MySpace has introduced new tools to help musicians better promote and mangage their music.

MySpace has partnered with marketing platform Reverbnation and will offer its FanReach email marketing tool to all musicians with a profile. FanReach allows artists to communicate with others both on MySpace and via targeted email campaigns.

MySpace and Google have reached an agreement to renew and expand their search and advertising partnership, which is good news for the struggling social network.

Under the terms of the deal, Google will continue to operate MySpace search and advertising and will also provide additional display advertising services to improve the entertainment content on MySpace.

MySpace introduced what it’s referring to as "MySpace Hijacks" today. This is where curation of featured content on the site is taken over by celebrities, as if they had "hijacked" the site to bombard you with stuff they like. 

"On the heels of the newly redesigned Myspace, Hijacks is one of many content-focused initiatives supporting Myspace’s mission to provide the best social entertainment experience possible for the Gen Y audience," MySpace’s Laurie Spindler tells WebProNews.

WebProNews received some interesting findings from YouGov BrandIndex, indicating that it has not been a good year for public perception of social media brands (which in this case includes Google, Yahoo, Bing, and AOL, in addition to more obvious brands like Facebook and MySpace).

As if to offer visual proof that it’s trying hard to find it’s place in the social media universe, MySpace is using several different new logos simultaneously. Just weeks ago the "space" was deleted (see left), but yesterday at the top of an official press release, it was reinserted. And if that’s not confusing enough, MySpace created a new site to encourage user generated variations of the MySpace logos much like Google modifies its logo to celebrate special events. Here’s a visual history of MySpace logos past and present:

Myspace and Facebook announced an integration today that pretty much confirms Myspace is a place for entertainment content more than it is a social network. Myspace users will be able to use Facebook Connect to bring Facebook info, specifically info about entertainment that they "like", into Myspace. The integration is called Myspace Mashup with Facebook. Essentially, it’s just like any other Facebook Connect/like button integration, but is geared towards Myspace’s content library. 

How much time do you spend trying to keep with all your friends on the various social platforms? Chances are it’s quite a bit. Most of your friends are probably on Facebook, some are hard die heard Twitterers, and some won’t let go of MySpace.

To be clear: we don’t mean to spread rumors or alarm anyone.  But MySpace employees might want to consider setting aside some extra money and updating their LinkedIn profiles, as one News Corp. exec hinted during an earnings call that a drastic cost-cutting action of sorts may occur.

A large round (or two) of layoffs is one possibility.  A sale or even shutdown of MySpace doesn’t seem to be out of the question, either.  News Corp. COO Chase Carey made the situation sound quite serious.

The Ad Council has launched the “Internet Safety Coalition,” in an effort to educate teens about how to be smart about what they post and share online.

The Internet Safety Coalition members include big names such as Google, Microsoft, Yahoo, IBM, Verizon Wireless, AT&T, AOL, Comcast, the Interactive Advertising Bureau, MySpace and MTV Networks, among others.

Coming up with a social media plan isn’t always the easiest thing to do for businesses. There are so many factors that come into play, even beyond the landscape of communities that actually exist. For example, business leaders need to ask questions like: How much time should be spent interacting with social media sites? How many people should be representing the company on social sites? How much of their time should be dedicated to it? Should it be the full-time job of one person? The full-time jobs of more people? Only part of the job for a lot of people? Etc. Etc. Etc. 

MySpace announced its new redesign along with a new suite of products today. These, the company tells us, will "redefine the company as a social entertainment destination for Gen Y." We’ll see. 

Two months after their original three-year, $900 million search deal was supposed to expire, there’s word that Google and MySpace have reached a new agreement.  The terms are supposed to be rather different, too, saving Google as much as $200 million per year.

Although it obviously took a little while for anyone to notice, it looks like August will go down as a very important period in Twitter’s history.  comScore has determined that Twitter passed MySpace in terms of unique visitors last month.

In one sense, the changeup wasn’t a huge deal: Twitter just saw 96 million visitors versus MySpace’s 95 million.  But the switch looks permanent, considering that, on a year-over-year basis, Twitter’s visitor count increased 76 percent while MySpace’s fell 17 percent.

MySpace has introduced a new Sync with YouTube feature. This enables YouTube users to automatically distribute YouTube video content through Myspace. 

According to Michael Arrington at TechCrunch, the new MySpace (aka: Project Futura) is coming to some users on October 15, though that is subject to change. According to his sources, it will include a lot of white space and focus on the activity stream. Sounds like another familiar social network. 

American Idol auditions are coming to MySpace as the show celebrates its 10th anniversary. MySpace announced today that it has partnered with  19 Entertainment, FremantleMedia North America and FOX on the project. 

Starting today and ending October 6, people between the ages of 15 and 28 can submit audition videos for the show at MySpace.com/americanidol.

MySpace announced that it has appointed Tom Cox as its new Senior VP of Business Development, which means he’ll be responsible for crafting and implementing the overall business strategy for MySpace. It also means he’ll be identifying and negotiating partnerships for the company.

"Cox brings to MySpace a proven track record for crafting innovative strategies, structuring productive relationships, and building successful businesses and partnerships within the technology and online media industries," the company says.

It looks like MySpace’s dealings with Google aren’t over – or conclusively continued – just yet.  Even though a search and advertising deal is set to expire today, a report’s indicated that the companies’ existing contract has been extended a short time while negotiations continue.

MySpace has announced a new feature that lets users sync their status updates with their Facebook profiles or Pages, while also letting them share content from their MySpace page with Facebook friends.

"Sync with Facebook allows users to keep their friends on Facebook up to date on everything, including: sharing songs, latest photos, fun game apps, and more," says MySpace’s Jennifer Ruffner.

Today seems to be redesign day. Digg began rolling out its new redesign to all users (follow us here). MySpace introduced a redesign to profiles. In addition to these, UStream unveiled its own redesign with changes to the homepage as well as the dashboard.

MySpace has introduced new profiles for users, musicians, and celebrities. The goal, was to "clean things up", so MySpace is offering a newly designed MySpace profile and a theme gallery.