founders and Early Executives

MySpace was co-founded in August 2003 by , who served as the initial , and , who focused on product development and . The pair, previously employed at the internet marketing firm eUniverse (later Intermix Media), developed the platform as a digital space for personal expression, friend connections, and music sharing, drawing from earlier sites like but emphasizing customizable profiles and free artist uploads to foster organic user engagement over immediate commercialization. DeWolfe, leveraging his background in and from prior roles at companies like Xdrive Technologies, implemented growth strategies centered on adoption through communities and event postings, which propelled MySpace to over 100 million users by without heavy reliance on paid advertising. Anderson complemented this by prioritizing user-centric features, such as the default "Tom" friend addition for new accounts, which built immediate and with the , reflecting a philosophy of fun and accessibility amid the site's chaotic, user-driven aesthetic. Their early emphasis on and self-expression—allowing bands to upload tracks and users to embed —differentiated MySpace from profit-first models, enabling rapid cultural traction among youth and musicians before the 2005 News Corp acquisition shifted priorities toward monetization. Post-acquisition tensions arose as executives pushed for aggressive ad integration and structural changes, clashing with the founders' user-focused approach, which contributed to leadership transitions. DeWolfe's tenure as CEO ended involuntarily in April 2009, after which he transitioned to an advisory role while remaining on the board. Anderson, who had been president, stepped back from operational duties around the same period and fully retired in 2012, updating his online presence to reflect a life of travel and , symbolizing the dilution of original founder influence under corporate ownership.

Post-Acquisition Leadership

Owen Van Natta, previously chief revenue officer at , assumed the role of MySpace CEO in April 2009, succeeding during a period of intensifying competition and eroding . His brief tenure, lasting under 10 months until his abrupt resignation in February 2010, was marked by aggressive cost reductions, including the elimination of 720 positions that shrank the workforce by roughly 40% and the termination of a lease on expanded office space in Beverly Hills. These measures reflected News Corp's push for fiscal discipline amid MySpace's failure to sustain its peak user base of over 100 million monthly from 2008, as traffic shifted to rivals like , but they did little to reverse the platform's trajectory, with unique visitors dropping 25% year-over-year by early 2010. Van Natta's exit led to the appointment of co-presidents Mike Jones, the former , and Jason Hirschhorn, the , who oversaw further attempts at platform redesigns aimed at modernizing the and integrating more features. These initiatives, including layout overhauls in 2010, sought to address criticisms of cluttered profiles and slow performance but empirically correlated with accelerated user attrition, as monthly unique visitors fell below 50 million by mid-2011, exacerbating perceptions of mismanagement in adapting to mobile-first trends. Critics, including former employees, have attributed such decisions to a reactive focus on short-term fixes rather than core innovation, while proponents argue the restructurings laid groundwork for eventual pivots that prevented total shutdown. Following News Corp's sale of MySpace to Specific Media Group (later rebranded under parent Viant Technology) for $35 million in June 2011, leadership emphasized an advertising-centric model, repositioning the site as a music discovery hub with input from co-owner Justin Timberlake. Viant's executives, including CEO David Levy, integrated MySpace into a broader ad tech ecosystem, launching programmatic advertising tools and content partnerships that sustained niche operations but further distanced the platform from its social origins. This shift has been credited by some for enabling profitability in targeted verticals like entertainment advertising, yet data indicates persistent decline, with user engagement metrics remaining marginal compared to contemporaries, underscoring accountability questions in leadership's abandonment of broad social utility for specialized monetization.

References

  1. [1]
    Myspace | Research Starters - EBSCO
    Myspace (originally styled "MySpace") was launched by American internet entrepreneurs Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson in August 2003.Missing: history | Show results with:history
  2. [2]
    https://builtinla.com/articles/where-are-they-now-tracking-down-myspaces-early-founders
  3. [3]
    Infographic: Myspace vs. Facebook - Comscore, Inc.
    At its peak, Myspace saw 75.9 million unique visitors coming to the property in December 2008. Last month, this figure dropped to 34.8 million unique visitors.
  4. [4]
    News Corp. Takes Bath In Sale Of Myspace : The Two-Way - NPR
    Jun 29, 2011 · Back in 2005, Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. bought Myspace for a stunning $580 million. Today, News Corp. sold the struggling social network to ...
  5. [5]
    Myspace sold for $35m in spectacular fall from $12bn heyday
    Jun 30, 2011 · Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation bought Myspace in 2005 for $580m. In 2006 Google signed a $900m deal to sell ads on Myspace; by 2007 it had ...
  6. [6]
    How Myspace went from the future to a failure - NBC News
    Apr 8, 2011 · Six years after News Corp bought Myspace it has become another example of how startups and traditional media have trouble coexisting.Missing: credible | Show results with:credible
  7. [7]
    MySpace – what went wrong: 'The site was a massive spaghetti-ball ...
    Mar 6, 2015 · Former VP of online marketing Sean Percival on corporate interference, Punch The Monkey, and a failed attempt to buy Spotify.Missing: credible | Show results with:credible
  8. [8]
    [PDF] Hot Today, Gone Tomorrow: On the Migration of MySpace Users∗
    Evidence for a decline in the popularity of an. OSN or in user activity is typically provided by companies such as alexa.com [2] that monitor the number of ...Missing: credible sources
  9. [9]
    News Corp sells Myspace, ending six-year saga - Reuters
    Jun 29, 2011 · NEW YORK (Reuters) - News Corp has sold Myspace for $35 million, a ... News Corp, which swooped in to buy Myspace for $580 million in 2005.
  10. [10]
    The Rise and Fall of MySpace: A Cautionary Tale - Penji
    Oct 3, 2024 · Myspace remains online today, but its user base is significantly diminished. By 2019, Myspace's monthly visitors had dropped to seven million.What is MySpace? · The Rise of MySpace · The Peak of MySpace
  11. [11]
    What is MySpace in 2025? Can the Site Reclaim Its Former Glory?
    Oct 12, 2024 · As of 2024, the platform continues to exist, albeit as a much-reduced shadow of its former self. The platform, once a dominant force in social ...
