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 after Facebook's popularity in 2008.

Here's exactly what went wrong 👇

Back in the mid-to-late 2000s, MySpace was the most popular social network, with 75 million monthly users.

It was popular in the early 2000s, but no one seems to remember it today.

What went wrong with MySpace, the Facebook of the 2000s that dominated the social media space?

The rise of MySpace

In 2003, a lot of university students were using Facebook (a social network).

@myspacetom and @Chris_DeWolfe saw the potential in social networking and decided to develop their own social platform called MySpace, inspired by the popular features of Friendster.

They were working at this company called eUniverse, doing internet marketing stuff at the time.

It only took them 10 days to make the first version of MySpace, and it was ready to launch.
Throughout the process, Brad Greenspan, CEO of eUniverse, supported the project with a team of programmers and other resources.

Initially, MySpace users were eUniverse employees, and the company ran contests to encourage sign-ups.
MySpace quickly gained users and competed with Friendster for popularity.

They used eUniverse's huge email list of 20 million subscribers to spread the word about MySpace.

In just a month, MySpace had 1M people sign up. And wait for it—within 9 months, they hit 5 million subs.
It seemed like Myspace had the perfect business strategy going on at that time.

A challenge to Friendster

One reason MySpace became big was because it came out in 2003, when social media was just taking off.
Before MySpace, there was Friendster, but it had issues, and people started losing interest.

MySpace stepped in, letting users do cool things with their pages and adding features people wanted.
It became a hub for creative people and set the stage for how brands and users connect today, kind of like influencers.

Strategic moves

The success of MySpace was also due to meticulous planning.

Collaborating with tech experts for software architecture was just one part.
Opting for ColdFusion server hosting over Friendster's Java server pages was a key move.

It's not always about the numbers; it's about making the right choices that helped MySpace overtake Friendster.
So, back in February 2005, Chris and Mark Zuckerberg from Facebook had a chat about buying it.

The $75 million offer from Zuck seemed way too high to Chris for what they were getting.

So, the deal never happened.

News Corporation acquired MySpace

In July 2005, Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation (a large media company) bought MySpace from eUniverse for $580 million.

In the first year alone, MySpace tripled its initial purchase value, making it a sweet deal.

In 2006, MySpace expanded to the UK, China, and others.

They hit 100 million MySpace signups in August 2006.

MySpace also joined the OpenSocial Alliance, which Google leads, in November 2007.

It works with sites like LinkedIn and hi5 to set standards for social network software developers.

Downfall begins

MySpace was at its peak in 2007 and valued at $12 billion, but things changed abruptly on April 19, 2008, when Facebook stole the crown and surpassed MySpace.

MySpace began to decline and started losing memberships after that, whereas Facebook continued to thrive.

The problem was that there was not much of a comparison between MySpace and Facebook; Facebook was clearly the better product.

This was mostly because MySpace fell behind as Facebook improved, making it easier for people to use.
Third-party developers helped Facebook make apps and games. MySpace, on the other hand, failed because it was slow to adopt new technologies.

Adversity post-acquisition

After MySpace was acquired, the goals and priorities of the platform shifted & there was a greater emphasis on generating more revenue.
It was impossible to avoid the annoying ads that were all over MySpace.

These ads sent people to sketchy websites and got them to sign up for credit cards and other services.

News Corporation tried to reach its unrealistic financial goals by adding different parts that could make money without giving them much thought or planning.

This resulted in poor management of developer resources.
Users who were once popular on MySpace started to leave the site for other platforms because it failed to prioritize community needs & was no longer user-friendly.

Even though MySpace has tried many times to change its image, it has not been able to regain its former popularity.

Time Inc. acquisition of MySpace

In 2011, News Corp. sold MySpace to Time Inc. for an undisclosed sum, speculated to be $35 million.

The platform still exists today, with a primary focus on music, but it is much smaller than it once was.

MySpace faced a setback in 2019 when it had to apologize for losing 12 years of content during a server migration.

While MySpace is no longer popular and inactive, the website still exists but has shifted its focus.
It now features content related to music artists, actors, TV shows, and movies, functioning more like an entertainment website.

It went downhill when it switched from being a social network to an entertainment hub.
People initially hopped on for socializing, & instead of improving that, they changed the very reason people joined in the first place.

The articles available on the site are sourced from the music magazine Spin, and no new articles have been published on MySpace since Mar 2022.
MySpace is kind of hanging in there, but it's not what it used to be.

The platform is a bit of a mess – broken images, tracks that don't play – looks like they're not really keeping up.

Plus, there is no dedicated app for MySpace on iPhone or Android.
You can still access it on your phone's browser, but the vibe's just not there anymore, you know?

Wrap up

That's all for now!

If you enjoy reading similar stories, follow me (@ishratumar) and Muhammad Umar on Twitter/X for a daily dose of insightful content.