A major social networking site on the Web, especially for teenagers and young adults. Founded in 2003 by Tom Anderson and Chris DeWolfe, MySpace was acquired by Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation via its $500 million purchase of parent company Intermix in 2005. MySpace makes it easy for users to create a personal profile page, which can be enhanced with HTML code and turned into a multimedia Web page.
MySpace users invite "friends" who can create their own MySpace pages and so on, providing a chain of friends that results in the largest group of linked people on the Internet. MySpace is also used by people to champion their talents. For example, musicians and videographers post their music and videos, and artists show their paintings. Even political candidates use MySpace as a venue to air their opinions. In 2006, there were more than 100 million users on MySpace.
A Revolution?
Wired Magazine contributing editor Spencer Reiss said MySpace was the biggest mall, nightclub and 7-Eleven parking lot ever created and the most disruptive force to hit pop culture since MTV. Those comments would seem to justify why Murdoch paid half a billion dollars for it. In July 2006, MySpace was the most visited site in the U.S. Subsequently, Facebook jumped way past MySpace in social networking traffic (see Facebook).
Quite Controversial
MySpace attracts many under-age kids who want to be part of the "scene." Police and educators hold seminars about MySpace (and similar venues), warning parents that child predators are at work at such sites, where very personal information is readily available. See social networking site.
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