  12. [12]
    Whatever Happened To Myspace? - K.L.Wightman
    Dec 17, 2018 · The social media phenomenon was born in 2003 when founders Tom Anderson, Chris DeWolfe and Jon Hart—all avid users of Friendster—wanted to ...
  13. [13]
    The Rise and Fall of Myspace - The Atlantic
    Jan 12, 2011 · August 2003: Myspace birthed from the bowels of eUniverse as Friendster clone. November 2003: Washington Post runs a story about social ...
  14. [14]
    MySpace: The Beginning of Social Media - Fresh Digital
    Oct 17, 2023 · MySpace aimed to be a platform where users could customize profiles with their interests, add music, and follow favourite artists. Similar ...<|separator|>
  15. [15]
    Echoes of MySpace: How the First Social Media Titan Lost Its Crown
    Aug 12, 2024 · The platform's growth was staggering, reaching 100 million users by 2006. It became a cultural phenomenon, influencing everything from music ...
  16. [16]
    Where in the World Is Myspace Tom? - History | HowStuffWorks
    Jan 22, 2019 · Along with ad executive Chris DeWolfe, Anderson co-founded the site in 2003 as a response to older-old-school online buddy system, Friendster.
  17. [17]
    https://ninalevine.medium.com/the-original-social-media-the-rise-and-fall-of-myspace-d69b1f996df4
  18. [18]
    MySpace signs 100 millionth member | Digital media - The Guardian
    Aug 9, 2006 · The number of MySpace profiles reached 90 million at the start of July, so the last 10 million have taken just a month to recruit. Depending ...Missing: peak | Show results with:peak
  19. [19]
    MySpace, The 27.4 Billion Pound Gorilla - TechCrunch
    Jun 13, 2006 · MySpace has 75 million users (see somewhat dated comparison stats here), 15 million daily unique logins, is growing by a massive 240,000 new ...
  20. [20]
    Social Networking Sites Continue to Attract Record Numbers as...
    Social Networking Sites Continue to Attract Record Numbers as Myspace.Com Surpasses 50 Million U.S. Visitors in May ... RESTON, VA, June 15, 2006 ...
  21. [21]
    Most teens are MySpacers | Digital media - The Guardian
    May 17, 2007 · More than 90% of UK teenagers have used a social networking website and more than half use them because their friends do, according to research.
  22. [22]
    MySpace Top 8 Friends: What Was That All About? - Us Weekly
    Sep 17, 2024 · One of MySpace's flagship features was the Top 8 friends function, which gave you the ability to bookmark the profiles of your chosen besties front and center ...
  23. [23]
    Tila Tequila, the first star of MySpace.
    Apr 11, 2006 · Tequila, a diminutive Vietnamese singer with a fondness for string bikinis and up-tempo beats, has logged 31.5 million views.
  24. [24]
    The Toast of MySpace Tries the Music Business - The New York Times
    Feb 26, 2007 · Tila Tequila became famous for having the most friends on MySpace.com. Now she's hoping to translate her fame into a music career.
  25. [25]
    Lily Allen appears on MySpace | Pop and rock | The Guardian
    Jun 10, 2011 · That was in July 2005, and four months later, Lily Allen started posting mixtapes there. "I think the secret to the success of MySpace is that ...
  26. [26]
    Lily Allen headlining three secret shows - idobi Radio
    Feb 10, 2009 · Lily created her MySpace Music page in November 2005, where she used the site to post demos and self-produced mixtapes to attract thousands of ...
  27. [27]
    The My Generation: An Oral History Of Myspace Music - Stereogum
    Mar 30, 2020 · In Stereogum's oral history of Myspace Music, twenty artists and former Myspace executives discuss their experience both using and working on the site.
  28. [28]
    News Corp. to Acquire MySpace - Los Angeles Times
    Jul 19, 2005 · Rupert Murdoch's News Corp. agreed Monday to acquire Los Angeles-based Intermix Media Inc., the parent company of MySpace, for $580 million in ...<|separator|>
  29. [29]
    https://www.wsj.com/articles/SB113685068093942097
  30. [30]
    News Corp.'s Failed Social Experiment: Why MySpace Didn't Deliver
    Jun 15, 2011 · The company will retain a 20 to 25 percent stake. Not that News Corp. didn't try to overhaul the battered brand. Leadership of the company's ...
  31. [31]
    MySpace's New Friend: Google - Los Angeles Times
    Aug 8, 2006 · The search firm will pay at least $900 million to provide query results and ads on the website.
  32. [32]
    News Corp. sells Myspace for $35 million - Los Angeles Times
    Jun 30, 2011 · Researcher EMarketer projects Myspace's ad revenue at $184 million this year, down from $470 million in 2009. Myspace proved a drag on News Corp ...
  33. [33]
    How News Corp destroyed Myspace with ads and neglect - LinkedIn
    Mar 17, 2025 · They flooded the platform with ads, prioritizing short-term revenue over user experience. They ignored innovation while Facebook focused on ...Missing: impact | Show results with:impact
  34. [34]
    MySpace Once Tried to Acquire Spotify - Business Insider
    Mar 6, 2015 · As reported by The Guardian, Percival said MySpace's acquisition attempt was in vain: "They sure as hell weren't selling to us. They didn't need ...
  35. [35]
    MySpace Paid Over $10M a Year to Host Music (And Tried to Buy ...
    Mar 6, 2015 · MySpace had a very, very unique deal with labels. They were the only site on the web that you could go and play any song from a major label for free.Missing: acquisition attempt
  36. [36]
    Myspace rebrand 'would have prevented its collapse' - The Guardian
    Oct 26, 2011 · Social network's former chief says site was let down by marketing failures once News Corp took control. By Josh Halliday.
  37. [37]
    Myspace - The Rise, Fall, and Rise Again? [INFOGRAPHIC]
    Dec 6, 2023 · From 2005 until early 2008, Myspace was the most visited social networking site in the world, attracting 75.9 million unique visitors a month ...
  38. [38]
    Myspace | Website, History, Creators, & Facts | Britannica
    Oct 9, 2025 · In 2005 Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation purchased Myspace and Intermix for $580 million, bringing Anderson and DeWolfe along. The decision ...
