Scoble has a very interesting post on why myspace is successful.Secrets of Myspace

Among the reasons, get influential’s using your product, let your customers guide your actions, innovate quickly and frequently and finally make start up easy and friendly. While these all seem pretty basic, it is amazing how many companies either don’t buy into this thinking or simply loose this focus along the way. I would add one additional item to this list, and that is market creatively. In some ways myspace is the anti apple, their site is UGLY, however it has a massive following. By allowing for easy creation, easy sharing of music and the addictive addition of friends myspace has created a powerful network. For them the question is where do you go from here, how do you continue the growth while remaining hip and cool, something that is often not possible.

For the rest of us Scoble’s post is a good reminder of how important customer focus is, it is amazing how simple it sounds but listening to your customers really is a great path for success. One question facing much of the internet industry is how do you balance customer requests against monetization. I think the answer lies in changing the advertising game, for all the talk internet advertising has changed very little since it first blew up in 1996. I challenge all of the major online companies, MSN, Google, Yahoo, and who ever else to truly create innovation in advertising, then and only then do I think we will solve the challenge of Customer Focus v Advertising Focus online.  What about you? Any ideas for how to improve internet advertising?