MySpace opens to widgetmakers

Like Facebook, MySpace has opened its doors to people who create parasitical little software applications for profiles on its site. It's offering developers tools to create these little apps riding on its "platform," the New York Times reports. Called "widgets," they can add a lot of fun and functionality to users' experience on MySpace and could make the site that much more "sticky" for its users. Adds the Times, "MySpace has always allowed users to embed external programs, sometimes called widgets, in their pages; companies like YouTube and Photobucket got their start on MySpace’s back, in fact. But MySpace will now overtly endorse and attempt to nurture that widget ecosystem" and allow widgetmakers to make money from the applications they build.

MySpace 'backdoor' closed

The day that Wired magazine reported the availability of a "backdoor" to photos on some MySpace users' private profiles, the site sealed the door, MySpace said. It's an example of how the Net industry and the media, at odds on the surface, actually work together to protect users. Though Wired said "the glitch emerged last fall," it didn't report on it till January 17, the day MySpace said the "feature" - a way of allowing users with private profiles to make their photo albums available to friends, MySpace said - had been dropped. Private profiles of any change can no longer make their photos public. Don't be surprised, however, if reports of the bug continue to circulate, because not every blogger does fact checking.

MySpace, Facebook support NY law

The headline was that New York introduced a new anti-predator law. The news was that Facebook participated with MySpace and New York Attorney General Andrew Cuomo in the announcement. The law would, as a condition of parole, prohibit convicted sex offenders from accessing social networking Web sites, from accessing pornographic content online, and from communicating with anyone under the age of 18 over the Net, Dow Jones reports. Offenders would also be required to disclose their email, IM, and chat screennames and other Internet contact info with law enforcement and social sites so the sites can block them. Both MySpace and Facebook have worked with attorneys general for some time, but this is the first time they've appeared together at a major announcement by an attorney general and may preface Facebook's participation in the technical task force announced by 49 state attorneys general and MySpace on January 14. Laws similar to the legislation New York announced today have been passed in 11 states including Arizona, Colorado, Connecticut, Florida, Illinois, Kansas, Kentucky, Louisiana, Mississippi, Oklahoma and Virginia.

The MySpace experiment

Parents and teens aren't the only ones dealing with MySpace's image. Advertisers and MySpace itself are too. Last week the big story was MySpace as a corporate citizen. This week, a snapshot of where MySpace is as a business too - somewhere between "the chaos that is comfortable to many MySpace residents and the neatness that appeals to consumer product companies [advertisers]," as the New York Times put it. Just as in the corporate citizenship space, where MySpace has to strike a balance between keeping youth safe and sending them all to another site in the US or overseas without the safety precautions MySpace does have in place, so it juggles the "chaos" of customization that users love and advertisers hate (or that scares advertisers seeking association with a squeaky clean or at least predictable ad environment). The story illustrates the multidisciplinary challenge of a medium largely produced by its users. By multiple "disciplines," I mean parenting, marketing, copyright law, law enforcement, education, constitutional law, and so on. Advertisers and parents used to be able to count on media that the media companies, the content producers - not the consumers - controlled. Now the medium for advertisers' messages and parents' young content producers and socializers is a mix, some of it "professional content" owned and controlled (somewhat) by the media companies but most of it owned and produced by its own consumers (even the professional content gets sliced, diced, mixed, and mashed up by the Web's young producers). And the experiment grows, as MySpace moves from being a social site and a record label to being an incubator for Web startups. For details, check out this latest snapshot of a very complex picture at the Times.

New features afoot at MySpace

MySpace plans to be people's dashboard for navigating cyberspace, USATODAY reports - the place "where they can check in on the activities of friends, peruse email, get the latest on news and weather, and post their favorite photos and videos." To deal with the growing threat Facebook represents to MySpace, USATODAY says, the latter is projecting itself as a place for self-expression rather than being the social "utility" it says Facebook is (Facebook declined comment for the story). There are 6 million bands registered on MySpace, USATODAY adds. Other plans for 2008 include: giving members "the option of creating multiple profiles tailored to friends, family and business associates. A channel with Oberon Media, a maker of multiplayer games, is in the works for the first half of 2008. MySpace unveiled a service that lets MySpace members make free Internet phone calls through Skype (EBAY). And it just unfurled Transmissions, a program that lets musicians showcase music on their pages and sell performance videos," according to the article. With more members than the population of Mexico and local versions in 22 countries and territories outside the US, MySpace also continues its international expansion, planning to open offices and "launch custom sites in India, Russia, Poland, South Korea, and Turkey, the Zooped blog reports. For example, in India, where Net speeds are comparatively slow, a less bandwidth-greedy version is in the works. In South Korea, where blogging is hugely popular, MySpace will be more of a blogging site than in the US (though blogging is part of the US MySpace experience). Meanwhile, Facebook is growing fast internationally too - see Zooped for some comScore figures it cites.