  39. [39]
    https://www.statista.com/chart/26176/estimated-number-of-myspace-users-at-key-milestones/
  40. [40]
    Myspace Collapse: How The Social Network Fell Apart | HuffPost Life
    Jun 30, 2011 · Myspace has lost over forty million unique visitors per month, lost both co-founders, laid off the vast majority of its staff and more generally, has ...<|separator|>
  41. [41]
    Did the Microsoft Stack Kill MySpace? - High Scalability -
    Mar 25, 2011 · Steve Smith: MySpace's code apparently had a lot of technical debt and from the sounds of things, its architecture was textbook Big Ball of Mud.Missing: mobile adaptation
  42. [42]
    MySpace to add amateur, pro video site - Los Angeles Times
    Jun 28, 2007 · MySpace plans to expand its video offerings this week with a new site that combines amateur and professional material.
  43. [43]
    Myspace goes cool, crisp and clean in a last bid to recapture lost ...
    Oct 30, 2010 · The once-dominant social networking site, purchased by Rupert Murdoch for $580m, is ditching its grungy look and making a concerted effort to arrest declining ...Missing: customization removal
  44. [44]
    Why MySpace failed and what we can learn from it. | CircleClick Media
    Jun 28, 2011 · The interface on MySpace was fairly polluted from day 1. Around 2007 and 2008 there were numerous redesigns, so many that users felt lost.Missing: decline spaghetti code
  45. [45]
    Founder and Chief Is Leaving MySpace - The New York Times
    Apr 22, 2009 · Mr. DeWolfe's exit is involuntary, but Tom Anderson, the president of MySpace and a co-founder of the site with Mr. DeWolfe, is in discussions ...Missing: departure | Show results with:departure
  46. [46]
    It's Official: Chris DeWolfe To Exit As MySpace CEO; Tom Anderson ...
    Apr 23, 2009 · MySpace confirmed Wednesday that CEO Chris DeWolfe would step down, and that it was in discussions with Tom Anderson, everyone's first friend on ...
  47. [47]
    News Corp.'s MySpace Cuts Staff by 47% to Pare Losses - Bloomberg
    Jan 11, 2011 · MySpace is cutting 47 percent of its staff amid reports that owner News Corp. is preparing the social-networking website for a possible sale ...
  48. [48]
    Doing the math on News Corp.'s disastrous MySpace years
    Jun 29, 2011 · $37 million of its $88.9 million in total revenue came from the Network division, chiefly home to MySpace.
  49. [49]
    Exclusive: Myspace to Be Sold to Specific Media for $35 Million
    June 29, 2011 — Specific Media, a digital media company, today announced it has acquired Myspace from News Corporation. ...Missing: details | Show results with:details
  50. [50]
    Demise: MySpace – The Pioneer That Lost Its Way - Gizoom
    Jan 10, 2025 · MySpace declined due to missed opportunities, poor decisions, lack of innovation, and a focus on profits over user experience, leading to its ...Missing: 2008-2011 spaghetti redesign
  51. [51]
    Parent Company of Specific Media, Vindico and MySpace Rebrands ...
    Jan 14, 2015 · Ad Tech. Parent Company of Specific Media, Vindico and MySpace Rebrands as 'Viant', Launches Ad Tech Stack. Vincent Flood 14 January, 2015.
  52. [52]
    Time Inc Acquires Viant, Owner Of Myspace And A Vast Ad Tech ...
    Feb 11, 2016 · Time Inc announced that it has acquired Viant, a profitable company that has built a large ad tech business, but also owns other properties.
  53. [53]
    SEC Filing Gives Clues to Price Time Inc. Paid for MySpace Parent ...
    May 9, 2016 · Time Inc. paid $87 million for "certain assets" of Viant, parent company of MySpace, according to a filing with the SEC.<|separator|>
  54. [54]
    Meredith Corporation sells equity in MySpace owner
    Nov 4, 2019 · Time Inc., in turn, purchased Viant in 2016. And in January 2018, Meredith acquired Viant when it purchased Time and all of its properties.
  55. [55]
    MySpace Data Breach - Have I Been Pwned
    MySpace suffered a data breach that exposed almost 360 million accounts. In May 2016 the data was offered up for sale on the "Real Deal" dark market website.
  56. [56]
    360 million Myspace accounts breached - USA Today
    May 31, 2016 · Time Inc., which bought the social networking site in February, said Tuesday names and passwords from more than 360 million Myspace accounts were compromised.
  57. [57]
    Myspace loses all content uploaded before 2016 - The Guardian
    Mar 18, 2019 · The company is blaming a faulty server migration for the mass deletion, which appears to have happened more than a year ago, when the first ...
  58. [58]
    MySpace admits losing 12 years' worth of music uploads - CNN
    Mar 18, 2019 · “Myspace accidentally lost all the music uploaded from its first 12 years in a server migration, losing over 50 million songs from 14 million ...
  59. [59]
    MySpace Owner Viant Is Ready for the Online ID Revolution
    Feb 11, 2021 · Chris Vanderhook, co-founder and COO, bought back Viant from Meredith in 2019. Viant. Headshot of Andrew Blustein. By Andrew Blustein.
  60. [60]
    MySpace CEO Tim Vanderhook Interview - Business Insider
    Sep 15, 2015 · Viant, the ad tech company that owns MySpace, is harnessing the social network's database of 1 billion users to sell ads elsewhere on the ...
  61. [61]
    Viant co-founder: Myspace deal is about leveraging data to better ...
    Feb 12, 2016 · Co-founder and COO of parent company Viant tells ZDNet: "The goal isn't to show ads on Myspace. It's leveraging the data on the open web."<|separator|>
  62. [62]
    Featured Content on Myspace
    Lady Gaga (12), Bruno Mars (11) and Kendrick Lamar (10) lead the nominees for the 2025 edition of the MTV Video Music Awards, which will air live for the first ...Sign in · Profiles · Glastonbury 2025: Olivia... · Snapped: Skyline Festival 2025<|control11|><|separator|>
  63. [63]
    myspace.com Website Traffic, Ranking, Analytics [September 2025]
    myspace.com is ranked #7991 in US with 2.25M Traffic. Categories: Entertainment, Music, Online Services. Learn more about website traffic, market share, ...
