• Wendi Deng Murdoch, MySpace China
• Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson, MySpace
• Max Levchin, Slide
• Robin Li, Baidu
• Markos Moulitsas, DailyKos
• Elon Musk, SpaceX
• Ali and Hadi Partovi, iLike
• Mika Salmi, MTV
• Dmitry Shapiro, Veoh
• Quincy Smith, CBS
• Andrew Ross Sorkin, New York Times
• Peter Thiel, Clarium Capital
• Evan Williams, Twitter
• Andrew Zolli, PopTech

DeWolfe and his MySpace cohort, Tom Anderson, renewed their contracts last fall with News Corp. last year for $15 million apiece, spread over two years. Paying that amount has, FIM executives believe, left nothing for them. "They're pissed," says our tipster.

Then again, do these puffed-up Fox executives deserve much more than they're getting? Pop quiz: Name a Fox Interactive property other than MySpace.

"I think Silicon Valley is the most exciting place in the world right now," says Murdoch, DeWolfe's boss for another two years.

"Looking back, it looks like you got a pretty good deal," observes Battelle. "What did you see?" he asks Murdoch. "Was it like, 'I hope this one works out,' or did you think you'd be sitting on a red couch at Web 2.0 two years out?"

"We thought there was a real opportunity, and [asked ourselves], 'What do we have to pay to shut the doors?'" replies Murdoch. "We never imagined it would do this well."

Murdoch says that Fox Interactive Media, the unit of which MySpace is the biggest part, could cross $750 to $800 million in revenues next year. And there's a hint, in the back-and-forth, that the rumored earnout provision in DeWolfe and Anderson's contract might be tied to MySpace and the rest of FIM hitting a target of $1 billion in revenues.

DeWolfe and Murdoch make nice-nice comments about Google, which has a $900 million contract to provide search and ads on MySpace. Battelle keeps probing them. It's almost like he wants Murdoch to call Google a "frenemy," but, alas, the wizened, megarich News Corp. mogul settles for "threat and friend." (Google executive Megan Smith, recently locked in negotiations with MySpace rival Facebook, sat next to DeWolfe at the dinner before the interview.)

Confirming Valleywag's scoop that the MySpace platform would not be ready for today, DeWolfe says that the company is, as we reported, compiling a directory of third-party widgets currently used on the site's profiles.

Battelle asks Murdoch, "What do you think of Facebook?" A pause. "I think it's pretty cool," says Murdoch. "It's more of a utility.... In spite of the hype, we seem to be growing faster."

"Is that a reference to the September ComScore numbers?" asks Battelle. (ComScore, controversially, showed a drop in Facebook's traffic last month.) "Yes," says Murdoch. A pause. "I love that Rupert Murdoch is referencing ComScore Internet numbers. I don't know why, but I love it."

Is MySpace a portal? "We're more like a connectivity engine," says DeWolfe. Apparently that's better than being a "utility."

Battelle asks Murdoch about the acquisition of Dow Jones, publisher of the Wall Street Journal. "Well, I haven't paid for it yet," says Murdoch, alluding to the deal's expected closure in December. "Are you going to kill the New York Times?" asks Battelle. "That'd be nice," says Murdoch. Murdoch then says CNBC, rival to News Corp's newly launched Fox Business Network as "half-dead" — and then retracts the observation, noting that CNBC's still making hundreds of millions of dollars. As for FBN's future, "I'll stick with it for at least a few years."

Murdoch talks acquisitions for a bit, grousing that everything's too expensive and he doesn't want to pay 30 times earnings. He sounds like an old man complaining about the menu prices in a restaurant. DeWolfe talks a bit about the acquisition of SDC, an ad-targeting startup, and Photobucket, whose purchase Valleywag reported exclusively.

Intrepid special correspondent Paul Boutin steps up to the microphone and asks Murdoch, "With all the deals you do, how do you know when the price is right?"

"I don't," says Murdoch. "I just hope." More will be said, but for that, Murdoch deserves the last word.

Rumor has it that News Corp. COO Peter Chernin was against bringing Anderson and DeWolfe back. Good to know someone within Rupert Murdoch's empire is capable of reading a traffic chart.

