A new report has suggested that Facebook will reap $1.29 billion from advertisers this year. And while Facebook continues to grow, its traditional rival in the US, MySpace, is likely to diminish, says eMarketer.

In a statement, eMarketer said: “It’s estimated that advertisers will pay Facebook $1.29 billion this year, which is 3.7 times the amount that MySpace is expected to receive.

“MySpace is diminishing in importance, with an expected $297 million in ad revenues worldwide next year, down 14% from $347 million this year.”

MySpace isn’t the only company that may not do so well in advertising terms. eMarketer reckons that AOL will see only $890 million in American ad revenues this year, which is close to Facebook’s $835 million.

The question is how viable it is for Google to create a 
 successful social media product when faced with Facebook’s huge competition?

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The social network platform MySpace is about to launch a new-look home page. The new user homepage is set to offer a more prominent display of the activity stream and simplify the content discovery experience. It’s rather like Facebook, and it’s likely that the news feed success of Facebook has prompted the redesign for MySpace.

This is the first step in a series of planned changes to the MySpace design. From August 19th, the MySpace activity stream will span the first two columns, featuring shared content and status updates from friends across your network.

There are other sections on the sides of the page for features such as events, games and movies. A new “My Stuff” feature gives quick access to photos, videos and music right from the homepage.

There’s also a new alerts system that collects similar alerts and re-positions them in a more visible location so that users can browse and interact with their alerts.

The new MySpace experience is being described as a Digg-meets-Facebook type news feed. Tell us what you think when it goes live.

WebCreationUK have a social media package available, speak to us for more or any of your other web design needs.

A new survey has revealed that more than half of employees are prohibited from using social network sites for any reason while at work.

The Robert Half Technology research, based in America, asked 1,400 companies with 100 or more employees about their policy on visiting social networking sites, such as Facebook, MySpace and Twitter.

The results found that 54% of staff was prohibited completely from social networking during work hours.

Meanwhile, almost a fifth (19%) of companies allow staff to social network for business purposes only. Some 16& permitted the visiting of social networks for limited personal use.

Only 10% of companies permitted social networking for any type of personal use.

The reasons given for the varying policies included concerns about time wasting in work hours and the potential damage caused by negative chat about a company.

While this survey is American it’s likely that the same sort of percentages apply to the British marketplace.

What is your company’s policy on social  networking?