Die Spekulationen der letzten Wochen haben sich bestätigt: Das insbesondere unter dem Boom des Erzrivalen Facebook leidende Social Network MySpace wird 420 Mitarbeiter und damit rund 30 Prozent der Belegschaft kündigen.
Laut dem neuen MySpace-Firmen-Boss Owen Van Natta sei dieser Schritt zwar sehr schmerzhaft, aber „notwendig für die nachhaltige Entwicklung des Unternehmens“.
Das Social Network gehört zur Fox Interactive Media, dem Digital-Media-Ableger des News Corp.-Medienkonglomerats von Rupert Murdoch. Der Milliardär zahlte einst aufsehenerregende 580 Millionen Dollar für das Online-Netzwerk.
MySpace leidet dieser Tage nicht nur unter der Werbeflaute im Netz, sondern verliert seit Monaten auch massiv an Besucherzahlen – immer mehr Sozial-Netzwerker wandern zum Branchenprimus Facebook.com ab.
MySpace zählt derzeit rund 63 Millionen User, während Erz-Rivale Facebook.com längst auf über 200 Millionen Nutzer kommt.
[Update] Hier die offizielle Entlassungs-E-Mail von MySpace-CEO Owen Van Natta:
Everyone,
Today we are making a number of changes to MySpace’s domestic organizational structure. For the long-term health of the company we are making some very tough, but unfortunately very necessary decisions.
We are reducing our workforce from 1,420 employees to 1,000 – all divisions within the company are affected by this restructure.
These decisions are difficult for everyone, but especially for our friends and colleagues who contributed to MySpace’s success and are directly affected by the changes. Through no fault of theirs our company’s size became unsustainable. The future success of MySpace is dependent upon us operating as a nimble and entrepreneurial company with the adaptive mentality of a start-up.
I believe this is the first difficult step toward a major turnaround – a step that will not only shore us up in the short term, but position us for long term success. We need to become a more innovative company. Becoming more innovative is an ongoing responsibility for all of us, not a one-time effort. We are developing a process that will empower anyone in the company to contribute ideas and enable us to integrate your thoughts into our plans for the future. We will follow-up with details on this process in the coming weeks.
This week we will communicate the foundation for our company strategy. In the days ahead, I will visit a number of U.S. offices, starting tomorrow at HQ, MySpace Music, and El Segundo. On Thursday I look forward to seeing everyone in Seattle and San Francisco, and on Friday, I’ll be spending time with the team based in New York.
I’m honored to be working with you on the next phase of MySpace and I’m grateful for your patience during this difficult process.
Thank you,
Owen
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