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MySpace To Search Industry: Come And Get It 
By: SearchNewz Staff 2006-06-14 Though MySpace.com found itself in the top six last month in terms of search share, News Corp. isn't a bit shy to say it ain't about search, it's about green. 85 million captive members give it the leverage to tell Google, Yahoo! and MSN to pony up if they want in. After all, its milkshake brings all the boys to the yard.
News Corp. COO Peter Chernin told a group of Deutche Bank investors (now there's a group that should know cool when they see it quot; the shiny bald head of the gray-suit up front doubles as a coolness crystal ball) that MySpace would be taking offers from the three search giants to supply their internal search engine and search advertising functions. "We will redesign the pages to make search more prominent," said Chernin. "We will auction off our search business to Google, Yahoo, or MSN." The announcement was a confirmation of a Financial Times report in May that News Corp. was seeking a search partner for MySpace and that Google was leading the charge. According to that article, Yahoo! was "less interested" than Google and Microsoft. It is unclear if Yahoo! has maintained its aloofness (maybe it is a strategy. Ignore her and she'll like you better). A bidding war for the Web's new mistress could play out like a grudge match between MSN and Google, both still licking their wounds from battles over AOL and Amazon. But this is a different darling altogether, who entered the search share market almost by accident; its young demo conducted 43 million disco-lighted searches. That's a fraction of what the nearest search engine, Ask.com reported, but MySpace is not a search engine, and the website has to do very little to grow in membership. In the year since News Corp. bought the website, membership skyrocketed from 30 million members to 85 million, and shows no signs of slowing down. La la-la la la, warm it up. La-la la-la la, the boys are waiting. Though membership has grown exponentially for the social networking site, Chernin said revenue has just begun to take off since News Corp.'s $580 million acquisition. "Revenue is growing incredibly quickly," he said. "We've just scratched the surface of how to monetize it." View All Articles by SearchNewz Staff About the Author: One of the many staff writers covering the search engine industry for SearchNewz.com. |
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