June 18th, 2007
MySpace to befriend eBay?
MySpace has hinted at a potential partnership with eBay, in a bid to offer e-commerce services to its millions of users. In an article in the Telegraph newspaper, MySpace founder Chris DeWolfe is quoted as saying:
“If you’re on your site and you have a line of T-shirts you have designed and you want to sell them to your friends, we want to be able to provide you with the tools you need to do that.”
DeWolfe then goes onto suggest that eBay would make the perfect partner: “We haven’t decided yet, but it would be probably a good bet…”.
However, as The Register notes, any deal between the two companies would involve eBay having to share a big chunk of its MySpace-driven revenue with the News Corp-owned social networking site. But despite this concession, a MySpace partnership would represent a huge shot in the arm for eBays pending battle with Google. Forcing MySpace’s gigantic userbase to use eBay-owned PayPal as their means of exchanging money, rather the new kid on the block in Google Chekout, would further extend eBay’s dominance of e-commerce. Right now, eBay users are forced to use PayPal rather than Checkout, and partnering with MySpace extends that monopolistic strategy.
Of course, Google has a war chest so large that with regards to any of its products — including Checkout — it can afford to be in it for the long term.
Looking at the bigger picture, talk of MySpace shopping around for an exclusive e-commerce partner, further highlights the widening golf between its approach and Facebook’s new platform — where in theory, any company can come in and offer e-commerce functionality, without having to partner with the social networking site first, or more importantly, share revenue.
Steve O'Hear is a London-based consultant, educator, and journalist, focussing on the Internet and all aspects of digital technology. See his full profile and disclosure of his industry affiliations.
