IPO lessons from MySpace

My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:
Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!
Shelley

Cleaning spam out of my Yahoo email (it's spam-only), I saw mention of MySpace.

It jogged an old memory. I'd set up an account there in 2006 - mostly to secure a username in case it went anywhere. I still had the old password in my Filemaker web database (it goes back to 1995 or so).

Here's the first entry in my MySpace messages ...

Welcome to MySpace, the best place to connect with friends on the Net! 

I'm Tom, and I'm here to help you with MySpace. If you have any questions, comments, or just want to say Hi, feel free to send me a message! You can also check the FAQ for the most frequently asked questions. 

How do you get started? 

On MySpace you share your profile, photos, blogs, and messages with a fast-growing network of people connected to you by your friends. 

The first thing to do is to invite your friends -- then when they invite their friends you'll all be connected!

There are several hundred subsequent emails, all spam and terms of service announcements as best I can tell. Most of the site UI is advertisements.

Facebook is supposed to go public soon -- in the midst of Bubble 2.0. Investors should remember MySpace.