Mobile socializing via MP3 player

There's another kind of mobile social networking developing - mobile but not on phones. For Microsoft, it's about socializing around music, and it's aimed at the iPod market but will also have some things in common with MySpace music community and iLike in Facebook, which of course are also giant competitors. Stiff competition, but a worthy idea, analysts are saying. "Along with the three new Zune players, including Microsoft's first-ever flash-based model, Microsoft announced a new community site dubbed Zune Social that it will fire up as beta in November," PC World reports. "According to Microsoft, Zune owners can automatically share their current playlists with friends using a Zune-to-Zune Social sync." The syncing involves user profiles called "Zune Cards." Users view each other's Cards and play samples of the Card owner's favorite tunes, which they can then go buy in the Zune MarketPlace online music store.

NJ AG's 'Report Abuse' button

New Jersey Attorney General Anne Milgram wants all social-networking sites to have the "Report Abuse" button at the bottom of every page, NJ.com reports. Her plan, she told a Gannett New Jersey reporter, "will give users a standard form to report concerns such as suspected child predators or violent or sexually explicit material. Anyone who files a complaint will receive a confirmation number and contact information they can use to follow up on their report." New Jersey-based myYearbook.com and six niche sites run by CommunityConnect have adopted General Milgram's program so far. At first glance, it makes a lot of sense, but there are some key drawbacks: this is the program of a single US state, and social-networking sites are highly international; a number of sites, such as MySpace, Facebook, and Hi5, already have such systems in place; and, practically speaking, it's not a hot button that makes sites responsive, it's the customer-service system behind it that does. A better idea would be industry-wide, uniform best practices for abuse reporting and response to which all such sites agree to comply. But let's hear from a social site itself about this. Gannett reported that MySpace hadn't returned its call about this, so I contacted MySpace as to whether this program would make sense for its service and social sites in general. Hemanshu Nigam, MySpace's (and Fox Interactive's) chief security officer responded that….

MySpace already has a report abuse button "on the bottom of every profile and in key areas of our site."

MySpace's system is more granular ("users can choose the type of problem they are reporting).

"These reports are then handled by a trained customer-care group - each company is unique with a unique user base and set of issues."

"We are an international site that must handle reports from citizens around the world - a New Jersey-centric button fails to recognize the reality of the Internet" (it's in more than a dozen countries; see also "MySpace international").

"A singular process doesn't work - guiding principles in this area would be more successful rather than prescriptive requirements."

Mr. Nigam added that MySpace wasn't contacted by the New Jersey attorney general's office about the program - the company first heard about it in the news media. In related news, General Milgram's office this week subpoenaed Facebook, "requesting that the company turn over information as to whether registered sex offenders have profiles on the site," CNET reports. MySpace has responded to similar subpoenas in recent months (see "Social-networking dangers in perspective").

Sex offenders on MySpace: Some context

Last week Larry Magid and I co-wrote a commentary that ran in the San Jose Mercury News Sunday. Hundreds of news outlets worldwide had picked up the story that MySpace has deleted the profiles of 29,000 registered sex offenders. The news may have been shocking to a lot of parents of teen social networkers, so we felt parents deserved some perspective on this. Here's a slightly condensed version of what we wrote….

Finding and expelling sexual predators from social Web sites - something MySpace says it now does routinely - is a good thing. Other social sites are similarly cooperating with law enforcement. But this announcement from North Carolina Attorney General Roy Cooper (see General Cooper's "Protecting Children from MySpace," a link under "What's New" on his page) was only possible because MySpace took the initiative to develop a law-enforcement tool the federal government called for in a recently passed law but failed to create: a national sex offender database that MySpace then donated to the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children for broader use.

Beyond the Web. Sex offenders aren't just in social-networking sites online. They're in chatrooms and newsgroups, on discussion boards and file-sharing networks. They've been on the Internet since before there was a World Wide Web, long before social networking took off. Now social sites are helping to expose their online activities.

The numbers. Let's put the 29,000 profiles in context: More will probably be found, but there are more than 190 million profiles on MySpace at the moment. Now let's move from the Net to "real life." There are 602,000 registered sex offenders in the United States. That's just registered ones - those who've been caught and convicted. The vast majority of child molesters are not strangers whom children meet online. Very, very few are strangers in real life even: According to the California Department of Justice, “90% of child victims know their offender, with almost half of the offenders being a family member. Of sexual assaults against people age 12 and up, approximately 80% of the victims know the offender."

Actual cases. Last spring I was looking for a solid figure for sexual exploitation of minors in social-networking sites after hearing Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal's reference to "the towering danger of sexual predators" (see "Predators vs. cyberbullies"). General Cooper's office told me there were approximately 100 known cases in MySpace in 2005, but that number was based not on government statistics but a Lexis-Nexis search of news reports. That's 100 cases too many, but an extremely small proportion of the 12 million teens who use such sites, and it pales compared to the number of kids molested by acquaintances and family members.

