Twitter founders Ev Williams and Biz Stone have hinted at SxSW this week that they are planning to expand their micro-blogging platform with a new service called @anywhere. Though the pair will not completely reveal the service until their own developer conference in April, their media session in Texas and the company blog reveal a few snippets of information.

By inserting just "a few lines of javascript" to a website, it seems that the @anywhere service will allow surfers to send tweets from the page they are visiting, without being re-directed back to Twitter.com.

"We've developed a new set of frameworks for adding this Twitter experience anywhere on the web. Soon, sites many of us visit every day will be able to recreate these open, engaging interactions providing a new layer of value for visitors without sending them to Twitter.com," Stone said on the company blog.

The service will initially be introduced to a few "big" sites that include Amazon, AdAge, Bing, Citysearch, Digg, The Huffington Post, Meebo, MSNBC.com, eBay, The New York Times, Salesforce.com, Yahoo!, and YouTube.

"Imagine being able to follow a New York Times journalist directly from her byline, tweet about a video without leaving YouTube, and discover new Twitter accounts while visiting the Yahoo! home page" Stone continued. "And that's just the beginning. Twitter has proven to be compelling in a variety of ways. With @anywhere, web site owners and operators will be able to offer visitors more value with less heavy lifting."

Expect more on this come Twitter's April developer conference.

The BBC is said to be spending thousands and thousands of license-fee payer's money by sending their staff on courses teaching how to use social networks such as Facebook and Twitter, The Sun newspaper has revealed.

It's enraged not only those dismayed to hear the BBC's cost-cutting plans to axe 6 Music and the Asian Network, but also the staff themselves, many of whom see the courses as an unnecessary expense.

"We're meant to be belt-tightening. It's an astonishing waste of money," one sound engineer remarked."Teenagers who can barely read or write have managed to teach themselves."

The day-long"Making the Web Work for You" lessons cost £100 a time. Cut them along with Chris Moyles and you'd have more than enough to save 6 Music, by my calculations.

Via: The Sun

It's been on the cards for a while, but Twitter has finally added geo-location features within Twitter.com. Users can now opt in to have the Tweets they send from the website attach location-based information to their micro-blogging messages.

While users of third-party apps like Foursquare and Tweetie have been able to enjoy the benefits of location features for some time now, this is the first time Twitter themselves have entered the geo-tagging fray. With location based features set to be a big trend this year, and with Facebook looking to roll out their own location features next month it, looks as though Twitter are trying to get one step ahead of the game.

In terms of the how the new feature itself works, its a pretty simple add-on. After agreeing to share your location information (which may be a little too easy to do, particularly for kids) a small location icon will appear next to each tweets byline. Clicking it will bring up Google Maps, displaying your location.

What do you think of Twitter's latest additions? The future of communications? Or a security worry that you've thus far avoided with Foursquare et al?

Let us know.

Twitter has hit the 10,000,000,000th tweet milestone. The massive figure was reached at around 1am GMT on March 5th. The news comes just five months after the micro-blogging site hit the 5 billion tweets mark.

To put into perspective how quickly Twitter is growing, tracking site GigaTweet predicts it will only be 200 days until Twitter gets its 20 billionth tweet.

If you we're hoping to read this famous 10 billionth tweet, you're out of luck I'm afraid; the user who made the post has their page set to private. Still, if you're interested, here's the 9,999,999,999th tweet.

Google have entered the social networking fray with their new Buzz network. It's not the first time they've tried their hand at social networking (their Orkut network has a very respectable 100 million users), but by integrating it into their Gmail service they already have an installed user-base of 170 million, a figure that completely dwarfs Twitter's audience.

From Google's point of view, a land-grab on the social networking scene is a no brainer. Though they now have access to the Twitter pipeline, it's near impossible to monetise through advertising, while the 400 million users of Facebook and all their user-created content also eludes their clutches. Buzz offers Google more pages to advertise through and further information to be mined on their users.

For an in-depth look at Google Buzz's features, check this post by Tech Digest's Ashley Norris.

It's not a completely cynical move by Google however; Buzz does have some nice features, particularly on mobile devices. For instance, if public status updates are posted on a mobile, they not only become searchable, but are also geo-tagged by your current location thanks to integrated Google Maps support. If perchance Brad Pitt and Angelina Jolie took a low-key trip to your local Lidl, you could post a quick update and get all of your nearby friends to descend on the scene, cameras and autograph books in hand without the need for messaging each individually and dishing out directions. Sure, Foursquare may have got their first, but it'll be a great way to quickly find out everything going on in your locality, giving it one over Facebook whilst on the move.

