Does MySpace Devalue Interpersonal Relations?

MySpace and the Phenomena of Personal Marketing

I have heard complaints more than once that MySpace is responsible for or perhaps representative of the breakdown of some unspoken, though apparently essential, element of communication. Despite these often impassioned renunciations of this new internet based communications tool, the number of members grows daily and more and more people are setting aside their reservations in the quest to discover just what it is that makes MySpace so irresistible.

What many people do not realize or fail to consider is that the internet itself was created as a communications tool. Although it was originally meant to serve the purpose of research and education, the internet quickly and inevitably expanded to include personal and commercial use. MySpace, unlike any website before, has managed to create a free arena in which people are able to promote both personal and commercial expansion. In this sense MySpace is the fusion of personal and commercial elements of internet communications. Despite criticism to the contrary, most individual MySpace members know and interact with a number of their MySpace friends outside of the MySpace community and in person. In this case MySpace simply serves as an alternative form of communication in which images, videos, and brief comments supplement an already active relationship. However, it is obvious with a brief glance at most MySpace profiles that people are collecting a great deal more friends than it is humanly possible for them to maintain any working relationship with.