Myspace
(or My Space) is a free service that uses the Internet
for online communication through an interactive network
of photos, weblogs, user profiles, e-mail, web forums,
groups, as well as many other communication devices.
This all-inclusive service is sometimes called a social
networking interface. It is an active site always updating
or creating new features for their members. Myspace
is also sometimes used to describe a user created webpage
on the Myspace.com service. Members are usually titled
as Myspacers.
Myspace.com
was founded in 2003 by a couple of individuals in Southern
California. The person mostly responsible for the advertisement
of the site is Tom Anderson. Myspace was created by
a team of twenty-five people in the beginning. There
are a couple of individuals that played a much larger
role in Myspace's development than Tom; namely Chris
and Josh. A little known and mysterious figure, Shane,
was also greatly responsible for much of Myspace's early
success by getting famous friends to join, bringing
their fan bases with them.
Within
months, the site's popularity exploded and the programmers
were hurried to improve the site as much as possible.
In early September, many changes were made just so that
users could delete things.
On
September 25, 2003, Myspace announced the addition of
several major features to the site. Included were the
first group profiles, the ability to empty the trash
in the mailbox, a new look for the bulletin board, a
mail indicator live anywhere on the system, unlimited
friends, and the option to change an email and turn
off reminders. Also, a number of bugs were fixed.
October
2003 brought new features such as leaving comments on
people's profile pictures, hiding online status, having
the ability to block friend requests, and approve comments
before they could be posted. In November of 2003, Myspace
added features such as Classifieds, picture ranking,
and a way to find users by interest. The "Online
Now" status was also added in more areas, and the
Mailbox was vastly improved. At this time, users were
starting to experiment with HTML, creating more elaborate
profiles that attracted interest. Some users offered
their help so that new and inexperienced users could
also learn to customize their profile.
On
December 18, 2003, Myspace introduced their Instant
Messenger, for one-on-one IM communication between users.
Some Myspacers have created their own IRC chatrooms,
and marketed them as unofficial. MySpace added its own
Chat Rooms in February of 2004. To this date, Myspace
generates a large amount of revenue through promotional
partnerships and sponsorships.
In
2004, musical artists were allowed to create their own
profiles and were given the option to post streaming
MP3s of their songs to build up bigger fanbases. Some
bands even allowed the MP3s to be downloaded. The concept
has worked for some, and less so for others. In early
April 2004, new features such as forums, games, Advanced
Browse, and a new Journal customization were introduced
to the public. The games included the very popular Gold
Miner.
On
June 4, 2004, members were given the ability to create
brand-new groups so that like-minded people could share
a common bond. There are two ways for groups to add
members. The moderator of any group can invite members
individually, or members can join themselves by either
word of mouth or by browsing the 'Groups' section of
Myspace. However, some groups have gone under scrutiny
by the creators of the site, with some posting offensive
photos, which was a direct violation of the site's rules.
Attempts are being made everyday to deal with these
types of groups, and in the end the hope is that it
remains free of offensive material. Other threats that
have emerged within groups and the site in general are
spammers and trolls, however trolls tend to vandalize
the forums with HTML.
Fall
of 2004 brought another small feature to the blogs.
Users could now give "props", later changed
to "kudos", to their friends if they were
in support of them, to praise them, or just to give
respect. Another name change came to the journals; they
were then called blogs
Towards
the end of 2004, and into 2005, Myspace gave the option
to "event invite". Many bands are now using
this feature to invite fans to shows, and it can be
used for many other purposes. Also at this time, rumors
of a possible shutdown of the site were circulating
and to resolve this, Tom posted on everyone's Mailbox,
saying "Myspace is not shutting down, and it will
never shut down". Tom Anderson has a strict policy
of running with anything that makes him money.
On
January 27, 2005, Myspace introduced another new feature
that lets members see if their friends on AOL, Yahoo!,
or MSN are members on Myspace. After early teething
problems this is now a useful addition to the site.
Myspace
implemented another new feature with member's schools,
that previously people had to show that they were alumni
or students of. On February 8, 2005, all those who had
entered their schools into the system were automatically
assembled into a homepage for each school or college
that they were either an alumni or student of. Members
could now search for classmates with much ease, and
in the process the homepages replaced some thriving
groups dedicated to schools. The new homepages displayed
fifteen members at random; all were students of the
school, plus recently added members were pushed to the
left hand side of the page. The homepage also gave classified
spaces for people to sell textbooks, and advertise open
apartments and spaces for roommates. Also those looking
for these items or positions could request in their
own section. The homepage came with its own forums,
thus rendering the original groups useless, however
there was no ability to add pictures, and unlike the
groups, there was no moderator.
On
February 24, 2005, Myspace implemented a handy new way
for moderators to keep certain threads constantly at
the top of group forums. On other sites with forums,
these are known as "sticky threads", that
are perpetually accessable to all users, rather than
having to search through pages of other threads. For
a moderator to make a thread "stick" to the
top, they must activate what Myspace calls Pins; pinning
a thread sends it to the top until it is unpinned. This
feature is useful for those who want attention drawn
to a certain topic rather than have it pushed down by
others, or having to "bump" it back up.
March
28, 2005, brought the introduction of usernames that
members could create for use in a new URL address. Other
members who knew this address could type it into their
address bar for instant access to their friend's profile.
Myspace
has always had much trouble keeping up with new members,
as thousands join daily, and the servers have undergone
frequent maintenance to speed up the system. Ironically,
all the maintenance had a tendency to slow down the
site even more. Additionally, the creators of the site
added a new feature nearly every month.
There
are also allegations of political bias. Numerous "anti-racist"
organizations are allowed in the groups section that
profess violence towards "racists", and anyone
thought to be associated with racism is banned, despite
any respect for the rules.
Tom
and the other creators have also hosted many parties
in Hollywood, Miami, New York City, Chicago, Boston,
San Francisco, Seattle, and Hawaii to support the site.
Many
users admit they feel Myspace parties are nothing but
commercialized events that feel exactly like a normal
club night. A smaller population of users are irritated
at the fact that Myspace never offers anything free
to the users in return for the income they provide the
site and it's creators through annoying ads.
Some
stats from the site (as of January 20, 2005):
