MySpace’s CEO Out

Owen Van Natta, who only joined MySpace in April of last year, will no longer serve as its CEO.  Reports indicate that he’s in fact been fired, and MySpace has at least confirmed that Jason Hirschhorn and Mike Jones, who reported to Van Natta, are becoming co-presidents.

This series of developments comes as a big surprise.  Just one week ago, rumor had it that Hirschhorn might leave MySpace due to tension with Van Natta.  But according to Kara Swisher, News Corp. Chief Digital Officer Jon Miller then became involved, and after talking to all three men, wound up sacking the CEO.

So let’s discuss MySpace’s new co-presidents.  Before becoming MySpace’s chief product officer, Hirschhorn filled executive positions at both Sling Media and MTV.  Jones founded Userplane prior to becoming MySpace’s chief operating officer, and also worked for AOL following an acquisition.

Both men have done well at MySpace, too.  Miller stated with respect to Van Natta’s semi-replacements (remember the difference in titles), "Mike and Jason have demonstrated true leadership in their operational and product guidance, respectively, and I have the utmost confidence in both of them to lead MySpace into its next chapter."

Hirschhorn and Jones said, "We joined MySpace last April with very a specific set of goals in mind, and are anxious to continue working together to make those goals a reality.  This business is now pointed in the right direction, and we have a great team of employees that will continue to push MySpace closer to its potential as the place where people go to be discovered and to discover great content."

MySpace May Be After Flixster

Over the past several months, MySpace has become much more formidable thanks to some new features, a deal with a record label, and a couple of acquisitions.  It looks like the growth spurt may not be over, either, as a report’s indicated that MySpace is now interested in getting to know Flixster.

Flixster is a sort of social networking site organized around movies.  It’s not as popular as Amazon’s IMDB, but could prove valuable because, according to Compete, it pulls in more unique visitors than News Corp.’s Rotten Tomatoes (3.4 million versus 2.2 million in November, for example).

As for what MySpace might do with Flixster, Kara Swisher wrote, "Whether this is an acquisition or more of a larger partnership deal with News Corp. digital entertainment sites is unclear.  Several sources said a purchase was a possibility, while others talked about a more complex deal that did not necessarily mean a purchase."

Neither relationship is hard to imagine.  Would-be users can already register on Flixster with a MySpace account, proving that the two can coexist.  But MySpace has bought iLike and Imeem in recent days, demonstrating that it likes to own things outright.

We’ll keep an eye on the situation.  Just don’t count on any deals getting sealed in the immediate future since things tend to wind down in December.

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