Since MySpace lost it’s VP of product strategy - I’m gonna keep spewing out free strategy to them - as they’re the ones who are keeping Facebook honest. I hope everyone noticed that as soon as Facebook launched their Facebook platform - all of a sudden MySpace started to open up themselves.
Sure it took over a year to happen, but changing courses in the middle of the stream has never been easy. Just ask Microsoft about that. And that’s what MySpace has proven it can do. So now they just need to keep re-inventing themselves.
I highly doubt MySpace would have ‘opened up’ if it weren’t for Facebook - so thanks to Zuckerberg et al for that one. MySpace’s support for OpenSocial and they’re pushing the envelope of openness with MySpaceID are the cornerstones of our open success story - so let’s not forget to thank them for that.
So me handing them this strategy is my thanks. I have these vivid memories of standing around a pool in Westwood (LA) and trying to explain to Ross Levinsohn (who was the boss at the time) that they HAD to open up MySpace. He literally laughed at me.
That’s why I know it’s possible to dream, to insist upon ideals and stay true to my gut feelings when it comes to strategy.
Six years ago I told Jonathan Abrams that Friendster would go out of business with the attitude he had towards “owning users” - and all he seemed to care about was that he had just gotten Kleiner, Perkins VC money. The fakesters scandal showed how little Abrams understood his users, and it didn’t take a crystal ball to figure out that Friendster was doomed.
Five years ago I started demanding that large BigCos release their user’s data.
Four years ago I stood up and asked Bill Gates to give us two-way APIs so that user’s could move their data anywhere they want - and THEY GAVE THAT TO US!
For years I’ve stood up at conferences and asked the same question over and over again. Lots of people complained - but that’s what you have to do to draw attention to an important issue. The truth is that I knew (down deep inside) that the world would open up. And it has!
Who’s to say that MySpace won’t zig while others zag?
I don’t wanna come off as some sort of curmudgeon (and only focus on the negative) so I DO want to highlight some of the great things MySpace is doing.
MySpace Music is clearly ahead of the pack and resembles what Cyworld did in Korea. At one point Cyworld’s music service was the second most profitable music service in the world - after iTunes.
MySpace band pages are still a MUST when it comes to launching and maintaining a band’s publicity and public presence and these pages have grown to being a marketing vehicle for many other kinds of content and products. In fact you could easily say that Facebook is copying MySpace when it comes to ‘pages’.
And then there’s MySpace’s customization capabilities which has given birth to an entire ecosystem of CSS themes and allowed their members to ‘express themselves’ like no other social network. Sure it’s caused them headaches but that is the price you have to pay for taking risks.
News Corp in general has to re-tool and wake up. Rupert’s empire is (partially) based upon newspapers and uh - gosh last I looked that’s tanking pretty rapidly. So an overall International consolidation, which would include getting rid of the extra FIM structure - is probably a pretty smart thing to do right now.
So shut down those local MySpace offices, move those sales people into the local News Corp office and make sure the music rights you ‘negotiated’ with the major labels - works overseas as well!
——————
A MySpace engineering manager left an interesting comment to my previous post about Internet Access in Peru and the challenges the third world has is ‘keeping up with the 1st and 2nd worlds.‘ She agreed that shopping malls are the center of ‘modern’ culture in the 3rd world, as my experiences have shown in India, China and elsewhere.
Even in Italy the one place you can be SURE to find a McDonalds is at the local shopping mall.
And all of these shopping malls - around the world - now have empty retail space.
So in fact this strategy I propounded is something that local municipalities will latch onto. Finding some way to educate their youth, get them off the street, get traffic back into the local malls and connect the dots between:
- the Internet
- the local job and business market
- the youth and job skills
- and major world wide brands
…would be a tremendous strategy! The publicity for this sort of ‘MySpace rebranding‘ would also bring kudos from far and wide (thus raising News Corps stock price) and the live events and kiosks would also spread out MySpace in exactly the places where Facebook ISN’T.
Needless to say synergy has been the underlying notion that drives convergence. But real synergy is something we rarely see.
I always assumed that MySpace would be a key link in News Corps strategy and that cross-promotions between launches and banner ads would be relegated to NON-News Corp advertising partners. Yet - that’s about the best we’ve seen from MySpace when it comes to ‘the Simpsons’, ‘24′ or ‘House’.
