This week Twitter announced a brand new web interface, packed full of new features. Over the next couple of weeks, we should all have access to the new version, complete with tabs, integrated media and quick profile viewing.

Many social media experts, including Mashable, believe this might spell the long-term end for a lot of Twitter desktop apps. Processor and memory-hungry desktop apps like Tweetdeck and Seesmic may well be concerned about losing users to the new web-based Twitter interface.

However, most power users choose desktop apps — or web-based sites like Hootsuite — to deal with a number of social media accounts at once. While the new interface will prove to be a pleasurable experience for checking your tweets, it won’t allow you to post across a number of accounts at the same time. Nor does it offer multiple user capabilities, analytics and connection to other social networks.

So Twitter hasn’t quite reached the point where it can compete with third party Twitter clients. But with this latest improvement, it’s moving a step closer. Watch this space.

What do you think about the new Twitter web interface? Will you be switching?

With a record number of companies pouring money into social media (eMarketer: Social media ad spend to hit $1.7 billion in 2010) we’re starting to see some really interesting viral campaigns popping up all over the place. Think back over the last year, which campaigns have been the most memorable?

Old Spice is by far one of the most popular video virals of the year, thanks to a humorous approach and a quick response to requests on Twitter. According to the Social Times, the campaign received 5.9 million YouTube views in the first day, 20 million by day three and 40 million by the end of the first week. By creating a series of speedy follow ups, the brand extended the popularity of the viral and spread their campaign across both Twitter and Facebook. The brand’s Twitter following increased by 2700% and their Facebook interaction rose by 800%. Traffic to OldSpice.com increased by 300%.

Social advertising

By embracing YouTube, Old Spice have changed the image of their brand and products, proving to be a step ahead of their competitors. The company has since reported that their sales are up by 107%, elevating their position to become the number one brand for men’s body wash

Other YouTube-based virals include the recent Tippex campaign, where the viewer directs the result of the video, and the recent trailers for The Expendables, which resulted in Stallone jumping out of his video to shoot down all the related videos.

Interactive movie trailers

Movie companies in particular have added YouTube to their social media strategy. Unsurprisingly, the release of The Social Network (a film tracking the meteoric rise of Facebook founder, Mark Zuckerberg)has led to an interactive video trailer (or an i-Trailer), featuring facts and social media mentions about the film when you click on the video. The ironic thing? According to Pocket-Lint, the film about Facebook debuted its trailer on….MySpace.

What do businesses have in common with Terry Jones, the religious extremist whose plan to burn Korans on his front lawn could have ignited a religious war?

Nothing at all obviously. And yet…

From everything that has been written about him since he started first made his inflammatory declarations, Jones is clearly a pathological attention seeker. Miffed at not getting the respect he thought was his due, he stepped onto the world stage and with a single tweet set in motion an extraordinarily effective campaign, fuelled by a Facebook page and YouTube clips.

Within days he had the whole world in the palm of his hand, the headline topic in the press and on television, with earnest appeals to him being made by President Obama, Secretary of State Hillary Clinton, Gen. David Petreaus, Pope Benedict XVI, etc, etc.

It’s a sobering reminder of the extraordinary power of the Internet to spread information in the blink of an eye. The mainstream media at first loftily ignored Jones, but was forced eventually to report his campaign – the perfect amplification.

Businesses too need attention to survive. Of course they aren’t pathological, and they don’t have to be inflammatory in their statements – it would be counterproductive. And clearly Jones tapped into a deep stream of paranoia in the American public psyche. Companies just sell stuff.

But the point is, the mechanism for achieving rapid awareness of their products and services is there, as long as they understand how to make use of it. All they need is something that people will genuinely respond to, and with a bit of understanding of how social media works, the rest will take care of itself.

Facebook Pages have gradually grown over the last year, offering more and more features to customise your page. The leading social network is usually fairly wary about allowing users to customise their experience, so the introduction of the Facebook language FBML is an interesting one.

With FBML, you can create your own landing page, with clickable links and images. We’ve already looked at Facebook shopfronts last week and, in theory, you can replicate the majority of your blog or website on your Facebook page.

So, what’s stopping you? Well, at the moment FBML is still fairly basic. Templates with Flash are hard to come by, leaving the pages looking a little flat. You’re also at the mercy of the Facebook server, which has its many issues. The majority of pages are static too, meaning regular updates are time-consuming to edit and upload.

However, it will be interesting to see where Facebook go with Pages in the future. With more flexibility and ease of use, this function could prove to be a contender for those wanting a more simple blog.

Could Facebook change the whole future of blogs? A social networking service offering full blogging capabilities would be an interesting concept indeed, but will they be the first to take that step?

What do you think?