News Corp. (NWS) and MySpace. They've been together for a while. And I have a question: Should they still be together? Is there any reason for the social networking business to be in Rupert Murdoch's empire? Personally, I don't see a rationale for keeping MySpace in the fold.

Of course, I'm sure Chief Digital Officer Jonathan Miller has a different opinion. In fact, in the following Reuters article, he denies rumors concerning a desire on the part of News Corp. to sell the asset. Too bad, because I think it should be sold. Seriously, my sympathies go out to anyone in charge of bringing MySpace back to relevancy.

Twitter has struggled to bring more users onto its website. Approximately 70% of end-user interaction with the microblogging service takes place away from Twitter.com. As the company moves toward its search-based ad model, expected to be released later this quarter, website traffic is becoming increasingly important. Yet, it's this gap between use and on-site action that might protect the company going forward ... at least if Facebook can be used as an indicator.

With Facebook Connect, members of the social networking site can interact with their profiles "remotely." If you want to share this blog post on Facebook, for example, you can do it without opening a new browser, plucking www.facebook.com on the keyboard and pasting the URL into the status field. This connection, even though it costs Facebook a pageview or two, reinforces the user's relationship with the site, increasing the likelihood that he or she will remain active overall. It also provides fodder for other members, fueling more clicks, comments and likes ... and ultimately cash in the Facebook till.

Do you remember when MySpace was all the rage? Of course you do. Then came Facebook; then came Twitter. Something else will come along, too. Unfortunately, though, News Corp. (NWS) committed itself to MySpace by buying it back in 2005. What a mistake that was.

I'm sure everyone knows about the growth problems at the social-networking site. This recent article at Reuters discusses them. Morale at the company appears to be waning. Unique visitors aren't what they used to be. An ad agreement with Google (GOOG) is about to expire; any new transaction on that front may not be as valuable now that MySpace has been relegated to not-as-cool-as-it-used-to-be status.

Back in August 2003, Chris DeWolfe helped to create a new site, called MySpace (funny enough, it was almost named "YoPeeps"). With little resources, the company grew tremendously and made social-networking a cultural phenomenon.

Well, DeWolfe left MySpace a year ago and of course, Facebook is now the new power. But the fact remains that DeWolfe is a pioneer of social networking.

An interesting piece of legislation is now blasting its way through the chambers of the Maryland legislature. This legislation threatens to lay waste to Internet social networking as we know it, if not for the inclusion of one solitary line of text.

While it appears honorable and well-intentioned on it's face, Maryland's HB65 (pdf file) is meant to place severe restrictions on the practice of international marriage brokering. If signed into law, the bill will place strict and deeply invasive disclosure requirements on the clients and providers of international match making services. This legislation does not bode well for the likes of eHarmony and Match.com.

Microsoft Corporation (MSFT) has been decent recently about integrating tools outside its own realm into its newer products. Take, for example, Outlook. The most widely-used corporate email client has lost ground in recent years to web-based email alternatives that allow email usage without a locally-installed application.

From looking at the newer Outlook 2010 (which has not been released yet), Microsoft is trying something new: making Outlook a central communication hugs that not only handles corporate email, but integrates such social networking services as MySpace, Twitter and Facebook.

The December 2009 data from comScore (SCOR) were released Tuesday, and the results for the social media sector are nothing short of staggering. Fifty-four percent (112 million) of the 205 million-strong U.S. internet-user population are on Facebook, with 27% (57 million) still using News Corp.'s (NWS) MySpace. But according to data from both comScore and Experian Hitwise (EXPN), the most active users were on Tagged, MyYearbook and Orkut. And Facebook users were more active than those on MySpace.

There's no doubt that plenty is happening in the social media space, but there are some facts that just might surprise you, either because of the speed of change or the discovery of players that may not have occurred to you.

You'd think retailers would flock to any place where they could find 400 million people. With the sixth anniversary of Facebook closing in, its robust user base still hasn't opened the eyes of many retailers.

Despite all the Black Friday social media engagement this year, a substantial 75% of the top 100 online retailers don't have a formal presence on Facebook, according to a study by ForeSee Results. Another 25% haven't even hit 10,000 fans.

As Facebook passes the 400 million user threshold, a flight from social media is beginning to take shape. A growing number of users are reconsidering the sharing (and oversharing) of life details. Reasons vary -- from seeing their networks swell from just close friends to distant connections and strangers to worries over where their personal information can wind up. More than anything else, they say they want to return to "real life."