  64. [64]
    [OC] I work at the company that bought MySpace, it's been ... - Reddit
    Jul 25, 2025 · Viant is an ad tech DSP (demand side platform). We work with brands, holding companies and ad agencies run their programmatic media. u ...
  65. [65]
    https://www.viantinc.com/press-mention/myspace-is-alive-and-well-and-powering-targeted-advertising/
  66. [66]
    What Happened to Myspace? The Fall of the World's First Social ...
    The Rise of Myspace​​ Myspace started in 2003, and was created and launched by Tom Anderson and Chris DeWolfe. The platform allowed users to connect with friends ...
  67. [67]
    MySpace and the Coding Legacy it Left Behind - Codecademy
    Feb 14, 2020 · How Profile Customization Worked ... The MySpace profile editor was freeform enough to allow inline style attributes, tables, embedded widgets ...
  68. [68]
    How to make a Great MySpace Layout | Aaron Saray
    Apr 4, 2007 · The new layout was a little bit more customizable and could use easier CSS declarations and better well-formed xhtml. There are pro's and con's ...
  69. [69]
    The Myspace Top 8 is destroying society - Garbage Day
    Oct 20, 2021 · “Members get to list their 'Top 8' friends, a list they can change at whim. It's an ingenious number, because it's just large enough to make ...Missing: impact 2005-2008
  70. [70]
    How MySpace's Top 8 Weaponized Friendship - Ned Hardy
    Jan 20, 2025 · The Top 8 forced you to pick favorites and made sure everyone could see exactly where they stood in your personal hierarchy of relevance.<|separator|>
  71. [71]
    [PDF] Social Interaction Design Case Study: MySpace - Adrian Chan
    Feb 14, 2006 · MySpace is proof that a talk system can give big media—its high production values, celebrities, focus-grouped taste-making and ad-funded ...
  72. [72]
    Inviting Participation, Part 5: Specific Tools – MySpace
    Jan 30, 2007 · Bulletin Board: Bulletins are messages that are sent to all your friends at the same time. Think of them as a group email. Yet another tool that ...
  73. [73]
    Send a Message – Help Center - Myspace
    Click on the message icon located at the bottom of your browser · Select View All to see all your messages under Inbox, Other, and Archived · Select New Message ...
  74. [74]
    5 Features that Prove Myspace Was Way Ahead of Its Time
    Aug 23, 2016 · ... Myspace Bulletins did a great job of bringing the group message online. Bulletins were posted to a “bulletin board” for all of your Myspace ...
  75. [75]
    How MySpace Turned Everyone Into Digital Creators and Changed ...
    MySpace created a direct connection between artists and listeners, demonstrating how digital platforms can flatten hierarchies and democratize access.
  76. [76]
    Making It Big On Myspace: The Arctic Monkeys Story
    The Arctic Monkeys Myspace page. This fan base went online and created an online community where they could share music and information about the band. The ...<|separator|>
  77. [77]
    [PDF] Music as Cultural Glue: Supporting Bands and Fans on MySpace.
    MySpace was launched from Santa Monica, California in fall of 2003. Los Angeles hipsters immediately adopted it. Indie rock bands were central to this community ...
  78. [78]
    How Myspace Opened The Door To Niche Music Genres - Forbes
    Mar 20, 2019 · The development of niche targeting opened up opportunities for bands and artists to convert online fans to offline ticket buyers––creating ...
  79. [79]
    Universal sues MySpace for copyright violations - CNET
    Nov 17, 2006 · Universal Music Group sued MySpace.com late Friday, claiming that the social-networking site is infringing on the copyrights of thousands of ...<|separator|>
  80. [80]
    Billy Bragg's MySpace Protest Movement - The New York Times
    Jul 31, 2006 · Bragg removed his songs from the MySpace.com Web site, complaining that the terms and conditions that MySpace set forth gave the social ...
  81. [81]
    MySpace technology to track copyright violations - Los Angeles Times
    Oct 31, 2006 · MySpace.com said Monday that it had licensed a technology to stop users from posting unauthorized copyrighted music on the social networking website.
  82. [82]
    How MySpace Changed Music - Interview with Top Eight
    Serving as a pivotal nexus for indie artists, industry professionals, and music enthusiasts alike, MySpace revolutionized the way we connect with music and each ...
  83. [83]
    [PDF] Civil Minutes - Central District of California
    MySpace system by redesigning its platform so that “all links to vidiLife video content embedded by MySpace users in their online profiles no longer function.
  84. [84]
    MySpace, Chasing YouTube, Upgrades Its Offerings
    Jun 27, 2007 · Each MySpace member page will link to a separate MySpace TV channel, which will display the videos the user has uploaded. Users can change ...
  85. [85]
    How MySpace Works - Computer | HowStuffWorks
    These customizable channels will allow users to save videos, comments and playlists, and the channels can also be linked to a user's regular MySpace profile. ...
  86. [86]
    Myspace - Wikipedia
    In July 2005, Myspace was acquired by News Corporation for $580 million; in June 2006, it surpassed Yahoo Mail and Google Search to become the most visited ...Criticism of Myspace · Category:Myspace · Tom Anderson · Chris DeWolfe
  87. [87]
    Myspace | Ultimate Pop Culture Wiki - Fandom
    In July 2005, in one of the company's first major Internet purchases, News Corporation purchased Myspace for US$580 million. At the time of the acquisition, the ...
  88. [88]
    MySpace Got 76% of US Social Network Traffic in '07, Facebook's ...
    Jan 16, 2008 · MySpace.com averaged 76.35% of all US visits in 2007* among a custom category of 53 leading social-networking websites, followed by Facebook.com, Bebo.com and ...Missing: contribution | Show results with:contribution
  89. [89]
    MySpace Will Allow Direct Uploads, But Is It Too Late? - TechCrunch
    Sep 11, 2008 · MySpace yesterday announced that it would allow users to finally upload videos directly to the site.
  90. [90]
    MySpace to Test Video-Filtering Technology - CNBC
    Feb 12, 2007 · The popular online hangout MySpace said Monday it will experiment with a video-filtering system designed to block clips containing copyright ...