(Photo by AP)

What BusinessWeek should have focused on is Eisner's attempt to ride the MySpace wave with his Web-only production company Vuguru. Its first show, Prom Queen, which was distributed over the social network, is considered a mild success — landing sponsors like the Hairspray remake, Verizon, and Elle Girl. What would make sense is the exact opposite of what BusinessWeek proposes. Instead of ransacking trading-card licensees for online-video ideas, Eisner should think about using Topps to print trading cards for the MySpace set. We can't wait to see the Tom Anderson and Chris DeWolfe cards.

You are e-mailing Customer Service, not Tom [MySpace]

By Trent Lapinski

By now, everyone knows what MySpace is—or at least, they think they do. The generally held assumption is that MySpace is a social networking site: "a place for friends," as their slogan puts it. In reality, MySpace is the next generation of marketing, advertising and promotion, exquisitely disguised as social networking. Simply put, MySpace.com is Spam 2.0.

Spam in Sheep's Clothing

On July 11th, 2006, Hitwise reported that MySpace had "surpassed Yahoo! Mail as the most visited domain on the Internet for US Internet users." Clearly, MySpace has become almost ubiquitous—everyone and their mom have a profile up, from the fourteen-year old girl next door to Madonna. Tom Anderson himself—one of the site's founders and every MySpace user's number one "friend"—has over 109 million pals with profiles, and that's just today; by next week that number could easily have increased by millions. What's interesting is that most users don't know that Tom Anderson is more of a PR scheme than anything else—the mascot designed to give a friendlier feel to a site created by a marketing company known for viral entertainment websites, pop-up advertising, spam, spyware, and adware.

Most users believe that MySpace started as some kind of fluke—a happy accident that began in Anderson's bedroom or garage—and many still don't wonder, know, or care about the site's real business history and model. Heralded as a haven of DIY self-expression, MySpace was actually created by executives whose backgrounds are anchored in spam and mass marketing, and who are tied to investment scandals. With his almost alternateen good looks, Tom Anderson has served as an exceptionally convincing distraction. The PR campaign is one of MySpace's two strokes of genius, brilliant, but not groundbreaking.

The real genius of MySpace lies in it's re-imagining and repackaging of spam. While most internet users expend time and energy attempting to keep it out, MySpace is spam that they actually invite in.

Ancient History

Internet spam originated as classic, straight-up, unwelcome, in-your-face-and-inbox advertising and marketing. At its worst, it comes from "Nigerian Bankers" and swindlers peddling Viagra, and more likely than not, this early incarnation of spam—we'll call it Spam 1.0—is lurking in your inbox right now. eUniverse, the company that essentially created MySpace, was a pioneer in this field. Headed by CEO, founder, and Chairman Brad Greenspan, eUniverse (now Intermix Media), was a multimillion-dollar marketing and entertainment company known for sites like Skilljam.com, pop-up advertising, unsolicited mass emails, spyware, and the adware behind controversial peer-to-peer file sharing network Kazaa.

Also essential to the creation of MySpace is current CEO Chris DeWolfe, who from October 1999 through March 2001 acted as the VP of Sales and Marketing at Xdrive Technologies, Inc., a company that offered millions of users large amounts of free online storage during the dot-com bubble. The business of "free," while not necessarily a lucrative enterprise for an online file storage company, would prove to be an essential building block of Spam 2.0 and MySpace. As a source close to DeWolfe at Xdrive put it, "DeWolfe learned that people will sign up for almost anything that they find useful, and they could care less about the fine print."

Xdrive hit hard times when the dot-com bubble burst, and in March of 2001, DeWolfe was laid off along with his entire marketing department. He quickly set up a new email marketing firm named ResponseBase. DeWolfe recruited and hired most of Xdrive's former marketing team for this endeavor—specifically, the employees who had been responsible for the production of Xdrive's email-based newsletter called "Intelligent X." At its peak at Xdrive, 8 million users subscribed to "Intelligent X."

Tom Anderson, the eventual face of MySpace. was originally hired as a copyeditor in DeWolfe's marketing department at Xdrive, and accompanied DeWolfe to ResponseBase when Xdrive laid them both off.

DeWolfe's new company, ResponseBase, was purchased by eUniverse on September 9, 2002. At the time of the purchase, ResponseBase had upwards of 30 million e-mail addresses at their disposal. This partnering of ResponseBase and eUniverse was the moment of inception for MySpace, although at the time neither DeWolfe nor Greenspan knew what path they were on, and the actual, conscious conjuring of it wouldn't happen until later.

In terms of future visibility and pseudo-celebrity status—Tom Anderson, the friendly face of MySpace and every member's number one "friend" stayed with DeWolfe at eUniverse.

