News Corp: MySpace Worth $6 Billion

In an investors meeting in Australia yesterday, Rupert Murdoch said that MySpace could now be sold for $6 billion — about a 10x return on the original $580 million that News Corp. paid for it.

In other news, one of the many MySpace alternatives, Facebook, is rumored to be in talks with IAC — or at least Zuckerberg (Facebook founder) and Jason Rapp (IAC SVP of M&A) were seen mingling together at the Foursquare conference in NY. Facebook has been in acquisition talks with Yahoo in the past, but either the price was too much or acquisition activity halted due to poor stock performance. A social network is something that the extensive IAC portfolio lacks, but I’m not sure Facebook with their primarily college demographic and steep price tag (rumored $2 billion) are the best fit. If I were IAC, I’d be looking at the well-branded (yet stagnant) Friendster — IAC’s network would breathe new life into Friendster, and the past rumored $50 – $100 million price tag pales in comparison to Facebooks’. Friendster has been up-for-sale in the past and holds actual patents on social networking, which likely will result in News Corp. paying licensing fees for in the future (once Friendster has rallied their legal case together, and once MySpace’s wallet, er, growth, plateaus — allowing Friendster to tap into a business worth much more than the $6 billion Rupert speaks of today).