Posts Tagged ‘MySpace’

MySpace – the new Hollywood launchpad – covers premier of Avatar

December 14th, 2009

myspace_small_logoThe MySpace makeover continues with the launch of the highly anticipated James Cameron mega-movie Avatar with full “blue-carpet” coverage of the Hollywood premier this Wednesday evening (Dec 16 @ 6pm PT/9pm ET).  In addition to the premier coverage, MySpace has been busy turning itself from a social network player into a media outlet.  Now offering everything from fashion to music, and of course movies, the MySpace makeover seems to be in full effect.

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Since taking the reigns of MySpace in April 2009, CEO Owen Van Natta has been transforming MySpace from a social networking site that was losing its market share to Facebook at an alarming rate, to a new media platform target the entertainment industry.  Whatever you may think of the new mega movie from Cameron, the fact is MySpace has become the online launchpad of Hollywood’s blockbusters (see trailer courtesy of MySpace Movies below).

Avatar Trailer in HD

Trailer Park | MySpace Video

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MySpace Music goes live in the UK

December 2nd, 2009

myspcemusicIt’s official, MySpace Music now live in the UK.  As we’ve noted before, MySpace is in the midst of a rather major identity change under new CEO Owen Van Natta.  New verticals in movies and fashion have been in the works under Van Natta’s leadership.  That said, the clear cornerstone in his re-awakening of MySpace is the music vertical.  MySpace’s already deep roots in the industry is a clear advantage and this launch is the beginning of what could the emergence of MySpace from the dead pool.

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The launch of MySpace Music in the UK is a big bold move for the News Corp company, bringing the new music portal to the UK along with an iTunes download option.  The launch in the UK is the fourth nation in MySpace Music’s portfolio, following the US, New Zealand, and Australia.

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MySpace’s launch of “The Twilight Saga: New Moon”

November 20th, 2009

newmoonMySpace has been on a mission over the last few months to remake itself into a media company at the center of the “socialization of content” movement as stated by its new CEO Owen Van Natta.  Its latest and most ambitious effort culminates today with the release of “The Twilight Saga: New Moon”.  The new blockbuster has taken over MySpace over the last month with multiple media elements.  Officially in theaters today, “The Twilight Saga: New Moon” is one of the most anticipated films of the year.  Last month, the first “New Moon” trailer premiered on MySpace and was viewed over 7.8 million times.  Check it out below.

The Twilight Saga: New Moon Trailer in HD

Trailer Park | MySpace Video

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MySpace Fashion relaunch, Van Natta’s transformation continues

November 14th, 2009

myspacefashionMySpace CEO Owen Van Natta is continuing his transformation of the site into an entertainment and lifestyle social network.  The relaunch of MySpace Fashion marks another milestone in his quest to restore MySpace’s position as a social media leader via his proclaimed “socialization of content” movement.  Earlier this month, Van Natta outlined his plan for MySpace at a Web 2.0 conference.  Shortly thereafter MySpace Music was launched.  Next for Van Natta – the redesign and relaunch of MySpace Fashion.

OwenVanNattaThe once great social network that took a downward spiral for some time is beginning to regain some traction by leveraging is vertical communities – like MySpace Music.  Since taking over the reigns in April 2009, Van Natta has said the he thinks MySpace has a unique position on the web given its relationships and deals with major music labels as well as independents.  Now Van Natta is looking to apply his successful music strategy to another vertical, MySpace Fashion.

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Google’s OneBox Launches: Music Search powered by MySpace and LaLa

October 28th, 2009

Capping a busy day for the Silicon Valley stalwart, Google also announced today the release of its project code-named OneBox – music search powered by MySpace and LaLa.  Google debuted the new music search feature today at the historic Capitol Records building in Hollywood, California.  The new Google Music Search feature allows users to submit searches for songs, lyrics or albums which brings them links to streaming songs from iLike and MySpace, as well as links to artist information on Pandora, Imeem and Rhapsody.  Check out the demo below courtesy of the Official Google Blog:

Not only is this a great new feature for Google in the “music library wars”, this is clearly a big deal for MySpace as well given their recent announcement to focus more of their attention on MySpace Music.  Interestingly enough, it seems as if MySpace is backing away from a head-to-head battle with Facebook for the social networking crown and has instead decided to turn itself into a content and entertainment destination – specifically gaming and music.