Also of interest, the acquisition of ResponseBase by eUniverse involved a finance partnership, TTMM, LP., consisting of Andrew Wiederhorn and his wife Tiffany. Wiederhorn was a high school classmate and past business associate of DeWolfe's, and in the late 90s DeWolfe was VP of Marketing at First Bank of Beverly Hills, a co. of WFSG purchased by Wiederhorn's former company Wilshire Financial Services Group. In late 2002, DeWolfe joined Fog Cutter Capital Group, Wiederhorn's new investment operation. At this time, Wiederhorn was under legal investigation for his activities with Wilshire Financial Services Group, and as of August 2004, Wiederhorn began an 18-month jail sentence for felony charges. Despite Wiederhorn's predicament, he kept a seat on the board. Donald Berchtold, Tiffany's stepfather, was temporary CEO while Wiederhorn was in jail. The investment group put Wiederhorn on a "leave of absence" and paid him an annual salary of $350,000 while he sat in federal prison. FCCG had a 3-year contract with Wiederhorn starting in 2003 wih an annual salary or $350,000 plus bonus. Ultimately, Wiederhorn served only 13 months in jail and upon his release, after completing mandatory work program, he received a $2 million bonus to cover restitutions from Fog Cutter Capital Group and resumed his duties as chief executive.

DeWolfe left Fog Cutter Capital Group just a few months before Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation purchased MySpace.

Recent History

The MySpace that we know was conceived about a year after the 2002 launch of Friendster. Preceded and influenced by Ryze, a social networking site which focused on business, Friendster offered a new twist: the site connected people through networks of friends for the specific purpose of dating and making new friends.

In August of 2003, Brad Greenspan received and accepted an invitation to join Friendster from Chris DeWolfe, who had been a member since June 2003. Once Chris DeWolfe, Tom Anderson, and other eUniverse employees had all set up Friendster accounts, the ball was rolling. Recognizing the potential of the Friendster concept, a plan was hatched to quickly mimic the appealing features of the site, re-brand it as MySpace, and then out-market them using eUniverse's resources. According to internal emails and documents provided by Brad Greenspan and sent between eUniverse executives and the team at MySpace, DeWolfe's squad worked fast: MySpace 1.0 was ready within ten days. As part of the internal testing and promotion of the site, the company held a contest to see who could sign up the most people. The hope was that if all 250 eUniverse employees brought on 10 friends, they would have a starting user base of 2,500. Even self-proclaimed loner Tom Anderson took part, stating in an email, "I am as anti-social as they come, and I've already got 20 people to sign up."

So it happened that MySpace essentially blossomed into Spam 2.0 out of seeds planted by DeWolfe during his Spam 1.0 days. eUniverse's business was booming when MySpace launched, so in retrospect it's almost endearing to learn how tentatively they tested and promoted the site. Considering the resources of connectivity that the project started with, MySpace was arguably assured a strong launch. At that point, eUniverse had over 50 million email addresses in their database, as well as over 18 million monthly web users. Originally, DeWolfe's business model was intent on selling accounts to MySpace, but it was Greenspan who proposed to keep MySpace free and to make profit through advertising. Greenspan and eUniverse even cannibalized valuable existing websites they owned, such as their paid dating service, CupidJunction—a top dating website with over 3 million users. Members at CupidJunction were encouraged to set up free MySpace accounts. Unfortunately, Greenspan was forced out of the company soon after MySpace's launch.

With the site quickly gaining popularity, and Greenspan no longer providing integral direction, DeWolfe and the MySpace team moved to create a false PR story that would best reflect the ideals and tastes of its growing demographic. They wanted to prevent the revelation that a Spam 1.0 company had launched the site, and created the impression that Tom Anderson created the site, and the lie worked.

The venture, of course, turned out to be a huge success. MySpace has spawned an incredibly successful twist on the age-old art of self-promotion, allowing—even encouraging—the marketing of everything from bands to businesses on their site. Essentially, they've opened up a channel through which to solicit and promote everyone and everything—most importantly the individual. The whole site is, in essence, a marketing tool that everyone who registers has access to. Users constantly receive spam-like messages from said bands, business, and individuals looking to add more "friends" (and therefore more potential fans, consumers, or witnesses) to their online identity. A testament to this strange new social paradigm is the phrase "Thanks for the Add," a nicety offered when one MySpace user "adds" another as a "friend."