The problem lies with attracting new users to the service. While 170 million potential Buzzers (I may well have just coined a new term there!) is a massive figure, it's got a fair bit of catching up to do if it plans on competing with Facebook's 400 million users. While it's easy for Gmail users to jump right in, there will be many groaning at the thought of managing yet another network and separate email account to access it, myself included. I wouldn't call myself a dyed-in-the wool Hotmail user, but to me juggling one personal and one work email is quite enough, thank you very much.

For instance, if you've got a blinged out Myspace page with 8 billion friends, all your drunken holiday snaps posted and (unfortunately) tagged on Facebook, and are secretly stalking Ashton Kutcher's geo-tagged posts on Twitter, can you be bothered with the rigmarole of establishing yourself all over again on a new network?

I mean, seriously, how many status streams do we need to be connected to? Rather than being the definitive online social space it's really just a mish-mash, "Frankenstein's monster" of all the best bits from Facebook and Twitter. It's not really bringing people together in any new way, it's just further diluting people's interactions across yet another network.

This may sound a little fascistic, but surely the world would be better connected on just the one single network rather than spread thinly over several? I'm all for choice, but when it's just between a series of cookie-cutter clones, I'm starting to think my time would be better spent socialising the old fashioned way; a meet up down the pub with a few friends...organised through a Facebook event, of course.

First Google, now Twitter is standing up against this latest wave of web censorship. The brains behind the micro-blogging phenomenon have revealed that they are looking into ways to protect Twitter from Big Brother's uncomfortable gaze.

Speaking at the World Economic Forum, Twitter's chief executive Evan Williams spoke of Twitters resilience.

"We are partially blocked in China and other places and we were in Iran as well," Evans said to event's collected press.

"The most productive way to fight that is not by trying to engage China and other governments whose very being is against what we are about."

Though he didn't detail how Twitter plan to defend themselves, he did cryptically allure to "technological ways" to blinker would be attackers. More news on this as it becomes available.

Remember all those You've Been Framed clips of dogs playing the piano? Well that was just the beginning; thanks to Mattel's Puppy Tweets collar tag, your dog is about to enter the online world of social networking and Twitter. No, seriously.

First of all, you have to make a Twitter account for little Rex (stay with me here). You then clip the tag onto your dogs collar, which packs in both motion and sound sensing technology. The device then reads and categorises what your pet is up to, and sends it to the dog's Twitter account. Then you, smug dog owner person, sit back and marvel as the pooch tweets such dignified observations as "YAHOOOOOOOOO! Somedays you just gotta get your bark on" or "I finally caught that tail I've been chasing and...OOUUUCHH!"

This isn't exactly going to change the minds of those who still "don't get" Twitter yet. But can you think of an anymore zealous a group of animal lovers than dog owners? It'll sell like hotcakes, though I don't much fancy an army of Rovers following my feed.

And surely a "Budgie Tweets" collar would have been more appropriate? Hmmm...Excuse me while I just go file a patent...

The world's richest man and founder of Microsoft, Bill Gates has finally joined Twitter. With a nod to his programming roots, he kicked off proceedings with a first tweet of "hello world".

There have been plenty of fake accounts set up in his name, but this one finally looks like the real deal, having been confirmed by Twitter's own Caroline Mizumoto.

Looking to follow him? Look up the Microsoft main-man at @BillGates.

But who is Gates following?! Ashley Tisdale and Ashton Kutcher are among his followed, as well as numerous charities and news sites.

Having retired from his top post at Microsoft, Gates now focuses on his philanthropic work with the Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation.

TWITTER HAS BEEN BANNED...well for some well known sportsmen at least. No this isn't the latest clampdown from communist China, it's the Premiership's very own Manchester United riling against social networking.

The football club have taken control of Twitter accounts belonging to Ryan Giggs, Darren Fletcher and Wayne Rooney, while Facebook accounts for Rio Ferdinand, Wes Brown and again Ryan Giggs have also been commandeered.

A message on the club's site hammers home the new attitude to web networking. "The club wishes to make it clear that no Manchester United players maintain personal profiles on social networking websites. Fans encountering any web pages purporting to be written by United players should treat them with extreme skepticism."

Rio Ferdinand still seems to have an official looking Myspace page available. If anyone's interested in either Ferdinand or Myspace anymore that is.

So why the clampdown? Players revealing club secrets? Unlikely; that's nothing that zealous fan sites don't eventually mine out anyway. More likely, the clubs want to ensure maximum traffic hits their own homepages. Why would fans go through a third-party when you can interact directly with the players themselves through social networks?

