MySpace announced its partnership with video site Youku to expand its influence in the fast-growing online Asian market, Reuters UK reported Friday. Youku, a site looking to become the Chinese equivalent of YouTube, launched over a year ago, and has amassed investments since birth totaling some $40 million. In November 2007 alone the site secured $25m in funding to cap its first full year in operation on relatively strong financial footing. The Internet research group Nielsen/NetRatings claims that Youku is currently serving more than 100m video plays daily.
All in all, MySpace is smart to offer a good amount of attention to its easternmost operations. The Chinese Internet complex is only going to increase in size. Among the roughly 1.3 billion citizens on the mainland, only a portion equivalent in number to that which is “connected” in America is said to be utilizing Web services in some way or another. Proportionally speaking, China is still quite a ways from reaching critical mass.