My GOD people - do I have to spell it out in B&W?
- House opens up a whole world of medical facts, diagnosis skills and psycho, personality games.
- 24 is all about real-time, simultaneous story lines
- and the Simpsons has redefined sarcasm in the world today
You’re telling me you can’t figure out some fun activities for MySpace ONLY members to connect to these content properties?
And in this day and age of catastrophic meltdown, even MySpace members are worrying about the economy and where else to turn to - than the Wall St. Journal?
I haven’t heard back from Chris or Allen yet - but I’m optimistic they’ll at least listen. They have to. They can’t afford not to. They (eventually) listened when I chastised them about being closed.
Hopefully it won’t take as long this time to come around.
1. MySpace needs to be repositioned. Not just beyond the beer drinking, middle Americans which make up the majority of your clicks, but also into better leveraged, synergistic exploitation of the other News Corp properties - both within and out of MySpace. So be prepared, this is a megalomaniacal strategy.
2. The goal would be to increase profits, contribute to the new economy, redefine what business models social networking is ‘good for’ and go beyond banner advertising - and search.
3. First off - I commend you on your meteoric growth, $800M in revenues and incredible MySpace music service. You have your hands in all sorts of plays and strategy - so who am I to rudely suggest you make changes?
4. MySpace live events, local retail job centers and MySpace kiosks is what I’m proposing. The Skout Out announcement at DEMO got me thinking. Who cares about Skout Out? But a MySpace kiosk would ROCK! Especially in shopping malls, retail strips and places where your kind of customers hang out. I’m not talking about snotty book stores. I’m talking about sneaker and t-shirt shops, Old Navy and Wal-Mart. MySpace is all about middle America - and there’s a huge opportunity to help these people:
- get jobs, learn new technology job skills and in general - nerd out on Skype, video editing and web page building. Customizing MySpace pages and band pages.
- discover music and movies, and then offer them discount tickets, even freebee concerts and live events
- meet each and others like them, and get them all working together - to make money
5. You might have noticed Microsoft (for the second time) getting into the retail game. They failed miserably before and there’s no reason to think they’ll succeed again. “Who associates Microsoft with social networking, music or ‘things hot?’” Nobody - but EVERYBODY at a shopping mall would associate MySpace with all things hot, if it was done right.
I’m not talking about setting up MySpace stores, but partnering with empty retail space in shopping malls throughout America. Set up machines, get a fast line in there and Wifi and set about repositioning your company as a brand which means “help me get a job.” Teach them relevant skills, hook up an on-line marketplace and tie this all into kiosks - as well. Those kiosks will help promote your content properties, tie in partner promotions and point to upcoming live events - being putting on in cities around the country.
6. So let me jump to the chase. As the same time that you roll your MySpace kiosks - you launch a ‘MySpace jobs center‘ concept. This is not just about jobs listings, which you can do in conjunction with CareerBuilder or Monster (or even Craigslist) but this is MORE about developing jobs skills, and setting up local web and multimedia bureaus, so kids can learn how to build MySpace pages and band pages and help put on MySpace live events. These MySpace sponsored events will then tie into MySpace tech support and video phone call centers and ultimately end-up with - MySpace learning.
Think of this jobs skills program as a hybrid approach where kids (and even adults) learn how to build a web page, customize CSS, learn how to edit video or audio, learn how to integrate different web technologies together - which then support live event promotions, parties, activism, all sorts of ‘on the ground‘ kind of street fairs, etc. Even church events.
Radio stations, local newspapers, etc. all try this and come off boring and flat. But add in some MySpace joie de vivre, anchor live events with a well known act, and line up tons of local acts who would DIE to have a chance to perform - and before you know it you’ve generated yourself a little phenomena - which is exactly what is needed out in middle America - right now! What better brand to bring tech knowledge and job skills to the mall - than MySpace?
7. These local live events put on around the country will feature local photographers, artists and writers as well. But the anchor of the event will be the live music. Identify one or two top acts and for each town you travel to - use MySpace to identify local acts would would DIE to play backup to the stars. So the live event is a celebration of local creativity, job skills and ultimately finding jobs - all brought to you by MySpace!
7. Kids associate MySpace with technology. So what better brand than to educate them, get them jobs and position all that - vis a vis - your TV shows, newspapers and satellite services? What better way than to connect your music service, your social network and live musical events - than through kiosks and job centers - at local malls? What better way then to reposition Myspace and News Corp into a sweet spot in America today (and in fact around the world) “we’re gonna help you help yourself, have fun and place you in a job along the way…..”
