MySpace has appointed Alex Maghen to the role of chief technology officer, the News Corp.-owned social site announced Tuesday. He replaces outgoing CTO Aber Whitcomb, who had been at the company since its inception.
Maghen was already at MySpace, serving in the CTO position of its MySpace Music division, a joint venture with the major record labels. Prior to that, he held CTO roles at Yahoo Entertainment and MTV Networks--the latter of which was also the former employer of current MySpace entertainment execs Courtney Holt and Jason Hirschhorn.
"The next phase of MySpace's evolution will further empower our incredible audience of consumers, developers, artists, content creators, and advertisers with the tools they need to broadcast, discover, and express themselves," Maghen said in a release. "The future of our technology organization will be guided by an open platform and world-class standards to create a place of invention for our technical staff as well as the world's development community."
MySpace has fallen out of the tech industry's favor, surpassed both in traffic and technological innovation by once-smaller rival Facebook--even though MySpace advocated developer-friendly open standards well before Facebook came out in full support of them.
There have been some promising signs of late on the technology front: a MySpace-Twitter status sync proved popular enough to make MySpace's URL shortener the second most popular on the microblogging service.
MTV.com announced a new homepage design Tuesday that focuses more on content, rather than aesthetic changes. It will launch Wednesday morning.
MTV.com's basic color scheme will remain the same. The navigation at the top of the site will also remain unchanged. Even the prominent promotional box toward the top of the page, which MTV calls "The Marquee," will maintain its position on the new home page.
Not much has changed from the current page.
(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)The biggest change made to MTV.com comes in the form of a new module, called The Daily Fresh. Placed just below The Marquee, The Daily Fresh will feature content MTV grabs from both its own pages and third-party sites.
The Daily Fresh is basically a news feed. As MTV.com's editorial staff creates more content, the best stories will be hand-picked by MTV editors and placed in the feed. Those same editors will also place user-generated content that relates to one of the company's television shows, music videos, or news stories into the module. To accommodate those site visitors who want content outside of what MTV provides, The Daily Fresh will feature articles or videos its editors find from other sites across the Web. Eventually, MTV.com plans to feature a "submit" link to give site owners the opportunity to have their content featured on the music site.
The Daily Fresh underscores what is a slightly modified strategy for MTV. Instead of being a place for visitors to check out music news and the latest music videos, MTV wants to make MTV.com a hub for all the other online content MTV Networks offers on sites like VH1.com and MTVU.com. To do so, MTV.com will now syndicate some of the better content from its sister sites to the home page.
MTV also wants to give users a voice. To do so, it has partnered with a video technology firm called Innovid. Through its partnership with Innovid, MTV is allowing users to tag specific moments in videos, write a comment about the moment, and share that with friends on Facebook and Twitter. Those comments are also featured in the video's timeline. So far, the feature has been rolled out in a few videos on the site, but the company hopes to make it available on every video the site offers in the near future.
Although MTV wouldn't divulge exactly how it plans to "create more innovative ads"--a key component in its strategy for quite some time--it did say that it plans to hold a special advertising event on September 9 to celebrate the release of The Beatles: Rock Band on the Xbox 360, PlayStation 3, and Nintendo Wii.
The new site, complete with The Daily Fresh
(Credit: MTV Networks)When visitors get to MTV.com on September 9, they will see an ad that will display exclusive, unreleased content from the game. MTV said that the ad will feature seven "touch points" that visitors can click on. When they do, they will see in-game videos, sneak peeks of gameplay elements, and other features it wouldn't disclose.
MTV plans to offer Facebook Connect support at some point in the future, but it wouldn't say exactly when. Based on how the company's executives were talking, though, I'd expect to see it sooner rather than later.
Although I didn't have the chance to demo the new home page, it looks like an iterative update. The top half of the site has barely changed, while the bottom half features a few new modules that some users might find useful. If they don't find them useful, MTV said that it's willing to change. According to the company's execs, the update is experimental and it plans to modify the site's design based on usage patterns.
With its new home page, MTV wants to become one of the many sites Web surfers visit every day. It wants to be a media hub for entertainment. It's certainly possible. But whether visitors will respond well to the site's few changes when it launches Wednesday morning remains to be seen.
At their core, branded social networks are a marketing ploy by firms to keep you interested in their products. So, be aware that if you join one you will need to deal with some annoying advertisements. But if you want to join another community of people with similar interests, start with some of these services.
Branded social networks
Disney Disney's social-networking efforts provide a unique experience by appealing more to children than adults.
After you sign up for the social network, you'll be given the opportunity to create your own "page." There, you can add videos, audio, games, widgets, and a variety of other elements to make your page your own. Think of it as a custom home page. As you might expect, most of the elements you can add to your page are Disney-branded. So, you can have a "101 Dalmatians" background or play a "Pirates of the Caribbean" game. Once complete, you can check out other users' pages, chat with friends, or join groups. It's a powerful service and it's well-designed.
Disney lets you do a lot with your page.
