DIGITAL: The Story Behind MySpace

NYTIMES.COM: TRENT LAPINSKI, a 20-year-old blogger and journalism student, has been investigating the social-networking site MySpace since July 2005, when the News Corporation bought it.

This week, Valleywag, a Silicon Valley gossip blog, published Mr. Lapinski’s long, critical examination of MySpace. According to Mr. Lapinski and Nick Douglas, Valleywag’s editor, an unidentified “online publisher” that had contracted Mr. Lapinski to write the article balked based on “groundless legal implications” after News Corporation complained (valleywag.com). Mr. Lapinski said the News Corporation declined to comment on his article.

But News Corporation is not the focus. It is the tale of MySpace’s founders, who, according to Mr. Lapinski’s report, came from companies involved with spam, spyware and adware.