Roundup: MySpace history, Silicon Valley gloom, and more
Here’s the latest action:
How Google overpaid for weak advertising inventory on MySpace — Entrepreneur Andrew Chen has published a tell-all blog post about his early years working at ad network Revenue Science, where he did formative deals with MySpace. The post is a tribute to a new book out called “Stealing MySpace,” which details the ins and outs of the social network’s evolution. Among the juicy details divulged in the book:
The point is, while the MySpace traffic was certainly amazing, it was clear to me (and the other ad networks folks I was in touch with), that there was no way the ads would perform at the level to justify the deal. And ultimately, I think we were proven right. The deal seemed like a crazy auction with a “winner’s curse” and it always seemed like the big bucks were going to get attached to the brand deals the FIM/MySpace team were putting together rather than making the remnant text ad inventory perform 10X better.
Finding true romance in Second Life — “Getting to know someone gradually, with patience and attention [in a virtual world], seems a whole lot healthier than a drunken proposition in a bar” — or so Newsweek describes the allure of virtual dating in an article about real-life online relationships.
More than 10 billion Covenant lay dead at human feet — In case you don’t know what that refers to, the Covenant is “a fictional theocratic military alliance of alien races” that you kill in Halo 3 (assuming you’re one of its some 15.4 million human players). The official kill count spans the 565 days since the game’s launch.
Silicon Valley chief executives not optimistic about 2009 — That’s according to a survey by regional business organization Silicon Valley Leadership Group, as covered by the San Jose Mercury News.
Tech accounts for a higher portion of new job losses in 2009 – Than it did in 2008, also as covered by the Mercury News.
Global online ad spending to fall 6.9 percent this year — So predicts ZenithOptimedia, a media buying unit of the Publicis advertising group. PaidContent has more.
Yahoo may announce layoffs as part of Bartz-driven reorganization — As GigaOm and The New York Times (and BoomTown) have heard.
Larry Brilliant to head the Skoll Urgent Threats Fund — More from CNET.
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About the Author, Eric Eldon
Eric currently covers digital media technology and business news, especially what's happening on social networks and their platforms. He also writes and edits stories about venture capital, and lots of other stuff, too. He started at VentureBeat in the spring of 2007, half a year or so after Matt Marshall left his reporting job at the San Jose Mercury News to found the site. Eric previously cofounded a startup called Writewith, that was building editorial software for newspapers and other groups of writers. The startup didn't work out, but he learned a lot.