UK Court Serves Injunction Over Twitter

Order means days of spoof Twitter accounts may be numbered

(NEWSER) - Britain's High Court has delivered what's believed to be the first-ever injunction served via Twitter. An anonymous Twitter user who created a spoof account called "Blaney's Blarney" using the photo of lawyer and right-wing blogger Donal Blaney has been sent a message via the site telling him to stop posting, remove his earlier posts, and identify himself to the court. More»

It may be the first time social-networking popularity has been a job requirement

(NEWSER) - For possibly the first time, an active Twitter following is a job requirement, the Telegraph reports. Best Buy asked that candidates for a senior marketing position at the company’s Minnesota headquarters have at least 250 followers for their Twitter pages. The posting also lists “1 year of active blogging experience” as a requirement, along with more conventional marketing experience. More»

Site can be used for targeted, effective networking

(NEWSER) - If you’re unemployed, the right attention on Twitter could land you your next position. Forbes offers pointers on using the micro-blogging site for networking:

• Make sure your account name contains something about your profession, so your feed shows up when people search associated topics.
• Search for industry leaders and other people and companies in your field you’d like to know—some firms even post job openings on their feeds. Sign up to follow their tweets.

You can't have 'meaningful interaction' in 140 characters

(NEWSER) - Call him a rebel, but Farhad Manjoo wants Twitter to double the number of characters allowed in a tweet. To many users, that’s sacrilege. But on Twitter’s fifth anniversary, “the 140-character limit feels less like a feature than a big, obvious bug,” Manjoo writes on Slate . “Forcing people to shrink their updates to 140 characters prevents meaningful interaction between users, short-circuits conversations, and turns otherwise straightforward thoughts into a bewildering jumble of txtese.” More»

Celebs making up to $50K per month pitching products to fans

(NEWSER) - American celebrities are raking in up to $50,000 a month for tweeting on behalf of brands. A single shout-out from 50 Cent or Snoop Dogg, for instance, can earn them $5,000, finds the Sun . The pay-per-tweet model is now heading across the pond, and UK celebs won't be required to use "spon" or "ad" to mark paid tweets. A government official urged the country's famous folk to tweet responsibly: "If people don't reveal a tweet is paid for it could undermine fans' trust," he warns. (Click here to find out how not to be a jerk on Twitter.) More»