News Corp’s and Google’s astronomic purchases of MySpace and Youtube might prove difficult to cash in on. User generated media naturally retains its own autonomy when it comes to content. If you censor it too hard, users will go somewhere else- an issue Google faces with IPR issues on MySpace. If you don’t censor, on the other hand, you’re bound to end up with non mainstream content, which will scare off advertisers. News Corp seems to be realizing this, according to Financial Times:

“Peter Chernin, News Corp president said at a recent conference: “We do not see big advertisers advertising with YouTube or MySpace. They have concerns about the content …so there is very little ability to monetise video advertising on user-generated video.”