I got MySpace recently and my intention was to use it for networking with writers and those in the writing industry. One thing I did notice, though, was all the unwanted (at least by me) “stuff” that shows up on my page. You know the drill: cool videos, cool people, ads, etc.
The other thing that I didn’t know would happen is the use of the “Bulletins” feature. Since I’ve had some friends join, the bulletin space is automatically being overrun by my friends’ so-called bulletins. I really don’t want any bulletins showing on my page, so I tried to delete them. Then I found out that MySpace doesn’t allow you to delete bulletins from friends, only yours. That’s not very user-friendly, in my humble opinion.
When I posted a question regarding this on the MySpace forums, I got the answer I wanted from “Pixy”. She mentioned that if you use Firefox for your browser, you could use some extensions to it in order to block bulletins, etc. It got really interesting at this point, as I use Firefox exclusively for internet browsing.
The only thing is that you have to be somewhat handy with computer applications. I’m not trying to scare you off, just a gentle warning at this point in time. If you can install applications and updates on your PC, then you shouldn’t have any problems. Just make sure you are using the latest version of Firefox and not Internet Explorer when doing this.
Okay. Let’s get into the “how to do it” mode. Follow these instructions in order:
1) click on the Windows “Start” button, and then click on the “search” option.
2) now click on the “folders” button at the top and then click on the “+” sign next to “my documents” so it will expand
3) click once on the “my documents” folder on the left side so it highlights
4) then go up to “File” in the menu bar at the top and click on it
5) click on “new” and then “folder”
6) you’ll now have a “new folder” highlighted on the right side of the panel
7) type in a file folder name in it, giving it something you will recognize later on, such as “Firefox extensions”
8) after doing that, the new folder will show up in the “my documents” directory with the name you just gave it
9) now we’re ready to get going…
10) go to: http://www.greasespot.net/
11) click on: Download Greasemonkey 0.6.8.20070314.0
12) you will then get a Firefox window pop named “software installation”, with the Greasemonkey extension shown.
13) click on “install” – it will automatically install into your Firefox browser. You will need to restart Firefox when you get the notice to do so
14) after the installation, it would be a good idea to download the PDF user’s guide to Greasemonkey and writing scripts. Not essential that you do this, but gives an excellent background on this very useful utility; you can find it on the Greasemonkey page
15) now go to: http://userscripts.org/scripts/search?q=MySpace
16) you’ll now notice a bunch of excellent scripts you can download; scroll down the page and check out the various things that these java scripts can do
17) when you find one that you want to use, just click on the blue title and it takes you to that script’s page
18) make sure you thoroughly read what the script does, and any comments left by people; sometimes the script is unworkable due to changes made by MySpace later on
19) click on the “install this script” on the right side of the page
20) you’ll now see the Greasemonkey installation window, with some background info on the script
21) click on the “install” button; it will appear that nothing happened, but
22) go to the top of your Firefox browser and click on “Tools”
23) if all went well up till now, you should see “Greasemonkey” listed as a tool, with an arrow to the right
24) then click on “Manage User Scripts”
25) the new script you just downloaded and installed on Firefox will show up on the left side, with a detailed explanation of what it does on the right side
All of this is for making your MySpace page a lot cleaner and less annoying. But when you go to the main page of Userscripts.org, you will see that there are loads of scripts for a lot of various sites. I’ve just scratched the surface with this guide for MySpace modification.
Please Note: Anytime you download anything to your PC, particularly if it runs a program, you should insure your anti-virus program is working and up to date. I would also suggest running AdAware and Spybot to check for any malicious bots imbedded in the code you download. It also doesn’t hurt to do a system backup anytime you download a program or scripting code.
If you experience any problems and have a suggestion, please add a comment to this article so we all can benefit.
Legal disclaimer: I am not responsible for any problems you incur by using the above instructions. They are merely provided to you for your information and further research.