Best yet, to use the site, members must log in, causing them to inadvertently view advertisements, and then read their messages on a page with even more advertisements. In the world of MySpace, spam is earth, air, fire, and water.

Super Publics and the Wisdom of Crowds

As for Brad Greenspan, who had offered his resources and full-fledged support, sought capital for the site. He was superseded by two eUniverse executives situated below him—Brett Brewer and Chris Lipp—who enabled an investment group named Vantage Point to assume a majority of preferred stock in eUniverse through defrauding stockholders. Once Vantage Point was in control, Greenspan was forced out of his position, maintaining 30% of shares in the company at the time, and only held 10% of the company by the time MySpace and Intermix Media (eUniverse) were eventually bought by News Corp. Various other corporate dramas have ensued, including the sale of Intermix Media (formerly eUniverse, and the umbrella company to MySpace) to Rupert Murdoch's News Corporation in a deal that has been described as a cash-out merger as a result of an unfair process and at an unfair price. Somewhat justifying suspicions, Viacom (the company that owns MTV) went on the record stating, "It's fair to say that we had an opportunity to participate in the process [of purchasing MySpace]. We looked closely at MySpace, but didn't fit our financial filters." Further justifying suspicions, The New York Times recently reported that Chris DeWolfe, Tom Anderson, and other MySpace employees now employed by News Corp. received multimillion-dollar bonus payments "to smooth the feelings that were ruffled when Intermix was sold, dragging MySpace along with it against the will of its founders, who received only a small portion of the sale price."

Base business details and corporate scandals aside, the crucial story here is how a site built on a foundation of spam has become one of the most culturally, socially, and technologically influential websites in the history of the Internet. To their credit—and an important key to the site's popularity—the MySpace team has intuitively gone with the flow, treating their users as co-developers (whether by luck or by wisdom), and allowing network effects from user contributions to steer their evolution in many ways—a fundamental difference between both Web 1.0/2.0, and Spam 1.0/2.0.

A social paradigm has shifted with the tipping of MySpace. It's incredible to consider, but Spam—as negative a connotation as it has—has morphed to enable and fuel the massive development of an incredible Super Public. Tom Anderson and Chris DeWolfe may not even fully recognize the fantastic longitude and latitude at which they stand.

It's no wonder that a site this popular has been a consistent newsmaker, repeatedly finding itself at the center of various controversies. MySpace has become a sort of Super Public portal—entry to a world defined by an ever-changing digital architecture that creates pathways for connection between individuals who might otherwise (even elsewhere on the internet) never have met. In addition to facing accusations of not sufficiently protecting its underage users and subsequently being sued for thereby enabling sexual assault, MySpace has inspired debate over free speech from high school students to porn stars.

What truly remains to be seen is not the repercussions of misleading PR campaigns or bad business deals, but whether MySpace teens will fall victim like Narcissus to the worship and distortion of their own (and others') online reflections, or if they will lead the way in navigating a new world comprised of Super Publics, where old cultures collide, and new cultures are born.

By Trent Lapinski.
trentl@gmail.com
trentl.com

Lapinski is a freelance writer who resides in Orange County. He is also a starving college student.

Tom Anderson's second profile [MySpace]

The site was called TeamAsian.com [now redirects to GreatDate.com]. Another source says Tom photographed the models himself, and that Tom was almost sued for sexual harrassment. But, says this source, Tom sold the site to a domain parking company and blocked access from the Internet Archive's Wayback Machine.

According to porn review sites PornWizzard and Sexgine.com [NSFW], TeamAsian.com is for sale at $360,000. (I made a quick call to the listed number, and the operator told me that BuyDomains.com is still selling the domain. He had no info about previous owners.)

One source made a few other comments about Tom, but this is a family site, so we won't reprint them. But we want more on the story — especially if you can confirm the more devious accusations against Tom. E-mail tips@valleywag.com or AIM heyvalleywag.

Earlier: Did MySpace's Tom Anderson do Asian porn?
Photo: Tom Anderson's profile. Girls have no connection to porn, as far as I know.

