Why I'm Leaving MySpace

I'm often one of those people who will let others be the guinea pigs -- I'll wait for the kinks to be worked out of a system before I invest the time to try it out myself. It even took me several years before I got a cell phone.

But I'm an almost librarian and this is the age of Web 2.0/3.0. I had to get socially networked to stay in the game. So, I joined Digg, MySpace, Facebook, LinkedIn and, more recently, Newsvine, all within the past year or so. These are all pretty established sites -- I figured the kinks should, for the most part, be all worked out.

MySpace is about to be dropped from my list, however. I gave it a shot, I really did. But since joining MySpace, I've barely been back. Here are my reasons why:

It's Ugly
I think that the ads that take over the entire background are actually kinda clever, but the layout of everything else on top of that is really cumbersome. I customized what I could to try and tamp down the clutter, but I still hardly knew where half the stuff I wanted was. When I tried to customize my public page, the new profile editor wouldn't work with my browser (Firefox). Pbbbt to that!

It's Been Too Difficult to Make Connections
I joined a few groups, but just to find relevant ones took an inordinate amount of time. Of the groups I did join, there's been no activity (or none that I've noticed) to keep me engaged -- though the same can be said for the groups on Facebook, in many cases. The members in the groups all seem kinda scary (judging from the predominance of screen-lit webcam profile pics that all appear to have been taken around 3 a.m.). I have yet to find anyone I actually know on MySpace, excluding a couple of users I knew from other sites.

Nobody's Listening
As an experiment, I set up a blog on MySpace, but I don't think anyone's really visited it (in part due to the lack of connections). This is mostly my fault because I didn't do much to market the blog (I wanted to see how actively I would maintain it before I did so). Failure begat failure though. In addition to my own group of acquaintances having access to my blog, I think there should be some way for other users to happen upon it. My MySpace blog doesn't seem to have many chances for it to be serendipitously discovered. I don't think it's crawled by Google Blogs, etc.

Tom's Annoying
Sure, it's kinda comforting to have an automatic friend when you first sign up, but Tom should be like training wheels -- I should be able to disengage him when I feel confident to move forward on my own. It's supposed to be MY space, right? Get off my page! Plus, I have a feeling that the reason for Tom's existence is a bit more nefarious than for giving warm fuzzies.

I've Found Success Elsewhere
On Facebook, the other site I belong to that most closely mirrors MySpace, I was able to settle in right away. I found friends immediately. I found relevant groups with actual content and people I already know who are members. The space is clean and whatever clutter exists on my profile page is my own doing -- I know how to clean up when/if I decide to. People are paying attention to what I post -- maybe they're flinging a gummy bear at me in response, but I least I know they're out there.

So, so long MySpace. I'd love to say it's been a pleasure, but it hasn't. There's purportedly changes afoot with new apps and cleaner spaces coming, so maybe I'll be back. Hope Tom doesn't hold his breath though.

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