MySpace just got more guidance on what will happen if they abuse its users: An escalating series of warnings and punishments, ending in a full ban from the platform.
Clarifying punishment for abuse is a necessary step that a social network -- or any company with a platform -- must take to guide a platform ecosystem to stability.
News Corp.-owned MySpace launched its platform this spring, and it has been quiet about how it treats applications that do things like spam users with unwanted invites, emails and other annoying practices. Until now, only those developers who actually got punished were told about how punishment worked.
MySpace's newly-stated policies, from its developer blog: On first violation:
- In most instances,the application developer will receive a notice giving them 48 hours to fix the issue. If the problem is not fixed within that period of time, the application will be muted (muted applications may not send communication) for 48 hrs. If the application is still not fixed after 48 hours, it will be suspended.
- Should one company have an application in violation of policy once, and then do something with another application, that will be considered a second violation.
On second violation:
- The application will be muted immediately, then suspended after 48 hours.
On third violation:
- The application will be suspended immediately.
But Facebook's platform is still much larger than MySpace's. So these newly-announced MySpace developer guidelines will, the company no doubt hopes, help more developers understand how they can legitimately succeed on its platform -- and in doing so give it some more market share.