The network MySpace, one of the largest social networks in the late 2000s, was sold for $ 35 million to online advertising, Specific Media, which intends to make a vector for its activities. In 2005, MySpace was bought by News Corp, the group of media mogul Rupert Murdoch for $ 580 million, but the old social networking giant has seen its earnings and collapsed face value the success of Facebook.
MySpace "has transformed the way people discover, consume and interact with online content," said the CEO of Specific Media, Tim Vanderhook, said in a statement. "There are many synergies between our companies as we all attach to enrich the experience of digital media by making them more relevant and interesting," he added.
NEW LAYOFFS
While MySpace has already undertaken several waves of layoffs in recent months, a memorandum issued by the news website All Things Digital says that the company will undergo another drastic weight loss. According to reports, half the workforce would be affected, about 200 people.
The Director General Mike Jones, who had already removed 47% of the workforce earlier this year, announced he would leave himself MySpace after a two-month transition. News Corp. had begun in February looking for a new owner for the social network, he struggled to revive after repositioned as a meeting place for lovers of cultural events, including music.
In the last published quarterly beginning in May by News Corp., MySpace's results were included in a category with vague outlines, whose losses had been dug 125 to $ 156 million. MySpace now meets every month some 35 million U.S. Internet users, against more than 157 million for Facebook, according to figures from consulting firm Comscore. According to the firm eMarketer, advertising revenues have plunged MySpace since 2008 (604 million). "This year, eMarketer estimates that MySpace will earn just $ 183.5 million in advertising revenue in the world", down 36.3% year on year. "Facebook, by comparison, will earn $ 4.05 billion in advertising this year."
Asked Monday in New York on the failure of MySpace, a former aide to CEO Mark Zuckerberg Facebook founder Sean Parker, found that the management team at MySpace had "failed to adequately develop the product" . "It was basically a big pile of stuff poorly designed for many, many years. At one point, they were content to copy Facebook quickly, they would be Facebook," said Mr. Parker to Techcrunch. MySpace was created in 2003 by marketing professionals Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson, who had been ousted by News Corp in 2009.
