Reports quoting sources familiar with the process said News Corp has retained Allen & Co to field buyout interest for MySpace and has heard from around 50 parties.

The global media conglomerate is said to be considering several options for the future of MySpace, once the big daddy of social space on the web, but now overtaken by faster moving rival Facebook.

According to one source close to the process, an auction of the web site is to start yet, but Siegel said he was interested and had reached out to News Corp after the media company indicated it might auction off MySpace.

Siegel said he expected to pay up to $200 million for MySpace, though it was still a speculation.

In an interview, he said he would hazard a guess at between $50 million to $200 million. He added, a sales package had not been circulated yet.

In addition to usual social networking stuff, including information sharing and connecting with friends, MocoSpace, offers access to music, chatting features, and browser-based social gaming. According to analysts, with 3 billion page views monthly, the site could be part of the answer to MySpace's struggles of late.

Siegel said MySpace was a pioneer in social revolution and it could be paired synergistically with its offerings. He added MocoSpace and MySpace would be a powerful combo in the social networking world.

According to Experian Hitwise, MySpace continued to be the third highest social network (week ending 29 January) and was 2 per cent of social network visits behind Facebook (63 per cent share) and YouTube (19 per cent share). Twitter at 1 per cent share of visits, came in as the fifth highest social network.