(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)eBay Neighborhoods eBay Neighborhoods is a collection of groups of eBay users who communicate, review products, upload content, or just discuss the topics of their choice.
After signing up for eBay, you can easily join one of the company's neighborhoods. Those neighborhoods range in size from a few members to thousands of members that center on topics ranging from coffee to sports. The members in each group engage in discussions on those subjects. They can also review products and post blog entries. Some of the bigger neighborhoods have a lot of activity, while others have little activity. Either way, eBay Neighborhoods isn't a bad place to communicate with people who share your interests.
eBay Neighborhoods have some groups worth joining.
(Credit: Screenshot by Don Reisinger/CNET)
Two new members have been added to the fresh lineup of MySpace's executive ranks, following the appointment of CEO Owen Van Natta last week.
Jason Hirschhorn, most recently president of Sling Media Entertainment and before that MTV Networks' chief digital officer, joins MySpace as its chief product officer. He's the second prominent MTV veteran to take on a role at the News Corp.-owned MySpace in the past year, following MySpace Music president Courtney Holt.
Hirschhorn is firmly on the digital-media and entertainment side of things, something that will invariably come into play as MySpace (ideally) restructures itself as an entertainment destination rather than a networking tool. At Sling, he was charged with the development of the SlingPlayer online video aggregator.
The other new MySpace hire comes from a more traditional Silicon Valley background: Michael Jones, who sold his start-up Userplane to AOL in 2006, joins the company as chief operating officer. MySpace is already familiar with Jones' work: it uses Userplane's chat technology for its Web-based chat client, MySpaceIM.
Both will be based in Los Angeles and report directly to Van Natta.
Viacom's MTV Networks has brought some of its television content to Netflix's library of streaming online video, the companies announced Monday.
Yaaaaaaay! SpongeBob is taking over your Netflix account!
(Credit: Nickelodeon)The offering consists primarily of kids' shows from the Nickelodeon network, with select seasons from the shows "iCarly," "Blue's Clues," "Dora the Explorer," "SpongeBob SquarePants," and a handful of others, as well as the first nine seasons of "South Park," the Comedy Central animated series that you probably don't want your kids watching.
Netflix's streaming-video service still very much takes the back burner to its DVDs-by-mail service, but the company has deals in place with TiVo, Boxee, Microsoft's Xbox, and some HDTV providers.
It's also the second streaming Netflix deal for Viacom, which licensed content from its Logo network last year. Viacom has also signed content deals with Joost (Disclosure: CNET News publisher CBS is an investor in Joost) and NBC Universal-News Corp. joint venture Hulu, which now runs episodes of Comedy Central's hit talk shows "The Daily Show with Jon Stewart" and "The Colbert Report."
One major player in the video world with which you probably won't see MTV Networks making a deal any time soon: YouTube. Viacom still has an outstanding lawsuit against YouTube parent company Google over infringing content.
Boxee, one of the more promising media applications out there today, is announcing the launch of a few new content sources today at the Consumer Electronics Show.
Boxee now has added support for content from Joost and MTV Music. Joost is bringing its usual assortment of video content to the table, while MTV provides a huge amount of music videos. In the United Kingdom, Boxee has also added the BBC's popular iPlayer to its arsenal of content.
In addition, Boxee will be totally opening up its Mac, Linux, and Apple TV alphas to anyone who wants to sign up. The Windows version, however, will not be entering an open alpha, but rather an invite-only alpha while it scales.
Boxee, for those of you who don't know, is a media application that can act as a player for content on your computer or, where it really shines, as a conduit for viewing Web video from a variety of sources. Video sites that currently have a plug-in on Boxee include Hulu, Netflix, YouTube, CNN, Apple Movie Trailers, Revision3, CBS, Comedy Central, and more.
Boxee really does a great job of handling all of these different sources of content and presenting them in an easy-to-navigate way. In addition to these video sources, Boxee also integrates music sites such as CBS' Last.fm and Shoutcast. (Editors' note: CBS publishes CNET News.)
As you can see, there's a lot to be excited about here.
After its excellent implementation of Netflix instant streaming, people have been begging Microsoft to bring Hulu and other video sites to the Xbox. Boxee is beating Microsoft to the punch, even offering a Netflix implementation that is more full-featured than the Xbox's.
If Boxee can find a way to get its software off of computer monitors and on to more TVs (as it is doing with Apple TV), I think we could be looking at the next big contender in media software.
eJamming, a service that provides musicians with collaboration technology to help them form bands or work on songs together, said Tuesday it has formed a partnership with the MTV Networks Music Group.
The licensing agreement will allow the MTV Networks Music Group to use eJamming Audiio software for any future projects. According to MTVN, the software could be used in virtual worlds and new music sites.
The decision to use eJamming's collaboration tool makes sense. MTVN caters to people who care about music, and with the help of eJamming's Audiio, it can help them form a band, learn to play an instrument, or join an existing group. More important from a business standpoint, MTVN can use eJamming's technology to keep those musicians on MTV sites.