8. Take some lessons from Clear Channel and Live Nation - music is at the center of culture, and packaging is the way to make money from it. Add in TV and Movies and you’re all ready to go. But the packaging is changing.
You (MySpace and News Corp) haven’t been doing much more than cross-promoting and taking money from launch budgets. So what I propose is that these kiosks, job centers and live events get sponsored by your entertainment properties, existing advertisers and ‘middle America’ positioned brands. A series of live events, semi-trailer roadshows and mall booths all flog the same theme - “MySpace is how you can learn new skills, meet new friends and find a job”.
9. What America (and the rest of the world) needs now are tech companies who will help educate us on how to upload a photo, edit a video, remix a audio track. How to build a web page, customize a MySpace band page or even launch a new company - all using MySpace. So if you could imagine a local (empty) retail location, with a sign that says “MySpace Job Center” - the kids will line up. Give them free lessons on developing these skillsets, help connect them (via MySpace) to folks who will pay $15 - $25 - maybe even $50 - for a killer MySpace band page - and you’ve got a start.
10. Then those job skills get added to their resume right when corporate America is looking at $Billions$ of dollars of retraining costs. This is what the University of Phoenix is all about. Job skills. Useful skills to get a job. Once a kid has built some band pages, customized some CSS or even configured a laptop to support a live event - they’re gonna be armed with the knowledge that will help them the rest of their life.
You know what I’m talking about - the kind of knowledge they’re NOT getting from our school systems.
11. Setting up a giant game LAN, updating MySpace kiosks with the latest promotional artwork, content and service links, maintaining a network, helping to support VISTA machines (burp!), all those ugly job skills - which are actually in short supply! Why not have MySpace educate these kids - at the mall - and also set them up with gigs? And make sure to hang that “24″ and “Simpsons” flag, put on “House” trivia quizzes and tie into the Wall. St, Journal knowledge bureau - while you’re at it.
I had been planning and working on this panel for six months, ever since Loic and Cathy Brooks asked me to do it - during the summer. The timing was perfect because MySpace had just announced their MySpace ID platform at the show, while Facebook Connect and Google Friend Connect both shipped last week.
And on top of all that, Microsoft shipped a major upgrade to the Windows live suite of apps and services - and SixApart had shipped a product called TypePad Connect - so every single panel member had made a major announcement and was shipping their “open technologies” - within the past few weeks.
What transpired was a fairly comprehensive panel discussion on the state of open platforms in the web today (even though we would have liked to have had more time to go into the positioning of OpenID as either a technology or a solution) and other ideas on how these platforms can connect together. However we simply didn’t have enough time.
So here’s the panel - I think it went really well:
During the panel we triangulated between the interests of the major platform vendors and their business models and agenda - with that of “what’s best for end-users.” We gave the audience an overview of the various approaches to open social networking - Facebook (highly integrated experience, 98% open), OpenSocial (a set of APIs for providing Facebook ‘like’ apps) and Live Mesh (which is a synchronization, cloud computing/local server mesh approach.)
I tried to give each approach it’s own day in court and as far as I’m concerned, I think all three of these approaches can play together and work with each other - to create a viable, happy ‘open mesh’ of inter-conncted networks. I know that’s an idealistic dream, but all the pieces of the puzzle are coming together.
We even got heckled from the audience by Michael Arrington, who claimed that being an open platform isn’t always the best user experience and that maybe Facebook was gonna win cause it WAS closed.
“We have a new president and he’s shown us that through working together with people, we can achieve good. The old school Republican attitude was to call out Facebook for what they’re doing WRONG, but our new attitude is to work together with folks to move forward. We owe allot to Facebook, as we do to Doug Engelbardt, and we all make our contributions to what ‘open’ is.”
The panel started off by identifying “Open is the new Black” as the latest trend permeating the major platforms today. We went over the ‘Open Stack” and what each of the panelist’s companies define as “open”.
Dave Morin of Facebook informed us that Facebook had 130M users worldwide, 650,000 platform developers (from 180 countries) and 14.5B page views - a month. But when I asked him how Facebook connects into the open stack and which of the layers of the stack Facebook would connect to - he didn’t have an answer. [NOTE: Privately we know that Dave Morin supports us, but he's not the boss at Facebook.]
