MySpace announces 'Mashup with Facebook' collaboration

Alliance between News Corp's beleaguered site and longtime rival will put them in direct competition with Apple's PingOnce the best of enemies in the battle to be the world's No 1 social network, MySpace today finally capitulated to Facebook's popularity, announcing a partnership that brings the two sites closer.Facebook's 600 million users will be able to move their likes and interests over to MySpace, creating a "real-time stream" of automatically tailored updates from their favourite musicians and movie stars. The unlikely alliance, dubbed Mashup with Facebook, sets the two companies in direct competition with Apple's two-month-old social network, Ping.Repositioned as a "social entertainment" site last month, MySpace's latest move sets in stone News Corporation's strategy of aligning itself with Facebook, rather than competing against it. Mike Jones, chief executive of MySpace, said he was "thrilled" at the collaboration, which builds on a users' existing Facebook profile to recommend similar interests on its own.The collaboration, which allows MySpace users to "follow" updates from their favourite celebrities, is akin to Apple's own belated play for the social media market. Apple launched Ping in September after sensing a gap in the market for a social network based around music. But the launch of Mashup with Facebook will prove difficult for Apple to compete with, as its social network is restricted to users of iTunes.Mashup with Facebook works by allowing Facebook users to move their profile information ? such as their favourite band or actor ? onto MySpace with one click. This then creates a MySpace profile already populated with a user's interests, from which recommendations to follow certain celebrities or other users are based. MySpace will also soon implement the Facebook Like button across its site. This will build on a recently introduced feature that cross-posts status updates between the two sites ? a feature used by more than a million MySpace users, according to its chief executive.MySpace, the world's No 1 social network when Facebook was but a project in Mark Zuckerberg's Harvard dorm room, was earlier this month labelled "a problem" by its owner, Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation. Chase Carey, the corporation president, said the site's losses have been "neither acceptable or sustainable" since being acquired for $580m (�360m) in 2005.Elsewhere across News Corporation, executives are examining ways that the company's traditional news and broadcast media could integrate with the social networking site. Although the thinking is tentative, they reflect a corporate interest in developing ways of propagating news in an era of falling newspaper sales.Facebook has gained more than 50 million new users in the past 12 months, according to online metrics firm comScore. The site now has 620 million users around the world.More than 33 million people in the UK use Facebook, figures for October show. MySpace, meanwhile, has just under 3 million UK users. MySpace has lost 19% of regular users in the same timeframe, although it is still the fourth-largest social network in the world with nearly 91 million users.MySpaceFacebookApplePingiTunesComputingSocial networkingInternetNews CorporationSocial mediaJosh Hallidayguardian.co.uk © Guardian News & Media Limited 2010 | Use of this content is subject to our Terms & Conditions | More Feeds

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