  91. [91]
    MySpaceTV takes on YouTube - The Hollywood Reporter
    Jun 28, 2007 · News Corp.'s MySpace will launch an enhanced beta version of their video site this week designed to compete with Google Inc.'s YouTube.
  92. [92]
    MySpace spammers fined $230m | Spam - The Guardian
    May 14, 2008 · A team of notorious American internet spammers has been fined a record $230m for bombarding MySpace users with adverts for pornography and gambling websites.
  93. [93]
    MySpaceTV launched to battle YouTube - Life | siliconrepublic.com
    Jun 29, 2007 · In a bid to muscle in on YouTube's online video sharing dominance MySpace has re-launched its video site as MySpaceTV, with branded channels ...Missing: decline | Show results with:decline
  94. [94]
    MySpace launches mobile video streaming service - Campaign
    Dec 3, 2008 · MySpace has launched a new service that will allow users to view video content from video-enabled mobile devices.
  95. [95]
    MySpace is still active, and accidentally deleted 12 years worth of ...
    Mar 18, 2019 · “As a result of a server migration project, any photos, videos, and audio files you uploaded more than three years ago may no longer be ...
  96. [96]
    MySpace Developer Platform launches | ZDNET
    Feb 4, 2008 · 4, 2008 at 9:51 p.m. PT. As promised, MySpace has launched its ... through the provision of MySpace Developer Platform (MDP) APIs. A ...
  97. [97]
    MySpace Platform Goes Live February 5; Accepting Developer ...
    Jan 29, 2008 · Starting today, programmers can sign up to register for the MySpace API program, which will go live on February 5th.Missing: MDP | Show results with:MDP
  98. [98]
    MySpace launches developer platform - Computerworld
    Feb 5, 2008 · One new tool is Caja, a JavaScript sanitizer being developed by Google with MySpace to make JavaScript safer for use on social networking sites.Missing: restrictions | Show results with:restrictions
  99. [99]
    [PDF] Safety | Security | Privacy October 15, 2008 MySpace and its parent ...
    • All applications must use our API's, which have security features built in. • All applications go through a robust security review process before going live ...
  100. [100]
    MySpace: Why We Block Widgets - TechCrunch
    Feb 26, 2007 · For example, I just bought this “glass glossy” Widgy widget collection to add some unique custom widgets to my Home Screen. But unless you're ...Missing: MDP | Show results with:MDP
  101. [101]
    MySpace launches new developer tools - CNET
    Dec 9, 2009 · The new APIs offer a variety of features: letting third-party sites tap into MySpace members' status and "mood" updates, incorporate real-time ...Missing: restrictions | Show results with:restrictions
  102. [102]
    MySpace Launches New Set Of Realtime APIs With Google ...
    Dec 9, 2009 · The API includes granular filters that allows developers that leverage it to exercise full control over the amount of data that gets pushed out.
  103. [103]
    How Bad Code and Product Flaws Killed Myspace A Developer's ...
    Jun 15, 2025 · Spoiler: it involves spaghetti code ... By 2005, MySpace had over 20 million users, and that number was doubling at warp speed.Missing: decline 2008-2011 redesign
  104. [104]
    What Happened To MySpace? - Quantum Zeitgeist
    Jun 1, 2024 · At its peak in 2006-2007, MySpace had over 100 million registered users, making it the largest social networking site in the world. However, ...Missing: scalability | Show results with:scalability
  105. [105]
    How Bad Code and Product Flaws Killed Myspace A Developer's ...
    Jun 19, 2025 · While Facebook was building robust internal tools and infrastructure, MySpace devs were still pushing changes manually. ... At first, MySpace was ...2. Myspace Wasn't Just A... · 5. Zuckerberg Enters The... · 6. What Went Wrong Under The...
  106. [106]
    Myspace Begins Roll Out of New Site, But Is It Doomed To Fail? - TNW
    Nov 16, 2012 · Myspace has finally begun rolling out its new service to its users. Here's a detailed review about what to expect and why it's worth taking ...<|separator|>
  107. [107]
    Android MySpace App Launched, Motorola To Release Handset
    Oct 22, 2008 · MySpace has developed applications for Android, Sidekick, iPhone, is currently developing an application for Blackberry, and has more to come!Missing: iOS | Show results with:iOS
  108. [108]
    Justin Timberlake's Myspace releases iPhone app -- with GIFs - CNET
    Jun 12, 2013 · In January, an early version of the new Myspace was released to the public. Wednesday, Myspace arrives on iPhone and mobile Web, and also sheds ...
  109. [109]
    Myspace launches mobile music app - Los Angeles Times
    Jun 12, 2013 · Myspace, continuing its effort to mount a comeback, launched a mobile application that offers free, unlimited streaming of radio stations.Missing: Android | Show results with:Android
  110. [110]
    New Myspace emerges from beta with iPhone app, social radio and ...
    Jun 13, 2013 · Relaunched social network claims radio stations curated by musicians represent a 'bigger idea' than Apple's iTunes Radio.
  111. [111]
    New Myspace Officially Launches, Moves Out of Beta, Adds Mobile ...
    Jun 12, 2013 · The new Myspace officially launched today as its rebuilt platform moves out of beta and adds a new mobile app.
  112. [112]
    Myspace Announces Official Launch of New Platform Across ...
    Jun 12, 2013 · Starting today, the new Myspace is officially available at www.myspace.com. Profiles from Classic Myspace have been upgraded to the new platform ...
  113. [113]
    The rise and fall of MySpace - DEV Community
    Feb 27, 2024 · MySpace, a social networking site, dominated the mid-to-late 2000s, with 75 million monthly active users. Once valued at $12 billion, it declined rapidly.
  114. [114]
    Lessons from MySpace's Rise and Fall - Ikana Business Reviews
    Aug 16, 2024 · MySpace's rise from 2005 to 2008 was driven by customizable profiles and support for emerging artists. However, it declined due to poor adaptation.
  115. [115]
    What is MySpace's business model? - Vizologi
    The primary revenue model for MySpace during its peak involved income from display ads and targeted advertising, leveraging its vast user base and their ...
  116. [116]
    MySpace Gets Googled - Forbes
    Aug 7, 2006 · Google will provide all text-based and display and search advertising to Fox Interactive Media's sites, including MySpace.com, and pay News Corp. $900 million ...
