NEWS CORP. NEWS

News Corp. finally unloaded money-losing social network MySpace on Justin Timberlake (?!?) for $35 million (that’s about $1.50 per user!), $445 million less than what they paid for it in 2005. $445 million is only more than half of what News Corp. makes off of Simpsons merchandise per year. [Los Angeles Times]

COMING ATTRACTIONS

zuckerburgHey, you! Do you know who Mark Zuckerburg is? If not, you soon will, because 2010 is the Year of Zuck! He’s the cat who made the popular Friendster clone Facebook, which is currently in “hot water” for selling all of its users’ personal information to the Taliban in exchange for drugs. The outrage is so widespread that it even made the cover of Time Magazine, which is apparently considered a big deal!

As the face of Facebook (I hope you enjoyed this phrase!!! I stayed up all night writing it!!!), you can expect to see the Zuckster’s mug – which by the way used to be in the goddamn logo seriously what kind of weird egomaniac does that – all over the place in news story after news story as this privacy brouhaha continues into the summer. If we’re lucky, we might even see him look remorseful and say he’s really sorry, just like the CEOs of Goldman Sachs, Toyota, and BP!

Then, in the fall, an unflattering movie based on an unflattering book about Zuckerburg, his creepy mentor The Napster Guy, and the creation of Facebook will hit theaters, bringing his extreme jerkiness and unethical behavior to the attention of general audiences. And it’s in 3-D! Even if you don’t plan on seeing it, Hollywood’s relentless marketing juggernaut will ensure you’ll see fake-Zuckerburg’s face everywhere (except maybe on Facebook?).

Finally, if that wasn’t enough, Zuckerburg will guest star as himself (!) on The Simpsons (possibly to soften his image after public perception of him takes a beating?). This is surprisingly timely for a show that took seven years to do an episode about 9/11! For once, The Simpsons is actually jumping on a trend while it’s still sort of hot; it’s pretty amazing they didn’t go with Tom from MySpace. Could The Simpsons become culturally relevant again…? (Haha, no. They just did an episode about the Patriot Act, so I suspect it’s only a matter of time before Bart joins a flash mob.)

Anyway, shortly thereafter The Year of Zuck will conclude with Zuckerburg being thrown into a volcano after America grows sick of him, the end.