As is often the case, the media is trying to extract the "interesting bits" from Rupert Murdoch's keynote interview at the McGraw-Hill Digital Media Summit in New York yesterday. The best tidbit seems to be that MySpace is pulling in nearly $25 million per month in ad revenue, with a growth rate of 30% per quarter.
MySpace has grown much faster than anyone expected, says Murdoch, and they're seeing strong growth internationally thanks to MySpace Australia, MySpace France and other spin-off sites. But nor is Murdoch scared of Facebook - he says that students "pretty much need" Facebook accounts, and that young people will happily have accounts on both services. MySpace won't be the next Friendster, he says. That seems like a fair assessment: despite the skeptics, there's no sign that these supposedly fickle teens have plans to go elsewhere.
Although it's hardly news, Murdoch acknowledged that YouTube is a major force, and they've had to ramp up MySpace Video to compete. We tracked down a copy of the interview to post below - as if to prove the point, we found it on YouTube. (RSS READERS: click through to see it.)