No kidnappings. In all those cases, a teenager willingly got together with someone he or she met online and, contrary to what many people think, the kids often knew what they were getting into and, in every known case, went to meet the offenders themselves. This doesn't excuse these crimes in any way, but parents need to understand how this victimization works and what signs to look for….

Who's actually victimized. At a recent hearing on Capitol Hill, David Finkelhor, director of the University of New Hampshire's Crimes Against Children Research Center, gave a profile of what he described as a fairly typical victim of online predation: "Jenna" was 13 and "from a divorced family, frequented sex-oriented chatrooms, had the screenname 'Evilgirl.' There she met a guy who, after a number of conversations admitted he was 45. He flattered her, sent her gifts, jewelry. They talked about intimate things. And eventually he drove across several states to meet her for sex on several occasions in motel rooms. When he was arrested, in her company, she was reluctant to cooperate with law enforcement authorities" (see the full story). "Jenna" is not a typical teen or social networker; she's a typical victim of online predation, a high-risk teen offline, representing somewhere between 2% and 5% of online teens, Dr. Finkelhor indicated in a recent briefing on Capitol Hill.

Social networking's very individual. Whether it's a positive or negative experience depends on who uses it. The vast majority of our online kids are for the most part using social sites to socialize with their friends at school. Some are decorating their pages and learning graphic design, writing software code, playing with digital photos, producing and editing video, and so on, all in a very collective way. Unfortunately, some teens are seeking the wrong kind of validation online for destructive behaviors such as eating disorders, cutting, and substance abuse. The National Suicide Prevention Lifeline told us over a year ago that MySpace was its No. 1 source of referrals, so teens are also getting help in MySpace for depression, domestic violence, loneliness, and substance abuse, as well as suicidal thinking, through the work of 120 crisis centers nationwide whose work the Lifeline coordinates.

Cyberbullying affects a lot more teens. So far two nationwide surveys in the US have found that about one-third of online teens in this country have been victimized by cyberbullying (one in Canada put the figure at about two-thirds for Canadian kids!). That's at least 8 million young people in the US (this too in "Predators vs. cyberbullies"). This peer harassment needs to be addressed, which will certainly happen at home and in school, as we teach our kids to be good friends and "citizens" online as well as off.

So let's keep these scary predator announcements in perspective. We want parents to have the facts so they can remain calm. When parents (and officials) overreact and start banning things, kids just go underground - as they have since the beginning of time. Only now they can do so online too - on hundreds of social networking sites, in IM, on phones and all sorts of other devices and at proliferating connection points in parks, libraries, cafes, and at friends' houses.

Related links

As of this writing, there were more than 600 links in Google News to coverage in multiple countries of the North Carolina attorney general's announcement. That was just the start. The story has continued to unfold, so here's a sampler of coverage:

"Multi-front predator battle" - The Washington Post goes in-depth on the different aspects of this effort, including 10 states' new legislation requiring sex offenders to register their email addresses and what's involved at MySpace to catch offenders on the site.

Parental-permission piece dropped. North Carolina state legislators deleted from a proposed bill a requirement that the state's teens "get their parents' permission before signing up for social-networking sites like MySpace, saying it raised constitutional questions that couldn't be addressed," the Charlotte Observer reports.

Closer look at parental verification. Here's an audio discussion (podcast) on "The Pitfalls of Age Verification" by tech-public-policy experts Tim Lee, Braden Cox, and Adam Thierer. Cox and Thierer testified before the NC legislature on this subject. Here, too, is Advertising Age on this subject.

A twist in the UK. "Convicted sex offenders should not be prevented from using social networking sites such as MySpace, Scotland Yard said yesterday," The Times Online reported. The UK police agency's spokesperson said, “Just because you’re a convicted offender doesn’t mean you’re still offending,” a spokeswoman said. “Why would we pursue them in this way? These are people who have served their time.”

China's take. "MySpace weeds out 29,000 sex offender profiles," Chinese news agency Xinhua reported.

Canadian view. "MySpace kicks out sex offenders - but not in Canada" at Canada.com

MySpace's view. "MySpace defends efforts to vet sex offenders" in InformationWeek

AG looks at Facebook. An anonymous person who said he or she was "a concerned parent" contacted the New York Times about a fake teen profile he (we'll make it "he" to simplify) created apparently to check into the predator risk on Facebook, the Times reports. The Times put this account into an article that led with Connecticut Attorney General Richard Blumenthal's announcement that "investigators in his state were looking into three or more' cases of convicted sex offenders who had registered on Facebook." The Times added that "Mr. Blumenthal said he was taking a particular interest in Facebook because his children use the service."

