Social networking website MySpace is to launch an advertising system in the UK that targets users on the basis of personal information on their profile pages.

Travis Katz, the senior vice-president and general manager for international at News Corporation-owned MySpace, said the system, a form of "hyper targeting", had already proved to be highly effective and popular with advertisers in the US.

The new hyper targeting platform analyses information revealed by users on their profile that MySpace in turn utilises to put people into different "enthusiast" groups, such as music or sports.

"We only look at the public data that people post," said Katz, speaking at the MediaGuardian.co.uk Changing Media Summit today. "We then bucket people into 'enthusiast' target groups."

This in turn enables advertisers to run much more relevant and targeted campaigns, he added.

Katz said that the goal was for MySpace to allow advertisers to "get more bang for their buck" when they advertise across the social networking website.

In a bid to drive revenues, social networking websites have been experimenting with advertising models that go beyond standard formats such as banners and buttons. One area of experimentation has been behavioural targeting based on user patterns online.

However, there is a fine line between better targeting of ads and exploiting users' personal data.

Last year Facebook was forced into a climbdown over an intrusive marketing product, called Beacon, after a user backlash.

In January Deloitte warned in its annual predictions report of the potential dangers of over commercialisation of social networking websites.

However, Katz denied that there was any issue in over-commercialising MySpace with the new targeted advertising system.

"We have not seen that advertising is unwelcome from users," he said. "On the contrary, users like it as long as it is relevant and presented in an engaging way."

Katz added that four years after launch MySpace was a "far cry" from being just a social networking website, as it evolved into the next stage of its life as a mainstream medium.

"Social networking is not a new phenomenon any more," he said. "It is a very mainstream phenomenon, as mainstream as TV or as radio [now]."

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