Technorati, the blog search engine with an identity crisis, is now set to become a blog. In an e-mail, Technorati said it would unveil its revamped mission in October.

“Beginning in October, Technorati will feature original content on the site written by bloggers just like you! This is an amazing opportunity to give your writing vast exposure, become known as an expert in your field/s of interest, and to join a vibrant writer community,” The Next Web quoted a Technorati note to bloggers. Soon afterwards, Technorati removed a contact page mentioned in the email, according to Tech Blorge.

What might be the reason for the change? Some believe the switch is designed to regain some of the thunder Google stole when it began indexing blogs.

“Search engines lap up original content, and with Google already counting 60,400+ links pointing to the Technorati domain, the site could rank highly for all sorts of fresh content. If Technorati can produce even semi-readable articles, it could see a linear increase in traffic over time,” wrote Mashable.

The question is will Technorati have any better luck than its previous incarnations.

For Twitter users fighting the 140-character limit, URL shorteners were the perfect answer. Instead of a long URL like http://www.problognews.com/google-kill-rss, you could shorten it to http://bit.ly/DKRwM. Now Twitter’s default URL shortener has cloned itself and dropped two characters. Now bit.ly users need only type j.mp.

This is a smart move. “They’ve now eliminated one of potential competitors advantages by offering as short a URL as possible,” write Adam Ostrow of Mashable.

That competition could come from other companies, including Google, looking to put their own brand on the burgeoning market for URL shortening services. In August, Automattic unveiled wp.me, a URL shortener for users of the WordPress.com blog service, for example.

Bit.ly, which has raised $2 million in funding, recently told the New York Times it’s links are clicked on at least 50 million times each week.

New numbers seem to fly in the face of current wisdom. Blogging still beats Twitter in terms of benefit for employees, as well as customers. A survey of 1,700 executives found 43 percent felt blogs provided significant benefit for internal use. An even greater number – 51 percent – of business leaders said blogs benefitted outreach to customers and clients.

Real Simple Syndication (RSS), the technology used to distribute blog posts and other news, was also seen as beneficial to business.

“That’s 24% more than those who see any benefit from microblogging (i.e. Twitter),” wrote Steven Walling of ReadWriteWeb.

In recent months, a number of voices have pronounced RSS virtually dead with Twitter dancing on the grave.

“It’s time to get completely off RSS and switch to Twitter. RSS just doesn’t cut it anymore,” Steve Gillmore wrote in a May 5 piece entitled ‘Rest in Peace, RSS.’ The recent news that former FeedBurner CEO Dick Costolo (now with Google) would join Twitter as COO only seem to confirm that view.

Gillmore and others argue Google Reader helped kill RSS by disconnecting audiences from blogs. Rather than going to blogs and using RSS, you simply entered the website name and the articles appeared in full-text, surrounded by a Google-created atmosphere of ads and targeted links.

[Via ReadWriteWeb, Steve Gillmore and McKinsey]

Dick Costolo, Twitter's New COO. (Photo: PaidContent)

There may be other reasons for the move, such as previous financial ties.

“This is the old gang reuniting,” writes Staci Kramer, co-editor of PaidContent.org. Costolo invested in Twitter in 2007. Union Square Ventures, another Twitter backer, also financially supported Feedburner.

Baker in a post entitled “Twitter is the New RSS”, believes Costolo would provide the tools Twitter needs to offer something akin to Google Analytics for companies tracking the effectiveness of their micro-blogging campaigns.

[Via Search Engine Watch and PaidContent]

In a sign of its growing popularity, StickTwits Tuesday launched StockTwits Desktop. The Adobe Air-based application employs the familiar TweetDeck appearance – which isn’t a coincidence since StockTwits co-founder Howard Lindzon is a TweetDeck investor.

Lindzon told TechCrunch he envisions his new desktop application as a “Social Bloomberg” or the “Facebook of Finance.” Bloomberg Terminals, a mainstay with Wall Street traders, costs $2,000 per month while Facebook is the largest social network with more than 250 million users.

StockTwits allows Twitter users to follow stock-related news by including companies’ ticker symbol ($AAPL, for Apple, for instance). The service has been included in TweetDeck since February 2009. The inclusion followed a $500 million investment by a group including Lindzon. StockTwits Desktop essentially creates a separate application for StockTwits users.

Among the features: creation of specific trading groups. Private messages can be exchanged between group members without being part of the general Twitter traffic. The desktop application also includes a Web browser, allowing people to click on StockTwits links and never exiting the Desktop.

Download StockTwits Desktop.

[Via Mediabistro and TechCrunch]

Will Twitter’s “fail whale”, the screen the pops up when the microblogging service groans under incredible traffic, make fewer appearances? NTT America, which hosts Twitter traffic, said Monday it is opening a new 15,000-square foot facility.

In 2008, Twitter traffic rose 752 percent, prompting NTT COO Kazuhiro Gomi to remark in June that “Twitter is getting so big, it’s basically eating up a lot of our data center network resources.” The problem was the skyrocketing Twitter traffic was putting a squeeze on other NTT customers sharing the server space.

It’s still unclear how quickly the new resources will be available. In August, Twitter addicts spent hours twiddling their thumbs after a denial-of-service attack halted the service.

[Via WebNewser and TechCrunch]

Pro Blogging News has been revived after a short hibernation. I feel there is a need for serious inside business reporting on the blog and social media sector. While many traditional news outlets have come to realize the importance of blogging and blog readers, the majority of bloggers tend to ignore blogging business, viewing the information not ’sexy’ enough, without controversy and downright boring.

But blogging has matured. People are reading blogs for information. This means the inane ramblings have moved elsewhere (such as Twitter). It also means readers expect more, including “actionable” information they can use in their personal or business life. A “blog” can be small or large, but it is far from its initial use as a simple log of personal activity.

Likewise, the blogging arena is a multimillion dollar economy with venture capitalists, staid media moguls and small time publishers involved. It is less of a Wild West where anyone can stake a claim and make a killing. A definite ‘food-chain’ has developed, similar to other Internet businesses, such as search.

Because blogging has changed, so has Pro Blogging News. You won’t find blogging soap operas or traffic tips or how to make a million overnight. Rather, there are a few core areas PBN will watch: blog networks, blog advertising, blog acquisitions and blog management trades. We’ll also look at trends when they affect the business of blogging.

Electronics giant Sony is attempting to woo male bloggers, offering video cameras and DVD players in exchange for hopefully favorable reviews, the New York Times reports. The effort is just the latest by companies which see popular bloggers as a marketing bonanza.

Sony stresses its three-month trial offers Handy-Cams and Blu-ray video players on loan, not as a gift in exchange for rosy reviews. The marketing test comes as the FTC begins investigating previous attempts by marketers to influence the ever-growing popularity of bloggers for specific audiences. Attracting ‘Daddy Bloggers’ may help Sony and other electronics sellers the way programs aimed at ‘Mommy Bloggers’ try to sway the buying power of women.