Remember Myspace? It’s Scored a Million New Members

Just when you — and your marketing department — thought social networking had settled into Facebook, Twitter, YouTube and LinkedIn, the category is showing that it is constantly evolving. One site with a familiar name has gained a million new users in the last month — Myspace.

On Monday, the venerable social networking site announced that it had obtained more than 1 million new sign-ups in the last 30 days, directly resulting from the availability of its Myspace Music Player. The Player, the company said, is leading to more than 40,000 new registrations each day.

‘Dramatic Change’

The new player features what the company described as the world’s largest online catalogue of free music, with 42 million songs. It also has unlimited, on-demand listening, personalized radio, an advanced recommendation engine, and easy integration with another familiar name — Facebook.

CEO Tim Vanderhook said in a statement that the influx of new members attests to “strong momentum and dramatic change for Myspace,” adding that users are “getting excited” again about the site. In addition to the million new members, comScore reports that the site showed a 4 percent increase in traffic in January, the first increase in nearly 12 months.

While Myspace was once the leading social networking site — at a time when the term “social networking” was barely known — it was eclipsed by Facebook and others, and now, under new management, it seeks to become what the company describes as a “highly personalized experience around entertainment and connecting people to the music, TV, movies, and games that they love.”

Sold for $ 35 Million

In January, Myspace announced it had signed a deal with Panasonic for Myspace TV, which allows for music videos and TV shows to be shared and commented upon. The deal will place a Myspace app into connected Panasonic Viera HDTVs so that…
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