TX arrests 7 social-networking sex offenders

With identity info provided by MySpace, Texas police have arrested seven sex offenders, the state’s attorney general announced Thursday. CNET reported that “the seven, whose profiles on MySpace had already been removed under an internal program to weed out sex offenders prowling the News Corp.-owned site, were arrested for breaking parole or probation rules.” Six were picked up because they had MySpace profiles and their parole requirements banned their Internet use.

Catching online parole violations

States are now catching violations of convicts on parole with the information MySpace is supplying attorneys general. USATODAY reports that “many convicted sex offenders who had profiles on the popular MySpace website are on parole, and some may be sent back to prison for emailing minors.” Connecticut’s attorney general told USATODAY that “more than half of the 210 sex offenders from his state who used the social networking site are on parole. One was returned to state custody last week for using the Internet, a violation of a condition of his release.” MySpace has been lobbying for federal legislation requiring convicted sex offenders to register their email addresses and other online contact data (not just street addresses and phone numbers); such legislation, which also attaches penalties for failure to comply, is now working its way through the US Congress.

MySpace seeks court's guidance

Sometimes states ask MySpace to turn over sex offenders’ email addresses, sometimes the content of their emails. Addresses are one thing, but the content of private emails seem to be another. “MySpace has provided the profiles of offenders,” Reuters reports. “However, MySpace has not provided private email correspondence, citing legal restrictions.” Federal law (the Electronic Communications Privacy Act of 1986) “prevents Internet service providers such as MySpace from turning over a user's electronic communications without a search warrant.” Another problem Reuters cites is the difficulty of obtaining a search warrant for an offender not currently under investigation. The upshot of all this is that MySpace filed a request in a Pennsylvania court that is seeking its guidance on how the site “can legally provide local authorities with the private emails of convicted sex offenders on it.” MySpace handed the emails over to the court so it could decide whether or not to share them with law enforcement. What the court decides “is seen as a test case for how local US authorities and MySpace can cooperate in sharing information without violating federal law.” Here’s CNET’s coverage.

AGs' 'p.r. campaign'

That’s what Mark Rasch, former head of the Department of Justice’s computer crimes unit called it. In his column “Your space, MySpace, everybody’s space” that appeared in The Register and SecurityFocus.com, Rasch writes, “This is not the first time that law enforcement agents have used public perception of a crisis to try to convince private entities to waive privacy policies and pony up information to the government without legal process.” He adds: “MySpace didn't ‘completely refuse to cooperate,’ it just asked the AGs to comply with the law - or more accurately not force MySpace to break the law.” The law he’s referring to is the Electronic Communications Privacy Act, which limits ISPs and online communications providers’ ability to disclose member information. The attorneys general, Rasch writes, “found the privacy laws as applied inconvenient, so they attacked the service provider. Indeed, they insinuated that not only was MySpace [i]permitted[/i] to turn over subscriber or other data to the cops, but that it was legally obligated to do so, just because the cops wanted it. They never explained how the information would prevent a crime, or empower parents, or more importantly why drafting a subpoena was an excessive burden. Indeed, it apparently wasn't, as the AGs eventually got them.” Harsh, but thoroughly reported, and I’m linking to it because I feel accurate information – not fear campaigns – is what really empowers parents.

MySpace gives sex-offender data

MySpace and the state attorneys general have worked out a solution. Apparently without notifying MySpace, eight AGs last week publicly called for the social site to turn over sex-offender information. MySpace countered saying that federal privacy law required a subpoena or some other legal instrument before such data could be turned over. Today MySpace announced the two parties had arrived at “a process to expedite the delivery of useful information to enable the attorneys general to use it in their pursuit of any of these individuals who are breaking the law." The Associated Press reports that MySpace general counsel Mike Angus “said the company, owned by media conglomerate News Corp., had always planned to share information on sex offenders it identified and has already removed about 7,000 profiles, out of a total of about 180 million.” Here's last week's coverage.

Top-ranked social sites

It’s no surprise that MySpace and Facebook were the first- and second-ranked social-networking sites on Compete.com’s list for March ’07 – in terms of both site visitors and “attention” (Compete’s word for percentage of their online time people spend on a particular site). What was interesting was that Bebo was No. 9 in terms of visitors and No. 3 in terms of the amount of attention it gets from its users. “Bebo, a relatively new player in the space, has more than tripled in both unique visitors and attention from March 2006 to March 2007,” the Compete blog reports. By attracting and engaging quality traffic, the site leaps from 9th ranked in Unique Visitors to third in Attention.” Tagged, targeting mostly teens and with more than 30 million members, is No. 5 in both categories. Interestingly, BlackPlanet, targeting African Americans and with 16 million+ members, is No. 4 in Attention and not quite in the Top 10 in terms of unique visitors. Google’s Orkut, which is huge in Brazil and ranks 8th in Attention, is only 22nd in terms of site visitors.