What I WAS able to get out of Dave Morin was that we’ll be able to get access to the Facebook feed - whch we don’t today. Then David Recordon eloquently pointed out that building on top of open technologies (like our Open Stack) is better for developers and end-users. David is on the Board of the OpenID Foundation and there is movement to morph the OpenID brand into a full solution.
Max Engel then explained what MySpace announced (MySpaceID) and how MySpace users are used to have their ID as a URL (myspace.com/marc) and that fits right into the OpenID approach.
Dave Glazer then explained the difference between OpenID and OpenSocial (Glazer is on the board of the OpenSocial foundation.) OpenSocial brings Facebook app functionality - to “the rest of us”.
We then had a high level Microsoft executive named Jeff Hansen who explained how Live Mesh is a key component in their future and how it is a gateway technology to create and maintain symmetrical synchronization of one’s data and social graph - across a wide range of devices and your desktop. By implementing two-way APIs, Microsoft will enable any of us to access any Microsoft’s customer’s profile data (or any other implementation of these ‘live mesh’ protocols) and then put it right back from whence it came.
Then panel covers all the important issues of our industry today.
So we’re seeing open permeate throughout our world and raising it’s head in lots of interesting ways.
My friends David Recordon and the Plaxo dudes (Joseph and John) along with Chris Messina have a IPTV show called “theSocialWeb.tv” and it’s probably the best thing out there to highlight the status, trends and memes of this world and which dives deeply into the geeky issues surrounding “open social networking”.
But in fact - it goes beyond just social networking. Social features will soon be built into all software. That’s something else Fred Wilson is figuring out. So we’re seeing him (and his VC cohorts) start to invest in all sorts of open platforms and products, but they’re missing a crucial element to the game - contributing back to teh community. So that’s why I created the post “Taking advantage of open for proprietary reasons“.
Yahoo has finally launched their underlying ID layer - almost four years after I first asked Jerry Yang and Dan Rosensweig for that. Over the subsequent 3.5 years I was told “it was coming”, “yah yah - we’re gonna do that“, “yah sure - we’ll have APIs for MyYahoo” - but yet as of this writing we still don’t have two-way APIs into MyYahoo.
The BBC seems to be getting their open act together - and building their own underlying ID layer under the leadership of Eric Huggers. They’d better - they promised us Open BBC almost four years ago.
Microsoft has launched their Open Live Mesh Cloud thingie - Azure. And Facebook and MySpace (though clerarly closed meshes) are opening up - in their own way.
iGoogle appears to be positioning itself as a key aspect of Google’s “digital lifestyle aggregaton” strategy. With clean integration with OpenSocial, Reader, Gmail and (one would assume) ALL the suite of Google apps - iGoogle will soon be the state-of-the-art dashboard which I talk about in Chapter 6 - “UI Objects” - in my book.
And lord knows what’s gonna happen once Clearspring and Gigya start running ads in their widgets. That is one of the key milestones of our monetizable distributed business model. And heaven help us once Twitter declares their business model next year. Or FriendFeed starts to ‘experiment’ with ads. Watch for stampedes of new proportions.
Some call it the open stack. Others are bent on user identity oriented focus or an enterprise approach. It really doesn’t matter. Open will come in a myriad of sizes, shapes and packages.
Yes indeed - Open is the new Black. Everyone is doing it, in their own way - which is EXACTLY how it’s supposed to happen - to build an open mesh - where others can come in and participate.
I’m finalizing my book “How to build the Open Mesh” and Mary Hodder suggested that I add some Appendices on how various BigCos are building THEIR versions of the open mesh. The full title of this Appendix is “Aren’t Facebook and MySpace really Closed Meshes and how can we connect to them?”
So here is Appendix - D
Sending out tentacles or satellites isn’t the same as being open.
The tentacles of Facebook and the satellites of MySpace don’t fool us. They don’t REALLY want to mesh in with us, but they have to. So they put limitations and control over their user’s data, keeping them locked into their platforms. That’s their business model.
Both Facebook and MySpace have come up with architectures to allow for tight coupling of their user’s profile data, social graphs and content to the outside world. That will have to be good enough for us to mesh into - for now. Hopefully by the time this book is read - things will be better and we’ll be able to gain access to their user’s emails - which is the holey grail.
