Okay, my natural reaction of anything owned by Rupert Murdoch is initially fear and loathing, usually followed by capitulation, and finally giving it money hand over fist (see also: Sky fuckin' Digital). Anyway, a while ago I signed up to MySpace to make sure no crafty bastards went about the task of stealing my interweb nom du plume, and so I set up a placeholder URL. Basically, I didn't understand the phenomenon, and didn't want to. For all I could see, it was just a popularity contest for the type of annoying Goth teenagers who hang around War memorials in failing provincial towns.
I was back there tonight after getting a link to an author's homepage there, and decided to do a little work to my profile while I was in the vicinity: proof a couple of typos, etc. Then it happened: I got a bit addicted, after learning that a whole world opened up within the distance of a couple of clicks: a few customers of mine; schoolmates of mine; my boss's daughter; a guy I used to work with who's taken to lying about his age in a feeble attempt to pull gullible women, ... all on MySpace.
For a sick voyeur like me, it proved highly enlightening. Okay, enlightening clearly isn't the right word. Entertaining - maybe that's the one. Still haven't figured out what the site is really for, though.