Still, some clubs aren't so fussy. Take Sunderland for instance; Darren Bent's Twitter account has 30,000 followers, and often reveals some interesting details about the player, including his struggles with former club Tottenham Hotspur.

The Consumer Electronics show, the behemoth of tech, the Valhalla of gadgetry, has come and gone for yet another year. But this time, rather than arriving with a bang, it slinked into sight with something more like a whimper.

CES 2010 had really had the wind knocked out of it before it had even got into the ring this year. All eyes were already on Apple and their rumoured Tablet in the run up to the event, despite the fact that Apple are traditionally a no-show at CES, instead planning their own top-secret unveiling at the end of January. Likewise, Google delivered a sucker-punch in the shape of the Nexus One, their flagship handset revealed at their own event on the eve of CES 2010's opening.

To make matter's worse, Microsoft's opening keynote speech (delivered by walking personality drain Steve Ballmer) was pretty darn dull. First a power cut, then a load of waffle on the 2 month old Windows 7, Ballmer hardly seemed to be trying to keep our attention. Though the Christmas release date for Project Natal was welcome news, it revealed nothing new about the device, whilst the partnership with Hewlett Packard for the new Slate device seemed merely like a case of keeping-up with the Joneses. Or should that be the Jobs-es?

But the Las Vegas event wasn't without its highlights. Far from it in fact. Maybe it's the recession, or the generally pocket-pinching mood in the air these days, but for once the most sought after tech wasn't in the realms of dreamy aspiration, but was actually fairly affordable.

Take for instance the brand new 3D TVs on show, of which the Sony BRAVIA XBR-52HX900 (video above, courtesy of Ashley) was the pick of the litter. Finally shaping up to the standards set by its cinema siblings, company reps promised that the average 3D TV will cost little more than a top-end Full HD set. Skype and video calling in many TV sets too will help turn your living room into somewhere the Jetsons could only dream of.

E-readers are also looking to be both big and affordable in 2010. As a comic book fanatic I'd have liked to have seen more attempts at a colour screened e-reader (I'm not including the MSI offering, which is really just a dual-touch screened PC, super-cool as it is). Plastic Logic's Que Pro e-reader looked great though, with a massive, durable screen, and was far lighter than the hundreds of books you'd be able to store on the tabloid-sized device.

There were, of course, tablets aplenty. The dual-booting Viliv P3 may be an underdog in the category, but seemed way more exciting than Microsoft's offering. The offer of both Windows and Android on the same device showed a respect for user choice not often seen in the back-slapping world of consumer tech.

There was still time for fun too. The Parrot AR Drone Quadricopter was fun and fresh, combining real-world toys with augmented reality controls. A little less high-tech but full of retro-chic was the Lasonic i931 iPhone dock/ghetto blaster mash-up. Odd's on its at the top of Flava Flav's Christmas list. And there was still some time for the weird and the plain old dumb, too.

Though less prevalent than other years, there were some great examples of brand new tech on show that were genuinely exciting. A real head-turner and my favourite item of the show was the Light Blue Optic Light Touch. Using a pico projection engine and a touch sensitive sensor, it'll turn any flat surface into a touchscreen. It works ridiculously well despite still being in the development stages, and has almost unlimited potential.

Some detractors say that, recession or not, CES looks to be on its last legs. It's sad, but not unlikely, when you consider the audiences that companies like Apple and Google can command for just a single product launch. However, for emerging companies like Light Blue Optics CES is still vital to gain some exposure, not to mention the fact that such a prominent date in the calendar forces the tech giants to have made some significant, competitive advances in their gear, year-on-year.

So here's hoping the old dog's got a bit of life left in it yet. Hopefully next year will kick off the recessionary cobwebs and kick the show back into high-tech gear. It wouldn't take much to tempt us back to the City of Sin once more.

Click here for full CES 2010 pre-show, day one, day two and day three round-ups.

An argument over Twitter may have lead to murder, the NY Daily News is reporting.

New York Police are accusing Jameg Blake, 22, of fatally wounding Kwame Dancy, also 22, on December 1st last year from a shotgun blast to the neck. Blake has pleaded not guilty.

Police are looking into subpoenaing Tweets sent by the pair prior to the incident, the first time such messages have been used as evidence in court.

Though the Harlem pair were once pals, the NY Daily news is reporting that Twitter proves their strained relationship:

"Hours before the shooting, Dancy may have taunted Blake with a tweet: "N---s is lookin for u don't think I won't give up ya address for a price betta chill asap!" ... Blake's Twitter account is also full of online disses, though only one tweet mentions Dancy by name: "R.I.P. Kwame" on Dec.3."

