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"Twitter may be a toddler in terms of age, but when it comes to purpose the microblogging site has managed to become the most useful utility for keeping up with news and hot topics as they happen.\nTwitter is coming of age right before our eyes, and more and more people outside the immediate web/tech bubble are starting to respect the platform as more than just a flash in the pan. As such, we think it's important to zoom out from the actual status updates and start looking at some of the larger trends surfacing around Twitter. \nIn this post we'll examine how Twitter has changed the nature of search and created demand for real-time search engines. We'll also explore why Verified Accounts matter, how savvy marketers are engineering Twitter trends, the nature of sponsored tweets and what's to come, and the relevance of Twitter chat in third-party applications. This list is by no means exhaustive, but it encapsulates 5 important Twitter trends to keep your eye on right now.\n1. Real-Time Search Engines\nBy now, many of us have come to appreciate the importance of real-time search. In fact, even Google has admitted that they're behind the curve in supporting the demand for real-time social search.\nMashable's own Ben Parr previously explored whether or not real-time is the future of the web. Here's a snippet from his post where he describes implications around this trend:\n\nThis trend brings up two very important questions. First, is the Web going to become more and more of a real-time phenomenon, where speed matters most of all? Secondly, is it sustainable? And finally, can we filter the information so that it does not overwhelm?\nOn the first question: the trend seems to be towards real-time. As long as demand for information exceeds supply, faster information will be valued by our society. Faster social tools and new innovations make real-time Internet possible.\nThe answer to the second question is the most difficult one to answer. We can only read and listen to so much at a time. There may very well be a tipping point where we have to find a way to quell the information flow, but as long as the Web technology exists, real-time will continue to move forward.\n\nWe can assume the demand isn't going anywhere, and as such there are a bunch of companies that have picked up on the fact that Twitter does a poor job at organizing the real-time stream of information into consumable bits. Real-time search engines are starting to pop up left and right, and each of them are tackling the organization of links and content in slightly different forms.  In fact, we recently learned that Google may be building one of its own.\n\nTwo companies to keep your eye on in this space are OneRiot and Tweetmeme. Both Twitter search engines organize information around links being shared to get an aggregate view of what people are talking about right now. This data is key for brands and a myriad of professionals who are tracking online conversations.\nTweetmeme is fast becoming the defacto way to measure penetration in the Twittersphere, and they're search offering takes Twitter search to the next level with deep link search (they crawl the page you link to, index it, and add it to the database).  OneRiot's also innovating by way of their API, which lets third-party apps like Nambu give real-time search to application users, which means more advanced search capabilities on your terms.\nAlso don't take your eye off of Veoh's Video Compass, which is seeing massive uptake as users clamor to add video results to their Twitter search. Trust us, there are a number of big industry players who want access to the information that Veoh's capturing on real-time search and its applications to video.\nTrendrr, on the other hand, should be in your list of bookmarked sites, not because of real-time search, but because of what it can do for tracking your Twitter (and other social media sites) related campaigns. Their nifty embeddable graphs can bring real insight to what matters for brands and businesses looking to measure info like hashtag tweet volume over time.\nDisclosure: Trendrr CEO Mark Ghuneim is a guest writer for Mashable.\n2. Verified Accounts\nIn case you missed it, we broke the story that Twitter launched their Verified Accounts program on Thursday night. Right now, they've limited verification to celebrities, musicians, athletes, actors, and public officials or agencies.\n\nSo why does this matter? There are a number of reasons, first and foremost we know that celebrity impersonation on Twitter has been a growing a problem that reached a climax with the Tony LaRussa lawsuit. There's little question that this legal dustup encouraged Twitter to speed up the release of Verified Accounts. \nVerified Accounts essentially limit Twitter's liability and add more credibility to the social network as whole. As more and more newbies sign up, that little stamp of authenticity could prove to be pretty important for both the authentic account holders and Twitter itself.