[Sigia-l] Your take on MySpace

[Davezilla]

On 2/22/06, Listera <listera at rcn.com> wrote:
> Are you saying that the under-23 set (who, we are told, cares so much about
> fashion, coolness, posturing, etc.) somehow doesn't care about what that
> piece of real estate on MySpace that "represents" them look like? Where's
> the disconnect that urges them to spend money to change the surface of their
> jeans, iPod or cellphone, but not conspicuously their MySpace?

My guess is it has to do with how *quickly* you are encouraged to
personalize it. LiveJournal, Blogger, etc. throw you into themes
immediately. Nice, thought-out, standards-compliant themes that follow
the rules and play well with others. Does that sound like a teenager?

MySpace does not. While you're signing up you're customizing it. The
second step of the process is adding your photo. I've never seen a
community site that did that. Photos are always added *after* you have
an approved and confirmed account and manage to figure out how to
navigate through the dreaded USER PROFILE (cue scary organ music).

It's that immediacy to make it your own, and the very cheapness of it
that is so addicting. How can you be intimidated by an interface that
looks like the high school yearbook committee designed it? It's like
those horrible RONCO ads. You watch them and think, "Who would buy
that? The ads are so annoying!" Well, they are appealing to someone
and that someone happens to number in the millions.

"The masses are incurably ignorant'" — Plato

--
Color me gone,
Davezilla
http://davezilla.com/