Facebook Likes MySpace

So Facebook finally likes MySpace.

Which is interesting maybe, in part because it clearly means that MySpace is, now and forever, most assuredly not dead.

Not that it was ever really on life support. It’s just that some people left and never went back.

Sort of like hating your home town and leaving it as a teenager…and, ah, always regretting that you left someone special back there, too.

The truth is, Facebook needs MySpace, for three good reasons. And I’ve hinted at all of them already.

1. MySpace is for tweens, teens and artists. Facebook doesn’t even want you to have an account if you are under 13 (that’s easy to get around, of course, but they clearly do not want pre-teens on the site). This is as much a public relations gimmick as anything; adults don’t want to believe that teens communicate with other adults or other kids they don’t know, let alone in adult ways. And Zuckerberg doesn’t want to be seen as promoting something that controversial. In fact, the safety police have so thoroughly scrubbed Facebook that it can’t possibly do what MySpace did, which was to reach and engage younger audiences…the Holy Grail of the real advertising world…not the small-time advertisers that make up a large portion of Facebook’s current crop.

2. Grownups hate MySpace. Most middle-class, middle-aged white suburbanites – the power brokers in social media – think that MySpace is too noisy, too self-promotional, too ghetto for them. So they refuse to go in. Except for those who have a reason to be there.

…Are you starting to put the pieces together? Yeah, so…

3. By “Liking” MySpace, Facebook is playing social media family counselor. It’s creating a link to a music-filled, video-splashed, art-plastered, photo-naked, in-your-face social media environment that Facebook just can’t, and won’t be.

It’s like trying to get the Generation Gap to “Like” each other.

It didn’t work back then, of course, because the Generation Gap of old was separated by far more than just age and musical tastes. It was a complete cultural separation, including ideals, beliefs and behaviors, goals, aspirations and dreams.

Is the gap between Facebook and MySpace too wide to bridge?

Probably not so wide.

Most adults today can tolerate their kids’ music. They share some of the same ideals. They are far more open with each other, and much more tolerant of mistakes. And they experience many of the same dreams, aspirations, hopes, goals and ideals, whether they choose to believe so or not.

Maybe it’s not so much a bridge as a door, in the house.

Heck, I already know what my kids are doing on the computer anyway. Why not share my world with them?

Now the question is, do I want to go into theirs?

Oh yeah…but not always.

I enjoy hearing what my kids are listening to, and watching some of their movies.  And I want to share some things with them that I believe are outstanding works of art from my generation.

But I won’t pick up my daughter’s iPhone and listen to her music all day, and I don’t suppose she would want to scroll though my Facebook account to see what my friends are saying, either.

So yeah, I think getting to the point of  “Liking” each other’s worlds is probably good enough.

Okay. Session over. Time to pay the counselor.

Make your checks payable to F-a-c-e-b-o-o-k.