  117. [117]
    How Facebook learned from MySpace's mistakes - Fortune
    Nov 19, 2010 · At its peak, MySpace brought in close to $800 million in revenue in 2008, the year when Facebook surpassed it in the number of accounts.
  118. [118]
    Special report: How News Corp got lost in Myspace | Reuters
    Apr 7, 2011 · News Corp has put the money-losing site on the block. Some believe News Corp might be willing to unload Myspace at a bargain price.
  119. [119]
    Decoding Myspace's Rise and Fall: Essential Lessons for Start-Up ...
    May 14, 2024 · Myspace's revenue model relied heavily on advertising, which, over time, became intrusive and detracted from the user experience. Lesson 7 ...
  120. [120]
    Why Did MySpace Have So Many Intrusive Ads? - I'm a 2000s Baby
    Sep 17, 2025 · The reason MySpace had so many intrusive ads is because it was trying to make money in a new digital world often sacrificing user experience.
  121. [121]
    Time Inc. Buys Myspace Parent Company Viant - Variety
    Feb 11, 2016 · Myspace comes to the publishing and media company through Time Inc.'s acquisition of Viant Technology, a data-marketing company based in Irvine, ...
  122. [122]
    MySpace Music Acquires Shuttered Imeem Music Service - WIRED
    Dec 8, 2009 · MySpace Music, a joint venture between MySpace and the major labels, completed a deal to acquire “certain assets” of the popular social networking site Imeem ...Missing: 2010 | Show results with:2010
  123. [123]
    Ok, Now It's Done. MySpace Music Completes Acquisition Of iMeem
    Dec 8, 2009 · MySpace Music will be acquiring some of iMeem's remaining assets and transition its 16 million monthly users over to MySpace Music.Missing: 2010 | Show results with:2010
  124. [124]
    MySpace Music Resurrects Imeem Playlists | TechCrunch
    Jan 15, 2010 · Last month, MySpace finally completed its deal to acquire troubled music startup Imeem. Unfortunately for imeem fans, the bank shut the ...
  125. [125]
    Myspace - Crunchbase Company Profile & Funding
    In mid 2007, MySpace acquired PhotoBucket for $250 M in cash, plus an additional $50 M earn-out. By late 2009, News Corporation sold a 2/3 stake in Photobucket ...<|control11|><|separator|>
  126. [126]
    https://www.forbes.com/sites/joshmandell/2019/03/19/myspace-music-a-forgotten-casualty-of-the-streaming-wars/
  127. [127]
    MySpace Music: A Forgotten Casualty Of The Streaming Wars - Forbes
    Mar 19, 2019 · In 2008, the company launched MySpace Music, a service that allowed users to create playlists and stream artists' entire catalogs on their ...Missing: freemium | Show results with:freemium<|separator|>
  128. [128]
    MySpace race reaching China - The Hollywood Reporter
    Apr 27, 2007 · News Corp.'s MySpace launched a test in China this week, extending the popular social network into the one of the fastest-growing regions of ...
  129. [129]
    https://www.ftc.gov/news-events/news/press-releases/2012/05/myspace-settles-ftc-charges-it-misled-millions-users-about-sharing-personal-information-advertisers
  130. [130]
    Myspace Settles FTC Charges That It Misled Millions of Users About ...
    May 8, 2012 · Social networking service Myspace has agreed to settle Federal Trade Commission charges that it misrepresented its protection of users' personal information.
  131. [131]
    FTC's Myspace case: Part 1 | Federal Trade Commission
    May 8, 2012 · One particular FTC concern in this case is that the information Myspace shared with advertisers ... privacy policy, including sharing information ...
  132. [132]
    FTC Finalizes Privacy Settlement with Myspace
    Sep 11, 2012 · The Federal Trade Commission has approved a final order settling FTC charges that Myspace misrepresented its protection of users' personal information.
  133. [133]
    Myspace LLC, In the Matter of | Federal Trade Commission
    Myspace Settles FTC Charges That It Misled Millions of Users About Sharing Personal Information with Advertisers.
  134. [134]
    Myspace Agrees to Privacy Controls Sought by F.T.C.
    May 8, 2012 · The advertisers that tracked the online browsing habits of Myspace users were not charged, reflecting a general lack of laws governing online ...
  135. [135]
    Myspace Settles FTC Charges of Misleading…
    May 8, 2012 · The proposed settlement order bars Myspace from misrepresenting the extent to which it protects the privacy of users' personal information or ...
  136. [136]
    FTC Approves MySpace Settlement - Inside Privacy
    Sep 12, 2012 · MySpace's privacy policy suggested that it would not share personally identifiable information (“PII”) with third parties without the user's ...<|separator|>
  137. [137]
    FTC Finalizes Privacy Policy Settlement with Myspace
    Sep 17, 2012 · The FTC concluded that this practice violated Myspace's privacy policy, which promised not to share users' personal information with third ...
  138. [138]
    The MySpace Worm that Changed the Internet Forever - VICE
    Oct 4, 2015 · Samy Kamkar, then a 19-year-old hacker, released what has come to be known as the “Samy worm,” perhaps the fastest-spreading computer virus of all time.Missing: phishing | Show results with:phishing
  139. [139]
    MySpace Under Siege - Dark Reading
    The phishing attack, meanwhile, launched from a profile page using a specially-crafted HTML that hid the real MySpace page content and instead showed the ...
  140. [140]
    What happened in the MySpace data breach? - Twingate
    Mar 21, 2024 · MySpace, once the largest social networking site, was hacked and experienced a massive data breach that came to light in 2016.
  141. [141]
    Myspace data breach: 360 million accounts affected - WeLiveSecurity
    Myspace has revealed that it was the victim of a data breach. The incident took place a few years ago and is thought to have affected close to 360 million ...
