Book Review: Stealing MySpace: The Battle to Control the Most Popular Website

Launched in August 2003, MySpace was the brainchild of Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson (the site was almost named "YoPeeps"). Both were part of a struggling dot-com, eUniverse (which was eventually renamed Intermix) and wanted to find the next big idea. And they found it when they ran across Friendster, one of the first social networking sites.

So what to do? It was simple: copy it.

Hey, this is a time-honored thing in tech. Didn't Microsoft (NASDAQ: MSFT) rip off Apple's (NASDAQ: AAPL) cool interface? Oh, and didn't Apple rip this off from Xerox Parc?

But, of course, MySpace was more than a copycat. The site learned from the mistakes of Friendster. For example, MySpace allowed fake profiles (yes, people enjoy being voyeurs) as well as decorate them with HTML. As a result, a flood of Friendster users moved over to MySpace. Then, DeWolfe and Anderson skillfully reached out to the music crowd to build more and more buzz.

Interestingly enough, MySpace wasn't a case of the typical "make no money" Internet crowd. From the start, the site focused on monetization – but it wasn't easy. Advertisers were concerned about harming their brand (since users had lots of freedom to post content, which was often edgy). So, over time, MySpace found creative ways to pick up dollars, such as developing sponsored pages and hyper-targeting. Actually, by 2006, the site snagged a $900 million ad deal with Google (NASDAQ: GOOG).

At the same time, MySpace had to deal with the nightmares of real-life sexual predators. There were also hackers that brought down the site. For the most part, MySpace had a rickety technology foundation.

But something couldn't be ignored: MySpace was becoming a cultural phenomenon. And, it attracted the attention of a variety of media conglomerates like Viacom (NYSE: VIA) and Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation (NYSE: NWS).

Because of the constant need to raise capital, Intermix had a convoluted capital structure. As a result, to buy MySpace required savvy dealmaking. In the end, it was Murdoch's team that figured it out and won MySpace for $580 million in July 2005.

However, by being a part of a major corporation, there was a toll -- basically, it became harder to innovate. As a result, Facebook was able to make lots of headway.

All in all, Angwin's book is a great read. While I wish she had more to say about recent events (especially the surge in Facebook), this is usually tough in book form. But she does provide great insights into how technology, culture and media are converging – and the dangers and opportunities that come from it.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including The Complete M&A Handbook and the founder of BizEquity, a free online business valuation tool for small businesses. You can reach him on Twitter.