http://www.theage.com.au/news/web/facebook-the-future-for-social-networks/2007/04/24/1177180618008.html

There has always been a heated battle about whether Facebook or MySpace is the top social networking site, but according to Jimmy Wales, Wikipedia co-founder, Facebook will emerge on top.  So what makes Facebook so much better than the more veteran MySpace?  “It’s actually useful,” claims Wales.  While MySpace offered online social networking first, it is simply a social network for the sake of social networking.  Facebook, atleast originally, had a purpose to network college students with respect to relevant academic parameters like school, major and classes.  Though now its basic social networking capabilties are extended to pretty much anyone with an email address, its originally purpose is still its most popular.

So what makes MySpace for horrible?  The lack of a centralized purpose for one thing.  Wales also criticizes MySpace’s abuse of advertisements. Facebook, he claims, has a tasteful placement and appropriate amount of advertisements, while MySpace bombards its users with flashing ads. An interesting question remains, however.  How exactly did MySpace, the extremely popular and innovative social network become second rate to the newcomer, Facebook?  While ad frequency and placement certainly affected this shift, perhaps the more important difference is purpose. As mentioned above, Facebook had a distinct purpose, and this purpose attracted thousands of people whose primary interest wasn’t social networking but rather to learn more about their college.  Of course online network junkies from MySpace jumped on the Facebook bandwagon too, resulting in a rich and unique social networking experience. Mark Zuckerburg, the founder of Facebook, has declined offers of well over 900 million U.S. dollars for his site.  Clearly Facebook developers see a bright future for the site.