Jeff Yapp, MTV executive vice president of program enterprises, said in a statement that MTVN's decision to work with eJamming was rooted in the company's desire to become a quasi social network for musicians.
"The combination of interactivity and music speaks to people of all ages today," he said. "Connecting actual players online in real and virtual worlds via eJamming technology underscores the MTV Networks Music Group's commitment to bringing our fans cutting-edge experiences."
Neither company would say when MTVN will start rolling out eJamming's technology, but the service is growing quickly. According to its internal figures, the Audiio software has 18,000 beta testers in 158 countries.
(Credit:
Howcast Media)
Facebook, Google, and the Google-owned YouTube are among the sponsors for the Alliance of Youth Movements Summit, an event taking place at New York's Columbia Law School from December 3-5.
Along with other collaborators--which include the U.S. Department of State, MTV, Access 360 Media, and start-up Howcast--the event hopes to "find (the) best ways to use digital media to promote freedom and justice, and counter violence, extremism, and oppression."
The companies have amassed 17 leaders of different activist groups and hope to bring them together to come up with a common set of principles and strategies, inspired by a movement against a Colombian extremist group that was formed and organized on Facebook.
"Aided by social-networking technologies, the organization inspired 12 million people in 190 cities around the world to take to the streets in protest against the FARC, an extremist group that has been terrorizing Colombia for more than 40 years," an announcement of the summit read. "The magnitude of the marches illustrated once and for all that the FARC lacked a strong support base. Within days of the protests, the FARC witnessed massive desertions from their ranks."
Speakers at next month's summit include Facebook co-founder Dustin Moskowitz, actress and talk show host Whoopi Goldberg, and State Department Undersecretary James K. Glassman.
The State Department has already partnered with YouTube for its "Democracy Challenge," a moviemaking competition in conjunction with several film schools. And in the wake of the 2008 presidential election, Facebook has been stepping up its activism and outreach efforts; earlier this fall, it sponsored the ServiceNation summit.
A new kind of video advertising is coming to MySpace.
The company has partnered with a video advertising company, Auditude, and Viacom's MTV Networks division, to bring Auditude's video ads to MTV content on the News Corp.-owned social network's MySpaceTV video hub.
Here's how Auditude works: it can detect MTV Networks content if either MTVN itself or a MySpace user uploads it, and then it implements both targeted ads and "attribution ads," which provide data about the source of the programming. (For example: an "attribution ad" for Comedy Central talk show The Colbert Report could include information about when the program is broadcast on-air.)
Right now, according to a joint release, Auditude already has four years' worth of 100 television channels indexed in its database, plus 250 million standalone videos.
"As one of the leading providers of online video in the world, we give our fans the power not only to consume our content, but also to share and interact with it across the Web," Mika Salmi, president of global digital media at MTV Networks, said in a release. "With Auditude's solution, we can continue to give users the freedom to take our content wherever they go online, while ensuring that we can monetize it as well."
This is a bit of a surprise coming from Viacom, which sued Google's YouTube over the distribution of pirated content. MySpace has reason to feel jilted by YouTube, too--it's no secret that News Corp. had been interested in acquiring YouTube, which can credit a big part of its rise to embedded videos on MySpace profiles, before Google outbid it.
Auditude says that its technology is compatible with YouTube, as well as Veoh, AOL Video, Dailymotion, and others.
But despite Viacom's beef with YouTube, content from MTV Networks can be viewed on a number of partner sites, like Imeem and Veoh, and episodes of Comedy Central's The Daily Show with Jon Stewart and The Colbert Report are available on Hulu, the joint video venture between NBC Universal and News Corp.
MTV Networks also recently launched MTVMusic.com, a compendium of the longstanding pop-culture brand's music videos.
NEW YORK--Viacom division MTV Networks announced Monday that it has turned its minority stake in software company Social Platform into a full acquisition: Social Project, formerly known as Tagworld, is the basis for Viacom's Flux.
MTV Networks launched Flux just over a year ago as a social-networking platform that would be used across all its digital entertainment properties as well as eventually sites outside Viacom. The original Tagworld investment started in November 2006. Flux now powers community features on MTV.com, Colbert Nation, Atom.com, and other Viacom-owned sites, allowing users to access all of them with a single login and profile.
"The web is fragmenting," said Mika Salmi, president of global digital media at MTV Networks in a press conference on Monday, describing Flux as an "open, flat, and connected" technology. "People are attracted to niches and to what they're really interested and passionate about, and we as a company have a history in the cable business of going after niches."
In conjunction, MTV promoted Joshua Dern from vice president of social media strategy to senior vice president and general manager of social media.
Earlier this month, MTV launched what is arguably its most high-profile social initiative,Backchannel, which uses Flux profiles and credentials to power a game centered around the hit show The Hills.
But the service won't become an MTV exclusive. "Even though they're now part of us, we still want them to work with outside Web sites," Salmi said of the Santa Monica, Calif.-based Social Project.
"We will let anyone use the Flux network, with few exceptions," Dern said, adding that the lone exception is...porn.