Depending on how this shakes out, the trend could force social media company employees to get back to real life as well. If the backlash gains momentum, it could cost these companies traffic, which translates to a revenue hit and, in the extreme, viability. Yet, if the likes of Twitter, LinkedIn and Facebook can weather the storm, they will come out the other side stronger than they are now.

If Mark Zuckerberg knew then what he knows now ... Facebook would be more like MySpace, which is now owned by News Corp. (NWS). And, he's willing to admit this in public.

In a six-minute on-stage interview with TechCrunch, Zuckerberg went on at length about the social media platform's privacy settings, which have been the subject of unending debate. He says that he'd make more data public by default if he could start Facebook again. Though Zuckerberg cites Internet trends that indicate a reduced concern with privacy, the real reasons are more likely financial.

Facebook could use more older women, not to mention younger people in general. As the company pushes toward what is expected to be an IPO in 2010, it needs to shore up its user base in all demographics, if for no other reason than to diversify against a new social media platform that appeals to a specific community. So, even with the site pushing past 100 million monthly active users according to its advertising tool, with the addition of 5 million in December, there is work to be done if Facebook will make a successful entry into the public market.

Long derided by "serious folk" as a place for kids, Facebook's membership consists mostly of adults. Fifty-six percent of the user base is female, and 60% of users are 25 years of age or above. In fact, 20% of them are at least 45 years old. Some of the groups that are underrepresented are showing rapid growth. Men over 55 grew twice as fast as their female counterparts, though the younger generation moved onto Facebook most aggressively last year. Users age 26 to 34 showed the biggest overall increase in 2009, with 839,000 monthly active users. This represents a substantial shift from the trend earlier in the year, in which it was the later generation flocking to Facebook. Women over 55 didn't jump on the bandwagon as quickly as other groups.

Revenue hasn't been as fast to change as end-user sentiment, but all that looks like it's coming to an end next year. Social networking site Facebook, which passed 350 million users last month, is poised to move ahead of rival MySpace in ad revenue in 2010, according to a report from eMarketer. The research firm expects Facebook to rake in $605 million in ad spend next year, compared to $385 million for MySpace, which is a News Corp. (NWS) property.

According to Debra Aho Williamson, senior analyst at eMarketer and author of Social Network Ad Spending: 2010 Outlook, "As more marketers incorporate social networks in their business, they will no longer look at them as siloed destinations. Instead, they will look to increase the impact of their social network presence by linking it to other marketing initiatives, both online and offline."

Does anyone remember Friendster? For about ten minutes seven years ago, it was the hottest thing in social networking. The site that effectively kicked off the social media movement didn't stay in vogue long, however, eventually riding a wave of user referrals to Asia. Meanwhile, MySpace, Facebook and Twitter came along, taking over the sector -- and the hype that comes with it.

Well, Friendster is worth something to somebody, it seems. The company is due to be sold at the end of the month for $100 million. The social networking service is tops in Asia, which is where more than half of its 100 million-strong user base can be found.

Once upon a time, Mac users could brag they were much safer from malicious electronic attacks. After all, in the days before Google (GOOG), when Microsoft (MSFT) was the only uber-player in town, Windows was the perpetual malware target. Phishers, however, aren't discriminating; they're just looking for an account to plunge. So, both Apple (AAPL) and Microsoft users are threatened. Virus writers do tend to focus on the Windows operating system, which owns 90% of the OS market, but phishers are platform independent.

Phishing involves attempts to get a user to reveal information about their accounts. Once the soon-to-be victim clicks that link or fills out a form, the "transaction" is complete -- no operating system interaction necessary. As a result, there really isn't any advantage to using a Mac over a PC.

For News Corp. (NWS), MySpace is the mistake that keeps on costing. It's bad enough that Murdoch's empire paid $500 million for the social networking platform shortly before Facebook knocked it from the premier spot in the social media beauty pageant, but now we also know that News Corp. has committed $350 million to office space for MySpace that will never be used.

News Corp is shelling out more than $1 million a month for 420,000 square feet in Playa Vista, near Los Angeles International Airport. The deal was signed in August 2008 by Peter Levinsohn, former president of the Fox Interactive Media Unit. At the time, he issued a chest-puffing memo claiming it was "the single biggest real-estate transaction in Los Angeles in the last 25 years." Fortunately, he didn't mix the word "genius" in there at all.