Another One Bites the Dust

And just when I thought that MySpace was starting an uphill trend, it seems as if it's taking another hit from the top of the social ladder.

Hason Hirschhorn, MySpace's Chief Product Officer, is leaving the company soon after he was hired in April 2009. After only 9 months, hired along with COO MIke Jones, Hirschhorn created the reputation for cutting products that didn't contribute to its mission statement. But since MySpace hasn't really changed all the much in the past, aside from superficial formatting differences, this wasn't necessarily a good thing.

But that was the least of the problems; rumor has it that the lack of chemistry amongst the executive officers and Hirschhorn was getting in the way of progress. The CEO, Van Natta, was hired by Murdoch, while Hirschhorn and Jones were hired by Jon Miller. This posed as a problem, since Van Natta had no say in hiring his two right hand men and all three were thrown into the ring at once.

After joining the APOC Program, I kept hearing about how the MySpace platform still has a ton of potential even after I discounted its popularity. I even thought it was interesting to even create an account when the mass population is starting to shift toward social networking sites like Facebook. And now that Facebook alumni, parents, and teenagers under the age of 18, why not join the best of the best? Or should I say, the most popular of the popular?

With the coming of a new Chief Product Officer, MySpace will probably take a turn for the better...or worse.