• Users over 18 can't make friendships with users aged 14 or 15 without knowing their e-mail addresses or names. This will be flawless, because no one ever finds a stranger's e-mail address online.
• Anyone under 18 can talk to anyone else under 18, because 17-year-olds don't commit sexual assault.
• Online dating sites won't advertise to people under 18. Actually, this is because people under 18 don't have credit cards, but spinning it as user protection was a clever move.
• The annoying "punch the monkey" ads will now double as thumbprint-scan ID checks.
• Every user under 18 can still say they're 20, and every user over 18 can still say they're 14.
• Co-founder Tom Anderson (pictured) is accused of sexually harassing the 2 million minors he's friended.

MySpace to Add Restrictions to Protect Younger Teenagers [NY Times]

One of Tom's lovely ladies, says the tipster, left a between-the-sheets romp unsatisfied. And she was anything but quiet about it. And Tom wouldn't take that lying down. He cock-blocked her the hard way — every time she built a MySpace profile, Mr. Humps-a-lot kicked her off the site. Deleted her whole profile. "You'll never sleep in this town again!"

It might be a harsh punishment, but hey, the guy has a reputation to keep. It's not so bad — who hasn't locked an ex-lover out of the house?

Earlier: MySpace Tom orders half-price ass-by-air, said random Asian girl [Valleywag]

Actually, their comments are fucking boring. Where are the giddy recollections of nights spent trashing hotel rooms? The bitchy gossip about the women who fight over his body? Ugh, please anything more interesting than "What up Tom, miss ya, let's watch LOTR." Here's one of the few good ones:

Yeah, that's right. Tom rocks out to "Under the Sea." Which, let's face it, is so awesome it hurts.

After the jump, more handpicked comments.

Must...resist...punching...out...white boy!

Not appearing on Cute Overload any time soon.

Okay, Tom and his crew don't actually work, right? They just got plopped in a cubicle farm and periodically watered and fed?

Tom-Tom's user comments [Myspace]

In any case, sounds like this girl deserves a "Tom is NOT my friend" tee. The story, passed through another boy:

So, I hooked up last week with this half-Asian very hot Suicide Girl on - where else - MySpace.

Post-dirty sex, she's telling me "Tom from MySpace really liked that picture of my ass. He wrote me last month (post bad press) and told me he wants to 'hit my ass.' He offered to fly me to LA, but —"

Discover Tom's caveat after the jump.

"— he'd only pay for half the flight as the last girl who he flew to LA was hooking up with other guys in LA while he was at work."

Thus, without a full free ticket, she passed on his offer of cut-rate anal.

So, if you're only getting some of the trim (or ass as the case may be), you should only pay for half the flight?

And this is - as well as post bad press - post multi-million dollar "extra retention bonus."

Classic.

Tom's alleged excuse about "the last girl" sounds sketchy. Hard to believe a girl tapping Tom Anderson would need more LA hotties to keep her satisfied — unless this was during Tom's emo phase.

Chris DeWolfe and Tom Anderson, the poster boys for MySpace, went the way of so many startup founders. Diluted out of the gig by their investors and the spam company running their operation, they fought — and lost — a battle to keep Intermix Media from selling to News Corp. at an undervalued rate. It's a far cry from the sycophantic "young guys done good" story trumped up for the press.

Both the New York Times and Los Angeles Times got it wrong. MySpace isn't the brainchild of DeWolfe or Anderson, this was a Wiederhorn job. DeWolfe and Anderson were mere cabin-boys. [...] The site was created by a multimillion dollar company (a spam company), then purchased by a multibillion dollar entertainment/news company (Fox, News Corp.). The site was not a garage project; MySpace was created and coded by people being paid considerable salaries sitting in an office building in Los Angeles.

Trent has a whole series of investigative MySpace pieces. The most trenchant:
The MySpace Report
Why Doesn't Anyone Ask Who Actually Runs MySpace?
Fox To Buy Intermix Media/MySpace: The Truth About MySpace

There goes the little charm MySpace had left. Major props to Trent for cutting through another cloud of corporate-spin bullshit.

The Truth About The Money and Founders Of MySpace.com [Trent Lapinski via WebProNews]

How do you break the 12-photo rule and get 51 snaps on MySpace? Step 1: Date Tom Anderson.

MySpace Tom's secret Real Friends list is still a mystery, but here's one girl who's definitely on it. Tiffany Chao ( is just 22 (to Tom's 30) and fits Tom's rumored demographic just fine. Judging by their photos and comments, they're a real hot item. They headed out to Chichen Itza together, and they hang out on Tom's stomping grounds in L.A. And when Tiffany posted a snap of her and Joaquin Phoenix (or at least a wax figure of Jo), Tom got defensive: "he is 7 feet tall, but i'm 7'1,"" he commented from his secondary friends-only profile.