\nMore importantly, though, Verified Accounts have yet to be released for businesses (though you can fill out this form), who desire Twitter's seal of approval just as much as celebs. We believe that Twitter is reserving verification on this category of user because they're developing paid business Twitter services as part of their monetization strategy. Verified Accounts could become an incentive of a larger suite of analytics and services that ensure Twitter's financial survival in the years to come.\n3. Trending Twitter Giveaways\n\nAs we reported earlier this week, Squarespace effectively managed to secure the top spot among Twitter trends with their semi-deceptive iPhone 3G S giveaway. Even though they weren't actually giving out iPhones, just gift cards, Squarespace managed to gain a ton of attention because the contest entry had one small caveat: you must tweet with the hashtag #squarespace. That combined with the hype around the new iPhone was enough to inspire a smattering of tweets.\nOf course Squarespace isn't the first to do Twitter giveaways. In fact back in March, Maggiano's had a brilliant strategy for gaining new followers. The Italian restaurant was offering up $100 gift cards for tweeting to follow them. They too were incredibly successful at engineering a viral Twitter campaign.\nEven recording artists are hip to the viral potential of Twitter giveaways. Earlier this month we saw Travis Barker and DJ-AM give away a free download of a mixtape in exchange for a tweet with the hashtag #trvsdjam.\nEven though these types of campaigns have the potential to annoy a subset of Twitterers, we're likely to see many more in the coming months simply because they work and the formula is easy to repeat. Hot giveaway + Twitter + hashtag = trending topic. It's almost a no-brainer.\n4. Sponsored Tweets\nSure this trend raises a few eyebrows and can cause quite a stir, but the reality is the onslaught of sponsored conversations on Twitter is just getting started.\n\nThere are different types of sponsored tweets, and some efforts seem more legitimate than others, but as long as people can effectively monetize their twitter stream, they will. There are a few companies like Magpie, TwittAd, and adCause who have essentially created Twitter ad networks so that advertisers and Twitterers can find each other. We've also seen a sponsored hashtag campaign via Land Rover and a major cable network go so far as to hire a well-known member of their fan community to officially tweet on behalf of the show.\nWhile sponsored Twitter conversations aren't exactly new, IZEA's pending Sponsored Tweets platform is likely to make this a hot topic and important trend worth watching. The best practices in this space are still being defined - tweet disclosure isn't proving to be satisfactory - so the next few months should prove to be especially educational.\n5. Twitter Chat\n\n\n\n\nThere's no doubt that Twitter is a powerful communication platform, and it's quickly becoming the must support social site for other web services. The power of adding Twitter conversations to an application is luring sites like Justin.tv and Ustream to upgrade their standard chat features to bring in bigger audiences.\nIn the case of Justin.tv, they've integrated with Twitter to allow video viewers to see all the tweets coming from Twitter users in the channel, so tweets about the video appear in the chat area. Ustream followed suit with a full blown redesign and Twitter chat functionality. Ustream's Twitter chat is an additional chat area where Twitterers can log in with their Twitter credentials to participate in a Twitter stream with other viewers.\nAnd if you've been paying extra attention to our @mashable Twitter account, you may have noticed that we're doing a Twitter chat of our own. The Mashable Lounge, which is officially launching this week (though we've been actively load testing it), is our new place for live video and text chats.\nTinychat built us a custom application that supports up to 12 video broadcasters (we'll use this for Mashable staff and guests), and a chat room that's fully integrated with Twitter. You can log in with your Twitter credentials and tweet your chat responses to Twitter. We're really excited by the possibilities, so keep a look out for #mashchat tweets.\nMore Twitter Resources from Mashable\n- 10 Twitter Tools to Organize Your Tweeps- Local Tweets: 9 Ways to Find Local Twitter Users in Your Town- Everything I Need to Know About Twitter I Learned in J School- HOW TO: Create Custom Twitter Backgrounds- 10 Ways to Share Music on Twitter- HOW TO: Find a Job on Twitter"^^<http://www.w3.org/2001/XMLSchema#string>
<http://mashable.com/2009/06/14/twitter-trends-3/>