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MySpace launches music videos

October 21st, 2009

Earlier today, new MySpace CEO Owen Van Natta addressed the Web 2.0 Summit crowd in San Francisco, California and introduced MySpace Music Videos.  The new service is a searchable collection of music videos from all of MySpace’s major and independent label partners.

With their focus on social entertainment and deep partnerships in the music industry, the MySpace Music Videos platform could turn out to be one of the more comprehensive and always-on music video libraries available – think Hulu meets MTV (when they actually showed music videos that is), but even better since videos don’t expire. 


Ordinary People

John Legend | MySpace Music Videos

MySpace has also announced that its users can purchase and download music from both iTunes and Amazon directly through MySpace Music portal.  MySpace is clearly trying to create a virtual social ‘hub’ for musical entertainment by bringing artists and fans together with their newly announced tools and services.

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Mark Pincus of Zynga – the App Economy

October 21st, 2009

This week in San Francisco, California is the Web 2.0 Summit hosted by O’Reilly Media and TechWeb.  While much of the conference is the discussion of theoretical assumptions or predictions of our evolving technology orientated economy.  I won’t bore you with a lot oMark Pincusf the over analyzed content that a number of the presenters went through, including Mary Meeker of Morgan Stanley’ 68 slide presentation on why its now time for Mobile to take off led by Apple.

All that said, there was one presentation I thought was insightful and highlights one of the fundamental shifts I believe is occurring on the web.  It was a presentation titled, “Casually Serving 130 Million with Games” by Zynga CEO and Founder Mark Pincus (presentation clip below – unfortunately Mark was rushed through some key points of his presentation by the conference organizers):

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Google about to enter the music biz

October 21st, 2009

Rumor has it that Google is about to enter the online music business.  Apparently, the Silicon Valley giant is about to announce a partnership with iLike and LaLa to launch a new music ilikeservice on October 28th.  The launch event is being hosted by iLike and LaLa and is entitled ‘Discover Music!’.

So far the rumors are that this will be a joint partnership deal between Google, iLike and LaLa – but since MySpace recently acquired iLike, they may blala_home_logoe involved in the deal as well.

How will Google be involved in this deal – you may ask?  It sounds like users will be able to stream songs directly from performing a Google search.  So effectively, your search results from Google could turn into your playlist.  In addition, it also sounds like users may be able to also purchases songs directly from these search results in addition to streaming them (see sample Google Music search below):

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Meez launches virtual teen app on MySpace

October 20th, 2009

Meez, the San Francisco-based virtual playground for over 13 million teens, announced it is integrating its Meez Nation virtual world into MySpace.  The social gaming startup, backed by Anthem Venture Partners, Battery Ventures, Draper & Associates and Transcosmos, is looking to take its successful platform to MySpace’s growing social app store.

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Meez users can login to their virtual world directly from MySpace via the companies new widget.  This is clearly a two-way partnership between MySpace and Meez.  Meez currently ranks 5th in user engagement for online destination sites in the US and is 1st in onsite engagement averaging 36.4 minutes per user (stats courtesy of MediaMetrix).

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Meez will no doubt significantly increase its already impressive traffic – currently at over three million unique visitors per month – by gaining access to the MySpace network.  The company makes money through advertising, virtual goods and paid premium subscriptions.  As an example, users can send branded virtual gifts to their friends from advertisers like Nike, RocaWear, Clone Wars, NBA, NHL, plus many more.

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EA is about to buy Playfish for $250 million

October 16th, 2009

One of the worst kept secrets in Silicon Valley right now is that Electronic Arts (EA), which is one of the biggest gaming companies in the world, is about to buy social gaming startup Playfish for a rumored $250 million.  Neither side is ‘officially’ commenting on the speculation – but several sources are indicating the deal could be complete within the week.  The acquisition of Playfish would immediately place EA in one of the key top positions in the social gaming ranks with titles like, Restaurant City and Pet Society.

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This comes only days after John Schappert, the newly appointed chief operating officer at EA made the following comments in an interview with Wall Street Journal staff writer Yukari Kane indicating that he thought social gaming may be just another ‘tech bubble’:

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