News Corporation reportedly courts US rapper 50 Cent with $300M offer to join the MySpace Label.

Hmm, something tells me, this is not true.

For one, even when the music business was a good one (was it ever?), Murdoch wisely stayed away from it.  Notice that when News Corp. paid $580M for Intermix - parent of MySpace - it was largely to increase exposure to music’s upside without exposing himself to the negatives of the trade.

MySpace has wisely leveraged its musical assets (content, artists’ reliance, etc.) but that only makes sense for up and coming bands… I cannot imagine Murdoch paying $300M to an artist.  He would probably use that to buy more assets, especially with his arch-nemesis Sumner Redstone plunking down $1.8B for CNET, owner of MP3.com and Gamespot.com… meaning that between Last.fm/MP3 and Gamespot, Redstone is firmly locking horns with Murdoch’s MySpace and IGN.com/Gamespy.

Why is the 50 Cent deal so crazy?

The rumored branding agreement would also dwarf the size of the $120m offer that in October enticed Madonna to leave her longtime Warner Brothers record label for concert promoting company Live Nation.

Yeah, don’t count on this… though crazier things have happened in the music bizness.