It is that time of year again. The air is crisp, the snow is falling and some of your favorite musicians are flying to Los Angeles to wear eight-thousand dollar gowns.

That’s right: The GRAMMYs are approaching. They’re coming fast (Sunday, in fact) and, in turn, we here at MySpace Music will have all sorts of ways to get closer to your favorite artists over the next few days.

When Sundance rolls around, we dust off our parkas and head to Utah to get up close and personal with the talent and tastemakers that continue to support MySpace’s vision for entertainment. We mix and mingle and, most importantly, enjoy a sneak preview of the latest independent film ventures on the horizon. The event is truly an inspiration for the growing community of aspiring artists here on MySpace and we couldn’t help but share some of the highlights. I was thrilled to attend the opening night screening of the Shorts Program introduced by Robert Redford. Spike Jonze and Rory Kennedy debuted their shorts I’m Here and The Fence respectively followed by a brilliant look at a commercialized world in Logorama by François Alaux, Hervé de Crécy, and Ludovic Houplain.

As you know, the evolution of content distribution is changing right before our eyes and MySpace remains a key social tool for emerging filmmakers looking to break into the spotlight. While at Sundance, MySpace’s very own Chief Product Officer, Jason Hirschhorn sat down with Kara Swisher of All Things D to discuss the potential for social media sites to bring content creators closer to audiences than ever before. Don’t miss this video of Jason sharing his thoughts on the unique advantages of storytelling on the Web.

Last August we announced the global beta rollout of MySpace Mail, the uniquely MySpace twist on mail that blended the best of social networking and traditional mail. I’m extremely proud to announce that today MySpace Mail has reached 15 million accounts.

Adoption by our users has experienced phenomenal growth, well exceeding initial expectations. At launch we set a goal of 10 million accounts created within a year – we knew we were on to something when we surpassed this goal in less than a quarter.

Today I spoke at MIDEM , the global music industry event held each year in Cannes. MIDEM brings together the best and brightest from the world of music – including musicians, music journalists, and industry influencers – to discuss the future of music and how it is experienced on a global scale. This was my first keynote outside of the U.S., and I took this opportunity to share our vision of MySpace as a next generation content distribution platform.

MySpace Music has gained considerable traction amongst users, and today’s keynote focused on some of the company’s recent milestones. MySpace Music unique users grew by 30% this month, and unique users are up 92% year-over-year (comScore December 09). Add to that the fact that we’re now the #1 music site in Australia, and that our users have created more than 170 million playlists worldwide, and the power of our global platform really becomes apparent.

To attend the World Economic Forum in Davos is truly the opportunity of a lifetime. I would like to thank MySpace, the Wall St. Journal and the World Economic Forum for offering me this opportunity. I’d like to thank the…

Our MySpace users are talented. We’ve seen them dance, sing, strum, photograph, illustrate and speak their voice. Over the last six years, MySpace has become a platform that showcases undiscovered talent. From singer-songwriter, Colbie Caillat , to funny man, Dane Cook ; our site has become a hub for sharing raw talent and exploring one’s love to perform.

During the past decade, we’ve witnessed countless reality-based shows give the “average Joe” the opportunity to achieve their 15 minutes of fame and experience life in the spotlight. Now the industry is abuzz with the next stage of reality TV as Simon Fuller, the creator of “American Idol,” will premiere his new online entertainment show, “ If I Can Dream .” The show will document the lives of young people who dream of succeeding in Hollywood. As the exclusive social networking partner, MySpace is powering the platform for Hollywood hopefuls to audition for the show.

When we heard that MySpace Music (or The Spooce as we call it) wanted to make us a part of their “Introducing…” program we almost died. The amount of time we have spent working on MySpace since this band started in 2006 is insane. Yes b*tches, we talked to every fan that wrote us, posted 20 bulletins for every show we ever played, and even sent clever spam requests trying to build our loves aka fans.

Yesterday, I got about 20 texts from family and friends saying things like “holy bleep your face is on the homepage of MySpace!”. Having the king of music-social-networking commit to featuring a filthy band like ours is almost as helpful as magic.

Our MySpace users are loyal and visit the site daily to interact with friends, find new music, discover content and share their passions. Recent data shows that roughly seven out of 10 customers will not inform a company of an issue or problem, but simply stop using the site or product. We never want a technical error or site glitch to interfere with a user’s social entertainment experience on our site.

In my 1.5 years at MySpace as the SVP of Customer Experience and Operations, our team has revamped our entire user help experience with updates including a new homepage, layout and navigation, new search technology that makes it easier for users to find what they’re looking for and updated FAQs. We’ve also added help videos so users can see how to use our products on MySpace. For example, we posted a tutorial on how to sync your MySpace and Twitter accounts and how to create and share music on MySpace. The re-launch of MySpace Help decreased customer contacts to us by more than 100,000 each month!

I’m excited to announce that respected tech influencer Sean Percival has joined MySpace as its new Director of Content Socialization, effective immediately. In this new role, Sean will partner with MySpace’s Editorial and Content teams to increase visibility and traffic across the site. He’ll help lead the charge to create compelling social experiences for MySpace users by developing new and alternative ways to leverage social media activities. Sean will be based in MySpace headquarters in Beverly Hills and report to me.

As someone who has immersed himself in Social Media since its inception, Sean is an ideal fit for this role. His passion and expertise lies at the intersection of content and Social Media, and he has previously performed content related roles at Tsavo Media and Mahalo. Sean also has an extensive history with MySpace – an early adopter, he was one of the first 3,000 users to setup a profile, and one of the original proponents of social media marketing. He spent the early days of the social media boom helping brands and personalities maximize their exposure on MySpace, eventually sharing this knowledge and experience in his book MySpace Marketing: Creating a Social Network to Boom Your Business (QUE Publishing).