But our relentless pressure and insistance upon full freedom of our data - will win the day!
Now that Facebook and MySpace have truly opened up and will allow their users to move their profile data, social graph and content to other systems (under certain access controls) its time to talk about these behemoths connecting together via the OpenID Attribute Exchange.
First off I want to thank Dick for his enlightened approach and understanding of the politics and nuances surrounding evolving open standards and I’m excited as hell by something Allen Hurff (SVP of MySpace) said to me at the recent Facebook f8 conference:
“We looked at Attribute Exchange and we like it, but we need to do some extensions to it to match our solution.”
So this blog post is a plea to Allen, Dave Morin (Facebook), Kevin Marks (Google), Eran Hammer-Lahav (Yahoo), Angus Logan (Microsoft), Joseph Smarr (Plaxo) and of course David “get it done” Recordon (SixApart) to work together and extend the Attribute Exchange - so that we (the industry) can ALSO mesh into this compatibility ‘river’ of data and deliver to ALL our users and customers the ability to freely and easily flow their data - wherever the hell they want.
And let’s not forget Chris Messina and Will Norris (Vidoop and DiSO), Stephen Paul Weber, Leah Culver, Ben Laurie, Brad Nueberg, Simon Phipps, Scott Kveton, Tantek Celik and Brian Oberkirch - and all the other independents who are working on open social networking - in their various guises and scenarios. Or Dave Winer.
I know I’ve been ranting about this for a while (my wife actually complained to me that she’s sick and tired of hearing the same dam thing over and over again) but I hope you all agree that this idea’s time has come.
The key ascept to these extensions (from my POV) is matching, mapping and normalizing the various techniques of access controls. This will facilitate the smooth movement of user’s data between systems - with concise privacy and access controls over that data.
If one sets up their controls - in say Facebook (and utilizes their recently announced ‘dynamic privacy‘ system) then it HAS to match up to whatever MySpace and Google are doing. And vice versa.
And Microsoft is gonna have to play along with us - as well. We need to put the user’s best interests first and let that dictate what happens. But it seems to me that Facebook’s DRM bits for people sort of sets a standard level of behavior here - so the trick will be how others can get compatible with Facebook (utilizng other techniques.)
The goal is that (let’s say by Thanksgiving) we all have a normalized set of access controls with which we can interop between. It’s not just about enabling Facebooks apps to work outside of Facebook. Its about moving MySpace data into Facebook, then moving it to Orkut or Microsoft’s world - and back to Yahoo or Plaxo.
I’ll leave the technical details to you folks as to what exactly needs to get extended and mapped. But certainly upcoming efforts on ‘portable contacts‘ will supply us with a standardized schema and set of APIs to interconnect the PUT and GET of profile info.
Now we need to just all agree upon some common notions of media, messages, events and places, and of course the 800 lb. gorilla of them all - social graph. Both FOAF and XFN provide ways of doing that.
So let’s have at it.
BTW here are Dave Morin Allen Hurff and Kevin Marks (and me) at f8:
Final note - Allen says to me: “we’re trying to decide between FOAF and XFN” and I immediately say BOTH dude BOTH! We need them BOTH!
I have these vivid memories of standing around a pool in Westwood (LA) and trying to explain to Ross Levinsohn (who was the boss at the time) that they HAD to open up MySpace. He literally laughed at me.
MySpace Music is clearly ahead of the pack and resembles what Cyworld did in Korea. At one point Cyworld’s music service was the second most profitable music service in the world - after iTunes.
I always assumed that MySpace would be a key link in News Corps strategy and that cross-promotions between launches and banner ads would be relegated to NON-News Corp advertising partners. Yet - that’s about the best we’ve seen from MySpace when it comes to ‘the Simpsons’, ‘24′ or ‘House’.
I’ve been tracking MySpace’s progress, and the Dow Jones purchase, the rise of Fox News and (of course) the Simpsons, 24 and House.
6. So let me jump to the chase. As the same time that you roll your MySpace kiosks - you launch a ‘
And lord knows what’s gonna happen once Clearspring and Gigya start running ads in their widgets. That is one of the key milestones of our monetizable distributed business model. And heaven help us once Twitter declares their business model next year. Or FriendFeed starts to ‘experiment’ with ads. Watch for stampedes of new proportions.
