Myspace, a good old ghost town | Adam Boult

As MySpace relaunches as Myspace, is there still a place in your heart for the networking sites you used to love?For my money, MySpace is the best social networking website there's been. At least, it was great for a couple of years, before pretty much all 49 of my (virtual) friends abandoned it, posting "gone to Facebook" notices on their pages and never looking back.Since then the site has been a virtual ghost town, kept ticking over by a few die-hards, the occasional former user saying "wow, people are still on MySpace?" and a lot of bands taking advantage of the free music streaming function (my own included ? shameless plug).But now the site is getting a long overdue redesign. It's made its S lowercase and is incorporating some new features intended to make the ageing social network a companion, rather than rival, to users' Facebook and Twitter presences. In a press release yesterday the company boasted that it has "completely rebuilt its website, with a new visual identity and product features that put content centre stage"."Myspace will focus on promoting curators," it says, "? a subset of its audience whose reputation and knowledge around particular entertainment topics and emerging cultural trends make them uniquely influential ? by supporting them with the resources, tools and a platform to expand their reach within the Myspace community."That all sounds very impressive, in a non-specific PR-speak sort of way, but can Myspace really be saved from obsolescence? Since Rupert Murdoch shelled out $580m for it in 2005, its popularity has been on a consistent downward trajectory, and this much trumpeted overhaul could be too little too late.Those of us who mourn the rise of Facebook over Myspace point to the latter's versatility ? with some limited HTML knowledge, it's possible to modify a Myspace page in countless ways, and even now the site has an admirable wildness and openness that Facebook's walled garden approach can't match. While Facebook is arguably more about making online connections with people you already know, with Myspace you had much more free rein to build relationships with complete strangers, based on nothing more than similar interests or a shared sense of humour.Of course, even in its heyday Myspace had a lot of problems ? spam, fake accounts, eccentric people, Tila Tequila, garish pages that took an age to load or simply crashed ? but its often amateur, mish-mash aesthetic was all part of the charm. Facebook seems painfully sanitised in comparison.But then, I suppose one must accept that it's natural and right that such networks should eventually die off due to lack of interest. One day users of Facebook and Twitter users will up sticks and head for the next big thing, and there will be a few luddites like me complaining about how much better things used to be when we were all tweeting and poking each other.The social web is getting ever more slick, and the edges get worn down along the way. Nowadays we may look back bemused at the silly old sites we used to think were the best, most exciting things ever to grace the internet ? Friends Reunited, Friendster, Faceparty, Geocities ? but each of them had their charms, and there'll always be a few of us nostalgic types, standing Canute-like on the shores of progress, maintaining a Myspace page as if it were still the good old days of 2006.MySpaceSocial networkingFacebookSocial mediaInternetAdam Boultguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

internet world internet connections internet