But one detail really made me perk up: Tiffany lists herself as "single." Either Tom's due for a lot of MySpace drama, or he's still single too — which means you could hook up with the Myspace Mastah and get your own 51-picture profile.

Tiffany [MySpace profile]

Tom Anderson [Yahoo! 360]
Earlier: MySpace Tom hooks up on his own site [Valleywag]

My gf is a hot asian who is on MySpace and a couple of months ago Tom contacted her about hanging out in Santa Monica if she was ever single. She never replied, but she said the message came from this account: http://www.myspace.com/tomanderson

I had her send a friend request today. If he approves it, I will get you some screen shots from his friends list.

And then:

Damn. He wrote back to my gf that he only approves people for his second account that he has met and hung out with in real life. You're gonna have to crack that friend list from someone else.

Oh-ho! So Tom doesn't just collect his Asian-chick Pokemon online — that profile is his way to hook up. Way to go Tom!

Tom Anderson [MySpace friends-only profile]
Earlier: Tom and the hot Asian chicks [Valleywag]
And: Did MySpace's Tom Anderson do Asian porn? [Valleywag]

Still hunting for the secret Asian-girl-collection MySpace profile (gotta catch 'em all!) of founder Tom Anderson. But a reader went to Tom's party in Miami (pictured). Sez he:

He threw a MySpace party on South Beach and he had this entourage of Asians from California I believe that came with him, and they basically added to the "show." One of them is a model with her own MySpace page that has a big following i believe.

Not that we should be surprised — if you were a 30-year-old guy worth a few million, and you had 73 million friends to pick from, wouldn't you hang with models? So partly as evidence and partly as eye candy, we've got more pics from the MySpace party. Tom's bikini-clad Asian girls be after the jump.

Watch closely —

— the girls are never —

— next to Tom.

Wanna know the reason MySpace is so seedy? Before MySpace, Tom Anderson ran a porn site called TeamAsian.com. The first profiles were of the asian girls he used to photograph and put on his site.

Other rumors have floated around that Tom keeps a second profile to collect Asian girls as friends. (Gee, another white boy in tech who's crazy for Asian girls, who'd have thought?)

Not that there's anything wrong with all this — just that Tom may as well 'fess up. He's already made his millions, what's the worst that could happen?

What genius hast wrought this? Well, the same guy who showed it to me. So I pumped him for info. The IMterview's after the jump.

Video: Puppet Tom [MySpace profile]

Valleywag: Tell the studio audience your name or witty handle.
Puppet Tom: My real name? I guess we should really go with Puppet Tom for this.
PT is a project for my sketch comedy group Train of Thought.
Wag: Where can people find Train of Thought? Are there more videos?
P-Tom: Yeah there are. But not of PT yet. This is his first video blog.
They're all on YouTube. Train of Thought is on MySpace at myspace.com/sketchcomedy.
Wag: What else will Puppet Tom be doing on his vlog? Any other guests we can anticipate?
P-Tom: I think JA will definately be back once he heals from his beating. Puppet Tom's vlog will be about his different adventures in running MySpace and answering user questions.
Wag: Is Real Tom your friend?
P-Tom: No. We're having some fun with MySpace and the community in general. We're having a lot of fun putting these together. The goal is to be fun and stay positive.
Wag: And to get laid.
P-Tom: LOL
That wouldn't hurt.
but just in case we have a character for that too: http://myspace.com/drmarx
Wag: How much has News Corp. offered to buy you out?
P-Tom: LOL. We're going to wait and see what Facebook goes for.
Wag: So again, while we're not plugging you, that's http://myspace.com/puppet_tom and http://myspace.com/sketchcomedy.
P-Tom: Exactly.

About this Newsweek cover story — can we all share a moment of frustration? Newsweek really doesn't get the new web. The mag loses major points for:

¬ Saying "wisdom of the crowds" with a straight face
¬ Wikipedia will "take on Britannica" — Do you actually know anyone who looks things up in their stack of leatherbounds?
¬ Perpetuating the myth that MySpace's Tom is everyone's friend
¬ Perpetuating the myth that Dane Cook is funny
¬ Showing a dozen people with great ideas, inspiring thousands with stupid ideas

The New Wisdom of the Web [Newsweek]
Earlier: "Putting the 'We' in Web": Newsweek gets it!