Facebook and MySpace

InformationWeek reported on some informal research comparing Facebook users against MySpace users. From their article:

Since Facebook opened up last September, ongoing press coverage of MySpace as a dangerous place and Facebook’s positioning as a home for those with elite aspirations have help create a socioeconomic divide between the two sites, argues Danah Boyd, a Ph.D. student at the School of Information Sciences at University of California at Berkeley.

“The goodie two shoes, jocks, athletes, or other ‘good’ kids are now going to Facebook,” Boyd observes in an essay titled “Viewing American class divisions through Facebook and MySpace.” “These kids tend to come from families who emphasize education and going to college.”

Facebook appeals to the ruling class, as Boyd sees it.

“MySpace is still home for Latino/Hispanic teens, immigrant teens, ‘burnouts,’ ‘alternative kids,’ ‘art fags,’ punks, emos, goths, gangstas, queer kids, and other kids who didn’t play into the dominant high school popularity paradigm,” Boyd insists. “These are kids whose parents didn’t go to college, who are expected to get a job when they finish high school. These are the teens who plan to go into the military immediately after schools.”

Although just as informal, I am pleased to report that Facebook folks use Macs and MySpace folks use PCs. Perhaps InformationWeek will publish that finding which I am sure is just as solid a piece of research as Danah Boyd’s work.

Amazing the nonsense that gets published in the media.