News Corp. hires more MySpace executives

April 27, 2009 By BARBARA ORTUTAY , AP Technology Writer

(AP) -- News Corp. has hired two new executives at MySpace, expanding the online hangout's management team after having just replaced its CEO on Friday.

Michael Jones, who's founded several online businesses, will serve as MySpace's chief operating officer. Jones, 39, replaces Amit Kapur, who left last month.

Jason Hirschhorn, most recently the president of Sling Media Inc.'s entertainment group, will be chief product officer, a new position that focuses on the site's look and feel.

Though praised for its substantial entertainment content, MySpace has been criticized for falling behind rival Facebook when it comes to technology. Its worldwide user base has also stagnated at about 130 million, compared with Facebook's 200 million.

Monday's appointments come in the heels of last week's CEO shake-up at Beverly Hills, Calif.-based MySpace. Owen Van Natta, a former chief operating officer at Facebook, became MySpace's CEO on Friday. He replaced co-founder Chris DeWolfe, who left the company.

The latest executive appointments, which came from News Corp., had been in the works before Van Natta was named CEO.

Tom Anderson, MySpace's other co-founder, has been in talks about taking on a new role at the company. In a statement Monday, Jones said he is "honored to collaborate" with Anderson but the company gave no further updates on Anderson's fate.

Jones, the new chief operating officer, founded Userplane, a developer of Web-based chat and other communications technologies for online communities. AOL bought Userplane in 2006.

©2009 The Associated Press. All rights reserved. This material may not be published, broadcast, rewritten or redistributed.