The victims mother Madeline Smith is also quoted, expressing her shock at the futility of the bad blood: "That's not a reason to shoot somebody, that's crazy. I don't know what's going on with that Twitter thing."

Another day, another Tech Digest CES 2010 round-up. Fancy Tweeting hands-free in your car or controlling your PC by breathing? Check today's top stories below and find out how.

Twitter coming to Ford cars
The digital equivalent of drink-driving?

Motorola announce Backflip Android Phone
Hinged smartphone is Motorola's big CES 2010 offering

Ion launch the iType full QWERTY keyboard add-on for the iPhone
Making the portable unwieldy

Vuzix demo Wrap 920AR Augmented Reality visor
Turning your trip to the shops into a scene out of Robocop

Zyxio's new breathing-based PC controller, the Sensawaft
Affordable accessibility gadget, perfect for disabled PC users

3D gaming headed to the Palm family
Apple isn't the only mobile now capable of some hardcore gaming action

Is the Viliv P3 the underdog tablet to look out?
Dual-booting tablet is looking very tasty indeed

Razer and Sixense bring motion gaming to the PC
But will it catch on within the incredibly competitive PC gaming peripheral market?

UK getting the Dell Mini 3i
Android phone hitting UK shores in the not-so-distant-future

Video- Armour Home Q2 Tilt Internet radio
Innovative and simple radio from Brit-based Armour

Video - "World's smallest Windows PC" the UMID M Book 1
It makes a gnat's bum look big. Well...not quite. But you get the idea

Video- Casio's Digital Art Frame
Making all those dodgy Facebook snaps look good

Video - The coolest retro iPhone hi-fi ever, Lasonic's i931
Bring 80's boom box street-chic bang up to date

Video - Toshiba's Cell TV that is controlled by hand gestures
Innovative tech, but it makes you look a bit of an idiot; not sure I want a work out in front of the telly

Video - Sony's BRAVIA XBR-52HX900 3D TV
Their flagship 3D set is a stunner

Video - Panasonic's 3D camera
Bet the adult-entertainment industry cant wait to get its mitts on this one

Click here for more CES 2010 coverage from Tech Digest

Tech Digest at CES is sponsored by Best Buy. For more CES stories and videos go here

If texting and driving is bad, surely Twitter in-car is the alcohol of motoring digital no-nos? That's not the case according to Ford's Chief Exceutive Alan Mulally, who confirmed Twitter will be integrated into their in-car Sync system, and that it will be done with the utmost attention to safety.

Ford claim that by using the Sync system to connect up to a 3G-enabled mobile, motorists will be able to keep their hand on the wheel and their focus on the road rather than handsets. There's also talk of voice-recognition input for tweeting, as well as having a sat-nav style voice read out incoming tweets to drivers.

US road safety group the AAA remain unconvinced however: "The more things that are going on in a vehicle, the more things that can distract a driver" a rep stated.

Via: Electric Pig

Click here for more CES 2010 coverage from Tech Digest

Tech Digest at CES is sponsored by Best Buy. For more CES stories and videos go here

INQ Mobile have compiled a list of those their research have found to be the most influential people in the Twitterverse.

Their relative influence was measured by counting the number of tweets they sent, the number of times they re-tweet others' updates, the number of times that person's updates have been re-tweeted and the number of times they are referenced in other people's tweets.

Here are the top 10 Twitterers of 2009:

1. Pete Cashmore, CEO at Mashable (1.8m followers), influence rating of
81.0
2. Stephen Fry, Entertainer (1.1m followers), influence rating of 76.8
3. Russell Brand, Entertainer (0.6m followers), influence rating of 69.1
4. Dougie Poytner, McFly band member (139k followers), influence rating
of 64.2
5. Tom Fletcher, McFly band member (175k followers), influence rating 60.6
6. Eddie Izzard, Entertainer (1.3m followers), influence rating of 55.2
7. Zee M Kane, Editor in Chief of The Next Web (21k followers), influence
rating of 47.0
8. Jonathan Ross, Entertainer (461k followers), influence rating of 44.8
9. Richard Bacon, DJ and presenter (1.2m followers), influence rating of
43.9
10.Peter Andre, Singer/Celebrity (390k followers), influence rating of 41.4

Elaine Quinn, spokesperson for INQ Mobile said, "Twitter has certainly been the word on everyone's lips in 2009 but nothing has dominated the conversation quite so much as the popularity contest between celebrities. In the UK we've become used to hearing stories about celebrities going head to head in the fight for followers with Stephen Fry publicly losing his lead to Eddie Izzard and Richard Bacon.

