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News Corp Sells MySpace

Six year's ago Rupert Murdoch's News Corp purchased MySpace for $580M. Yesterday the floundering site was sold for a mere $35M.

The sale closes a complex chapter in the history of the Internet and of the News Corporation, which was widely envied by other media companies when it acquired MySpace in 2005. At that time, MySpace was the world’s fastest-growing social network, with 20 million unique visitors each month in the United States. That figure soon soared to 70 million, but the network could not keep pace with Facebook, which overtook MySpace two years ago. As users fled MySpace, so, too, did advertisers. The market research firm eMarketer estimates that the site will earn about $183 million in worldwide ad revenue this year, down from $605 million at its peak, when the site introduced many Web users and many advertisers to the concept of social networking.

MySpace Likely To Shutter

News Corp is reportedly putting MySpace up for sale after cutting staff by 50% this week. If there are no immediately takers, the site is expected to shut down by June. This will come as a shock to millions who thought MySpace was already gone. The site lost $100M in the fiscal year that ended last June.

That Doesn't Make You A Model

I'm getting a Jason Stackhouse vibe from the singer.

Birthers: Obama's MySpace Page More Proof Of Obama's Birth Shenanigans

World Net Daily's latest issue with Barack Obama's eligibility to be president? His MySpace page has his age totally wrong!

If President Obama were indeed born in Hawaii, was it while the islands were a territory of the United States? A new wrinkle in the dispute over his birth – and whether he is eligible to be president under the U.S. Constitution's requirement that the president be a "natural born" citizen – appeared today when Obama's official MySpace page declared his age is 52, thus placing his birth year at 1957 instead of 1961 as has been claimed. That would mean he would have been born during the archipelago's time as a territory of the U.S., the islands' status from about 1900 until statehood in 1959. The birth year also conflicts with campaign and other White House information that have discussed his 48th birthday this month.

WingNutDaily fails to note in their article that even if Obama were born in Hawaii before it became a state, he would still be eligible. Barry Goldwater, for example, ran for president as the GOP candidate in 1964 even though he was born in Arizona before it became a state. I'll allow that the MySpace thing is strange, though. It's still wrong, too, at this writing.

For Whom The Web Tolls

I wanted to write about ghoulish MyDeathSpace.com yesterday, but after the AP's story was picked up by virtually every news outlet, the site crashed from all the traffic. MyDeathSpace is a virtual graveyard populated by deceased members of MySpace - kids who committed suicide, soldiers killed in Iraq, victims of murder, cancer, car accidents - a cornucopia of tragedy.

The site currently hosts about 2700 profiles and receives more than 100,000 hits a day. There, vulturous vampiric voyeurs pore over the final posts of distraught teens, worried GI's, and bravely sunny chemo patients. There's even a death map so you can stalk the dead in your area. MySpace has no relationship with MyDeathSpace, but family members of deceased MySpace members are typically granted control over the pages and many leave their loved ones' profiles up as a cyber-memorial.

I find this phenomenon creepily fascinating. And fascinatingly creepy. I suppose if I were hit by a car, I'd want my blog to stay up, so I'm not entirely sure why MyDeathSpace skeeves me so. Maybe it's their banner ad for TrueSwords.com.

MySpace Politics

I have lost one of my "top eight" MySpace friends, for the moment. Barack Obama's campaign has wrestled control of the MySpace page being operated by one of his supporters after they decided that with more than four times more "friends" than the other candidates, it would be best if the page were run by his actual campaign staff. A guy named Joe Anthony had been running the very successful page, but Obama's staff was concerned about messages going out under Obama's name, even though they were satisfied with how the page was operating and even had password access.

Joe Anthony demanded $49,000 for his hard work on the page and Obama's campaign staff refused, ultimately winning the page back in arbitration with News Corp, although losing the 160,000 friends of the page in the change. Anthony is reportedly "heartbroken" at the "bullying" of the campaign staff and says that he will no longer support Obama. I don't know about $49,000, but it seems like some compensation is due Anthony, even if he started the page without their agreement.