Stealing MySpace

October 27, 2008
Angwin, an award-winning journalist for the Wall Street Journal
, recounts the history of MySpace.com in this well-written, entertaining and drama-filled chronicle. From its founding by Chris DeWolfe to its surprising purchase for nearly $600 million by Rupert Murdoch and NewsCorp., Angwin takes the reader through the company’s tumultuous journey to the top. Readers will learn how Eliot Spitzer’s spyware lawsuit nearly devastated the company and how Richard Blumenthal’s investigation into the site’s lack of protection of minors resulted in a blindsiding public assault. An array of personalities populate the book, including Viacom chairman Sumner Redstone, Bill O’Reilly and Tila Tequila, who was one of the earliest to use her popularity on the site to generate a successful business. Angwin also describes the massive defection of MySpace users to Facebook and leaves the reader to wrestle with the issue of digital identity. Attesting to the depth of her research, Angwin also includes a lengthy notes section. This engrossing look at how MySpace became a media powerhouse will find a solid audience of business history, technology and entrepreneurship readers.

November 15, 2008
MySpace, originally created as a data storage site, quickly transformed itself into one of the largest social-networking services worldwide, and it has revolutionized electronic marketing. Angwin, an award-winning reporter for the "Wall Street Journal", relays its history as it changed hands among different businesspeople and companies, eventually becoming the prize digital asset of Rupert Murdoch, the well-known CEO of News Corporation. The site currently has many competitors, the biggest of which is Facebook; market share is determined by individuals' decisions to join one of these services, decisions largely based on whether family members and friends are already members. Angwin explains how high-profile members exert power by threatening to leave if they are not given maximum control of their online experiences. She skillfully shows the combination of business strategies used by MySpace and Facebook, including copying each other's best features, to capture market share and advertising revenue. The first and only business history thus far of MySpace, this outstanding title is highly recommended for all public library and academic collections.Caroline Geck, MLS, MBA, Somerset, NJ

Copyright 2008 Library Journal, LLC Used with permission.

February 1, 2009
MySpace, the most popular social-networking site on the Internet, was not created by the likes of the high-tech engineers and computer geeks who created Google and Yahoo! but by two marketing executives with no technical prowess who ran a shady company called eUniverse, which sold wrinkle cream and ink-jet cartridges over the Internet. Founders Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson simply copied most of the features of MySpace from an earlier site called Friendster, but users flocked to the site because they were allowed to use fake identities and to customize their pages any way they wanted. Angwin traces the development of the company from its roots in the spam and porn industriesto one of the most popular sites on the Internet goingpublic andsold to Rupert Murdochs News Corp. Angwin, who has written on technology and media for the Wall Street Journal for six years, does an excellent job sorting out the details of this convoluted journey, addressing issues such as privacy and anonymity and the tentative nature of all things on the Internet.(Reprinted with permission of Booklist, copyright 2009, American Library Association.)