The Twittermania has begun! If you're not interested in these, you'll at least want to see the YouTube video somewhere in this post. Though it might give you a headache.

-- First, Nielsen came out with a poll saying that 60% of those who sign up for the service abandon it. But if you read Mashable's account of it, the data doesn't account for people who stop going to the site in favor of apps such as TweetDeck.

I trust you all had good weekends! Here is another thrilling installment of interesting things I have seen in the past few days. If you have anything you’ve seen that you think is worth sharing with colleagues but are feeling too timid to post yourself, 1) you shouldn’t 2) you can send to me to include in next week’s version.

What do you do when you buy the wrong next big thing, AKA MySpace? Why, you buy the current next big thing: Twitter.
 
A piece on Newser.com claims that Rupert Murdoch is considering buying Twitter. What's the evidence?
- Jon Miller was hired last friday to run Fox Interactive.
- Miller is a new media guy, so why would he want to "run an old-line media company's dubious digital strategy?"
- Unless Rupes convinced him that News Corp is about to get aggresive in the digital market...
 
It's kind of a far jump. I'd see Rupes buying Digg first; giving how dedicated he is to the newspaper industry (see: purchase of The Wall Street Journal), Digg seems like a more relevant purchase (did you know when you digg a WSJ article, you don't need to deal with the pay wall?)
 

Here's a helpful resource for you tweeting pros: MediaOnTwitter. It's a free database of -- you guessed it -- media who have Twitter handles.

You can sort by beat, region, name or media outlet. Read more about it here, and start following more media. Now.

Since I don't really pitch at all, I wonder if this is something many of you would use, and for those of you who do pitch, how you'd recommend that others use it...

I swear, swear, SWEAR this will be my last Twitter post for awhile.

Microsoft-sponsored ExecTweets launched this week. It's an aggregate for CEOs and other C-level executives' Twitter feeds. If you follow the ExecTweets feed, you'll only get what they consider the best of the best, from folks like Mark Cuban, Richard Branson and others.

I'm not sure why, or how comfortable I am with Microsoft running the show at ExecTweets, but I continue to believe the person who nails how to aggregate all the Tweets is going to be a very rich person. (Or company.)

I have a bunch of posts percolating in my head for a while but still haven't had the time to write them. In their place, I give you links to some of the stories I saw last week that I think are worth sharing (but I can't drum up enough to say for a whole post). I'd love to have a regular "link love" segment on here, but I'm thinking through what it would be called (any clever alliterative terms besides "link love?" something with a K?) and what its focus would be (if it needs one).

Did anyone else hear about this freelance writer, Paul Smith, whose goal is to travel around the world in thirty days, utilizing the power of Twitter?  This journalist admits that he has combined his childhood dream to hitchhike with his love of social media.  He plans to use this experience to help raise money for charity.  He has promises to abide by five self-imposed rules:

1. Housing options are procured by Tweet alone.
2. He can only plan three days ahead.
3. Money is just for food and drink.
4. Must choose among Tweet offers within 48 hours.
5. Stuck with no transit help extended after two days? Mission over.

Smith told the New York Times, "Spend a while cultivating your Twitter account, and you could develop contacts in every time zone." 

Some other words of wisdom from Paul:

An interesting piece on CNET today examines who's "getting" Twitter right. Don Reisinger argues it's @Starbucks, @ComcastCares and @Zappos.

Don says Starbucks is a winner because, "I have sent messages to the Starbucks' profile, which, as it happens, is run by an employee of the company. The responses have thoughtful, forthright, and most importantly, human -- it doesn't stink of marketing rhetoric."

Similarly, Comcast is succeeding because the man behind ComcastCares is "using his power at the company as well as his forum on Twitter to help customers. Without that power, he would be just as useless as Comcast's customer service number.

So the lessons?

I spent much of my weekend -- get this! -- following Phish on Twitter. I know it's surprising, given my usual anti-Twitter ways. I think Phish has been very interesting in how it's used social media -- even though in the years of the Internets, the band has updated its site maybe three or four times.

Mind you, I am not a Phish fan, though I don't mind the music. It just so happens that my husband and his circle are. Collectively, they've been to hundreds of shows; I have been to less than five, I think.

Chances are good that you've seen this already, but no one has yet posted, so I'm jumping in. Skittles has thrown their brand to the wolves, updating their Web site so that nearly everything on it comes from a third party. Upon giving them your birthday (likely more to collect data than for security reasons) you're immediately placed on the Facebook fan page, with a small control panel in the upper left of your screen. Click "chatter" and you're taken over to Twitter to see all the "tweets" (I hate that word so much) that are tagged Skittles. Ask for product information and you're taken to the Wikipedia entry. As far as I can tell, the only piece that's still theirs is the "contact" section.

Or should it be, why should I Twitter? Because I am not a tweeter. And except for wanting to live-Tweet American Idol or Lost, I don't really desire to get on board. Though, I have to admit that I'm Twitter-curious.

I read and hear a lot about how companies are using Twitter in lots of ways. And even though this didn't happen because of Twitter, Tropicana is dropping its new packaging due to consumer complaints about it (even though focus groups were fine with the changes). This, and other instances (e.g., Motrin moms) have some industry folk suggesting that we use Twitter for focus groups.