  142. [142]
    MySpace Predator Caught by Code - WIRED
    Oct 16, 2006 · Serial child molester Andrew Lubrano was looking to hook up with underage boys on MySpace when a computer search by Wired News picked him out of the site's 100 ...Missing: risks | Show results with:risks
  143. [143]
    MySpace: Your Kids' Danger? - CBS News
    Feb 6, 2006 · It wasn't the first time the alleged predator, Robert Wise, trolled the Internet looking for sex, according to Sgt. Dan Krieger of the League ...Missing: risks | Show results with:risks
  144. [144]
    MySpace: 90,000 sex offenders removed in two years - Reuters
    Feb 3, 2009 · The online networking site MySpace has identified and barred some 90000 registered sex offenders from using the site over the last two years ...Missing: child incidents
  145. [145]
    MySpace Agrees to Lead Fight to Stop Sex Predators
    Jan 15, 2008 · MySpace, the country's largest social-networking Web site, has agreed with attorneys general of 49 states to take new steps to protect children from sexual ...Missing: incidents | Show results with:incidents
  146. [146]
    Prevalence of Online Sexual Offenses Against Children in the US
    Oct 14, 2022 · In this national survey study of 2639 individuals, lifetime exposures were as follows: online child sexual abuse, 15.6%; image-based sexual ...
  147. [147]
    View of To catch a predator? The MySpace moral panic | First Monday
    This paper examines moral panics over contemporary technology, or “technopanics.” I use the cyberporn panic of 1996 and the contemporary panic over online ...
  148. [148]
    [PDF] Online Predators — Myth versus Reality (pdf)
    Most Internet-initiated sex crimes involve adult men who use the. Internet to meet and seduce young adolescents into sexual encounters. Most such offenders are ...<|control11|><|separator|>
  149. [149]
    MySpace lost 12 years of music and photos, leaving a sizable gap in ...
    Mar 18, 2019 · Millions of songs, photos, and videos that were uploaded to the site before 2015 were lost during a data migration, according to MySpace, with ...
  150. [150]
    MySpace Says It Lost Years Of User-Uploaded Music - NPR
    Mar 18, 2019 · The site was purchased by News Corp. in 2005 for $580 million. News Corp. considered acquiring Yahoo and merging it with MySpace but eventually ...<|separator|>
  151. [151]
    Myspace deleted 12 years' worth of music in a botched server ...
    Mar 18, 2019 · Myspace deleted 12 years' worth of music in a botched server migration. All of the music uploaded between 2003 and 2015 is gone.Missing: AWS | Show results with:AWS
  152. [152]
    MySpace loses 50 million songs in server migration - Sophos News
    Mar 19, 2019 · As a result of a server migration project, any photos, videos, and audio files you uploaded more than three years ago may no longer be available ...
  153. [153]
    Myspace apparently lost 12 years' worth of music, and almost no ...
    Mar 18, 2019 · Myspace has apparently lost most or all of the music files uploaded by its users before 2015, and it told users that the data was corrupted beyond repair ...Missing: mismanagement decline
  154. [154]
    Back-Up Lessons Learnt From Myspace Data Loss
    Users began to notice that there was a problem when many of them found that they were unable to play videos or sound files though Myspace. All of the affected ...Missing: criticism | Show results with:criticism
  155. [155]
    How data professionals can learn from MySpace's mistakes - DCD
    Apr 26, 2019 · In mid-March, the one-time social media giant MySpace announced that it had lost 12 years' worth of data due to a server migration problem, ...Missing: criticism | Show results with:criticism
  156. [156]
    What the Myspace data loss debacle tells us about how the internet ...
    Mar 20, 2019 · The news that Myspace lost 12 years of user-generated content during a botched server migration has prompted a lot of debate this week, ...
  157. [157]
    The Cons and Pros of the Myspace Data Loss - New York Magazine
    Mar 18, 2019 · Though Myspace has gone through years of decline, changes of ownership, and a site-wide reboot, it was assumed that the files users had ...
  158. [158]
    MySpace – an unfortunate disaster recovery failure - Fortified Data
    Mar 25, 2019 · “As a result of a server migration project, any photos, videos and audio files you uploaded more than three years ago may no longer be available ...Missing: backups mismanagement decline
  159. [159]
    Did We Just Witness the Biggest Data Migration Fail in History?
    Mar 20, 2019 · MySpace lost 12 years worth of photos, videos and audio files on its site during a server migration project, and many are wondering what ...Missing: criticism | Show results with:criticism
  160. [160]
    Musicians Freak Out as They Learn Myspace Lost 50 Million Songs
    Mar 18, 2019 · So while the company had quietly acknowledged a massive data loss in response to user inquiries last year, it took until this weekend for the ...
  161. [161]
    A portion of the lost MySpace music files has been recovered
    estimated to total 50 million songs (!) — was attributed to a botched server migration ...
  162. [162]
    How the world responded to the Myspace data loss - BBC Three
    Mar 20, 2019 · Myspace has revealed that any photos, videos, and audio files you uploaded more than three years ago may well have been wiped after a server migration caused a ...
  163. [163]
    Myspace and the Precarity of User Content on Social Media Platforms
    Jul 11, 2019 · Myspace reports that the loss of data occurred due to a server migration project gone wrong. Such a loss of digital content received mixed ...
  164. [164]
    What Happened to MySpace & How It Changed Social Media
    Dec 9, 2024 · Once a powerful platform for indie artists to showcase their music, MySpace is now simply an archive that barely has any influence on anything.
  165. [165]
    RIP MySpace music – the success stories of music's first social ...
    Mar 18, 2019 · Undoubtedly MySpace's biggest success story, Arctic Monkeys' rise ran concurrent to that of the once-ubiquitous social network. While Alex ...
  166. [166]
    Myspace acts who found success on the Official Charts
    Mar 27, 2019 · Myspace may have lost their music, but we'll never forget the icons who made their names there. · Arctic Monkeys · Lily Allen · Calvin Harris.
  167. [167]
    Nielsen Data Reveals MySpace Music Movement - Ignite Social Media
    Jul 22, 2025 · The following chart shows both the composition of this audience (how they compare to others), as well as sheer volume. Even though MySpace is ...
