An article is up today on MSN's website about the difference between myspace and facebook, with a slant. Who uses the one over the other? Not an unusual question, especially for market reasons. But when that question is based on class, my discomfort begins to set in. When I initially saw the article, I decided to click on it because I thought the question of class had more to do with a person's year in college (senior, class of 2007). Silly me. Of course it had more to do with financial classification. And according to these particular researchers, rich, more affluent young folks are on facebook, while the poor and working class, to use their terms, stick to myspace.  They go on to site some statistics about the recent increase and decrease in membership from both social networks. Although there has been a surge in membership on facebook, the stats they provide do not seem to reflect class; they basically say that facebook is growing in popularity. There information comes from a researcher who interviewed 190 people to get there information, and of course, they don't say what the class or racial dynamic is of this sample group or how it relates to the outcome.

All and all, this article lacked real evidence that any of what is being said is true. It deals more with ad revenue than anything else. To attach a class zoning to millions of people who use these social networks based on seedy evidence kind of sucks, for lack of a more appropriate word. And it wouldn't be such a big deal if there weren't so many of us who use these networks to communicate with others, network professionally and socially, and honestly, manage our lives. Employers are using them to do background checks now. You can investigate people you are in relationships with, and so on. You get the idea.

As a person who comes from a working class family, I have never had a myspace account. Shocking, I'm sure. I only have facebook. Most of my friends, from mixed incomes, have both or only myspace. I have many upper class friends that spend money to "pimp their page" so that is looks exactly like they want it to. Although facebook is changing, you don't need to pay to have features added. I think that alone would and does attrack students on a strict budget. In my experience, many people choose to use one or the other based on age or level of school in college. When I joined facebook, I had maybe 40 people as friends because most of the other students, especially those on the west coast, didn't really use it. A year later, those same people became members of facebook and wanted to add me as a friend because they were tired of complaining about how outrageous myspace had become. They said they were "too grown" for all of that.

In any case, facebook is growing, whether that has to do with classism or not. Because of that growth, it is changing dramatically, and many of us are ready to move on to the next thing when it starts up before that gets played out too. (Remember Black Planet?)

So what are your thoughts?

I personally like facebook better simply because the people you have as friends are much more likely to be people you actually know. What a thought! Friends you are actually friends with. I know other people really enjoy the creativity of myspace. What do you think?