"However, it actually gets more interesting when you look at who has the most impact. Even though Richard Bacon now has more followers than Stephen Fry, Stephen still holds more influence to date."

Hats off to Peter Andre, bringing up the rear at number 10. That's got to be the first time his name and the word "influential" have ever appeared in the same sentence, surely?

Back in October, Twitter asked its users to help translate the site into over 70 new languages worldwide. With the Twitter translation project moving full-steam ahead, Italian Twitterers can now tweet away in their mother-tongue.

In a statement (translated by Google Translate) Twitter's Jenna Sampson said:
"We're excited because today with the launch of the Italian version of our site becomes even more a platform for global communication. As always, we wish to thank all the translators who have participated in the project and who have shown us their skills."

She continued: "Now that the conversations on Twitter are enriched with increasingly diverse viewpoints on a global level, the network information will continue to grow in every nook and crevice of the planet. More events will be shared more knowledge and awareness will spread and the millions of people that feed Twitter will affect millions of others with their tweet."

As well as English, Twitter can already be used in Spanish, French and Japanese.

To access the new Italian version of Twitter, access your account settings as select the language from the drop down menu.

Google has launched real-time search functions into its search engine today. Making Twitter feeds appear as part of search results, up-to-the-second information is now available from the search giant.

While currently only Twitter feeds have been implemented, updates from social networks Myspace and Facebook will dynamically be fed into searches from early in the new year.

"Information is being created at a pace I have never seen before and in this environment, seconds matter," said Google's Amit Singhal. "There is so much information being generated out there that getting you relevant information is the key to the success of a product like this. It's all about relevance, relevance, relevance."

With Microsoft's Bing search engine making ground on Google's search engine dominance, such a move was necessary for Google to stamp its authority onto the market. Google currently hold around 65% of the search engine market, with Bing trailing at 30%.

Google also launched Google Goggles for the Android platform. The tool allows users to upload images as part of a search, which are then compared to a database of other images in order to find relevant information.

"In the nature of computer vision we are at the beginning here and the technology is just getting underway," said Google's vice president of engineering Vic Gundotra, "this today marks the beginning of this visual journey. We are at the cusp of a an entire new computing era where devices will help us explore the world around us."

Via: BBC News

Twitter is, like, SO in right now. Don't believe us? Then just ask the folks over at Vogue Italia, who have dedicated a whole issue to the micro-blogging craze.

The December issue of the fashion bible has a cover montage made using TwitPics of famous models such as Christy Turlington, Natalia Voaianova and Gisele Bundchen, and includes a Twitter-styled editorial piece.

While the choice to go all out and devote a whole issue to Twitter is a tad unusual, Twitter does have its place in the fashion world. An ever growing platform for news, Twitter is becoming a great source for the fashion community to pick up on incoming trends and styles.

While social networks are certainly helping to make the world a smaller, more communal place, it can still be hard to pinpoint where in the world your contacts are located.

Twitter 360, a new app for the iPhone 3GS, makes use of geotagging to help find where all those messages from around the globe come from. While not a fully fledged Twitter client, Twitter 360 can use you iPhone's GPS and camera in tandem to direct a user to nearby Twitterers using on screen arrows and markers.

Geotagging of tweets has been done before (the Tweetie app springs to mind). However the augmented reality visuals are a nice touch, especially if they work as accurately as the above demo video suggests.

Pick up the app here, or for more information visit www.twitter-360.com.

In its annual round up of all things wordy, the Global Language Monitor has announced Twitter its word of the year for 2009.

It beats "Obama", "vampire" and timely entries such as "unemployed", "deficit" and "H1N1" to the top spot.

Top phrases are also calculated, and so it's unsurprising to see "King of Pop", the late Michael Jackson's moniker, heading that list.

Any suggestions for what could top the list next year? Tweet them to @techdigestnews or leave a message in the comments box below.

Via: Mashable

Seesmic is getting set to launch a Windows 7 optimised version of its popular Twitter app.

A fully functional client, the program uses a drag and drop interface to help users easily send posts and view aggregated replies, and will be the first time the program has been native to the Windows environment.

Windows Seesmic will let users:

• Manage posts from multiple twitter accounts
• View aggregated Home, Replies, Private and Sent columns.
• Create and save searches
• View your Twitter lists and create your own groups
• Create unlimited columns
• Enable choice of multiple image and url shortening services
• Manage notification of your messages.
• Drag and drop to add user lists
• Sleek and Smooth User Interface
• Increased performance
• Full panel Twitter user profile
• Tabbed view of Accounts and Twitter lists

You can pick up a preview version of Seesmic for Windows here.