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Entries in MySpace (3)

Thursday
16Jul2009

The main problem with MySpace is the rubbish user experience

DateThursday, July 16, 2009 at 07:38AM

Barely a week goes by without another negative report about the state of MySpace, just this morning I read on Mashable that its popularity in music and entertainment is dropping.

It didn't have to be this way for MySpace, they were the king of social media a couple of years back and always had the user numbers to solve their issues but never have. So much money has been pumped into the site, into the branding and marketing but The Main Problem With MySpace Is The Rubbish User Experience.

I wonder if MySpace actually has any senior employees who understand the value of a good user journey or they have just invested in senior executives who care only about branding, branding and more branding.

Because it created no differentiation between a profile for general users and brands it suffered from the social condition of 'I am going to add everyone I can so I can have a big friends list'. Once it started copying Facebook features (badly) it just became an ugly mess.

Now when logging in:

  • None of my friends are online (they on the nicely designed Facebook)
  • I get a useless stream of uninteresting posts from people I don't know or care about
  • A horrible combination of messy adverts and rubbish widgets

MySpace needs to define what it is because even the band pages are starting to look a little dated. It needs to rebuild the entire user experience into something of value and remove any of the designers/IA's who have any responsibility for the current layout

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Saturday
06Jun2009

Facebook says jump and MySpace says how high?

DateSaturday, June 6, 2009 at 01:08PM

MySpace was the first serious social network, the first that everyone spoke about but Facebook and Bebo came along and swept everyone up. The reason it happened is because MySpace was a great idea poorly implemented and this wounded them.

Over the last couple of years MySpace has continued to justify its existence by copying all the best Facebook ideas and implementing them badly. First notable copy was the Facebook status, this micro blogging feature was added to MySpace, badly, all it shows is a list of the bands I like and what they are up to? Where are all my friends? They are on Facebook.

I just noticed when logging back in now they have added the chat functionality, but where are all my friends? They are on Facebook. The problem is when Facebook Says Jump MySpace Says How High but by the time they have answered another group of their users have gone.

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Friday
05Jun2009

MySpace is good for one thing

DateFriday, June 5, 2009 at 12:49PM

MySpace is pretty rubbish really, I think most people had an account once but when some of the better social networks developed they moved away. It has many problems but reminds me of those funny briefs you get occasionally that go something like this "I want to setup this new interactive social platform like Facebook but needs features like YouTube and Skype, I don't have a budget but I will consider an equity exchange."

MySpace is trying to be everyone, it is trying to be Facebook with its status updates and it is trying to be You Tube with its video channel but in reality MySpace Is Good For One Thing, music.

There is one reason many people return to MySpace again and again, it is a simple way to go and check out what your fav band is doing and listen to material. Guns N Roses, The Gallows and most recently Kasabian are example artists who have streamed a pre-release of their album.

Forget the social network MySpace is a music portal.

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