  168. [168]
    https://www.bunkhistory.org/resources/the-my-generation-an-oral-history-of-myspace-music
  169. [169]
    The My Generation: An Oral History Of Myspace Music
    Mar 30, 2020 · Artists like Panic! At The Disco, Arctic Monkeys, Soulja Boy, Lily Allen, and Colbie Caillat would become pop stars in part because of their ...Missing: unsigned | Show results with:unsigned
  170. [170]
    MySpace Records wanted to rule the music world - Yahoo
    Aug 14, 2025 · For many, the Arctic Monkeys were the poster children for MySpace's potential as well as the blueprint for success on the platform. The U.K. ...
  171. [171]
    Back to the Future: Myspace and Gen Z Digital Identity
    Aug 25, 2021 · Before Facebook stripped away personalization, Myspace gave users a venue for creativity and self-expression. Gen Zs today are embracing two ...
  172. [172]
    A Large-Scale Study of MySpace: Observations and Implications for ...
    Aug 6, 2025 · We study the characteristics of large online social networks through an extensive analysis of over 1.9 million MySpace profiles in an effort ...
  173. [173]
    Whose space is MySpace? A content analysis of MySpace profiles
    This study examines the content of MySpace pages to reveal the types of personal information users disclose on their pages and the types of communication ...
  174. [174]
    [PDF] boyd, danah. 2006. “Friends, Friendsters, and MySpace Top 8: Writing
    In a culture where it's socially awkward to reject someone's Friendship, ranking them provides endless drama and social awkwardness. Over time, this drama ...
  175. [175]
    I miss the era in which we were forced to savagely rank our best ...
    Apr 24, 2017 · Then that traitorous snake Ray-J rounds off her top four. we need to bring back the myspace listing of top 8 friends bc idk how reciprocal my ...Missing: feature | Show results with:feature
  176. [176]
    From Top 8s to mutuals; MySpace's forgotten influence on how we ...
    Feb 11, 2019 · For one, MySpace helped birth a new crop of celebrity: the Internet Celebrity. People like Paris Hilton and Tila Tequila soared to popularity ...
  177. [177]
    “People Move Into Tribes”: How Myspace Revolutionized Social ...
    Aug 15, 2023 · An excerpt from Michael Tedder's new book, 'Top Eight: How Myspace Changed Music,' about the website that changed music—and fandom—forever.
  178. [178]
    View of The Construction of the Virtual Self on MySpace
    Like many other social networking sites, MySpace offers users a chance to profile themselves. Users showcase who they are to other users within the MySpace ...
  179. [179]
    [PDF] Self-presentation and gender on MySpace
    Aug 15, 2008 · Within the cultural context of MySpace, this study explores the ways emerging adults experience social networking.<|control11|><|separator|>
  180. [180]
    8 Lessons We Can Learn from the MySpace Incident - High Scalability
    Mar 31, 2011 · ... problems were, talking with their vendor, waiting, getting a new ... infrastructure needed to support to maximize this feature. But ...Missing: early | Show results with:early
  181. [181]
    SpaceHey — a space for friends.
    SpaceHey is a retro social network focused on privacy and customizability. It's a friendly place to have fun, meet friends, and be creative. Join for free!SpaceHey IM · SpaceHey Mobile · Support SpaceHey · Login
  182. [182]
    Is MySpace Back? New Retro Social Network SpaceHey
    Aug 1, 2025 · SpaceHey is a nostalgic social media platform inspired by MySpace, offering full profile customization, bulletins, blogs, and no algorithms.<|separator|>
  183. [183]
    Facebook & MySpace: A Brief History - TheWrap
    Apr 28, 2009 · August 2003: MySpace is founded by Brad Greenspan, Chris DeWolfe, Josh Berman and Tom Anderson. February 4, 2004: Mark Zuckerberg and co-founders Dustin ...Missing: acquisition | Show results with:acquisition
  184. [184]
    Q&A: MySpace Founders Chris DeWolfe And Tom Anderson - Forbes
    Jan 4, 2006 · They use MySpace to discover new music and post events. Musicians upload their music. People use it for entertainment purposes or to sell goods ...Missing: roles | Show results with:roles
  185. [185]
    What happened to Myspace? - Slidebean
    Feb 6, 2020 · The News Corp company, owned by media mogul Rupert Murdoch sniffed the success and decided to buy MySpace in 2005 for $580MM. Although six years ...
  186. [186]
    MySpace Founder and Chief Is Out - The New York Times
    Mr. DeWolfe's exit is involuntary, but Tom Anderson, the president of MySpace and a co-founder of the site with Mr. DeWolfe, is in discussions about a continued ...Missing: CEO | Show results with:CEO
  187. [187]
    MySpace Tom: I Am 'The Guy Who Sold MySpace For $580 Million ...
    Dec 20, 2012 · Remember MySpace Tom – Tom Anderson, the cofounder of MySpace, who was everyone's first friend on the site? ... These days, Tom is retired.<|separator|>
  188. [188]
    Ground control to Myspace Tom - by Caitlin Dewey
    née Tom Anderson — built the world's largest social media site, sold it to News Corp and peaceably walked away ...
  189. [189]
    https://sbsun.com/business/20100211/social-network-ceo-is-leaving/
  190. [190]
    https://latimes.com/archives/la-xpm-2010-feb-11-la-fi-ct-myspace11-2010feb11-story.html
  191. [191]
    https://reuters.com/article/business/special-report-how-news-corp-got-lost-in-myspace-idUSTRE7364G4/
  192. [192]
    https://techcrunch.com/2010/02/10/myspace-ceo-owen-van-natta-steps-down/
  193. [193]
    MySpace CEO Owen Van Natta Steps Down | TechCrunch
    Feb 10, 2010 · MySpace has just announced that CEO Owen Van Natta has left the company. Taking his place will be co-Presidents Mike Jones And Jason Hirschhorn.
  194. [194]
    https://hollywoodreporter.com/business/digital/time-acquires-myspace-owner-viant-864255/
  195. [195]
    https://finance.yahoo.com/news/ceo-myspace-tells-us-why-182009846.html
  196. [196]
    The CEO of Myspace tells us why he just sold the company to Time ...
    Feb 11, 2016 · Viant also owns the Specific Media ad network and an "Advertising ... and Viant together, so we will remain as CEO and COO of Viant.Missing: leadership | Show results with:leadership
  197. [197]
    https://zdnet.com/article/time-inc-acquires-myspaces-parent-company-profitable-ad-network/