In their announcement of their SXSW plans, Hootsuite announced their integration of location-based juggernaut Foursquare, as well as faux-social-network-turned-music-self-promotion-clusterf*** Myspace!

This, no doubt, is not a coincidental timing considering the huge amount of checkins expected at SXSW this year. The location-based service also gives special badges for specific events.

The integration of MySpace probably didn’t happen because of the slowing traffic to it, it’s non-linear layout (that makes it different to capture feeds,) and the overwhelming majority of under-15-year-olds on the site. It may have missed the social media mobile power-user demographic by a decade.

Anyway – good news all around!

Also, here’s a blurb about what Hootsuite have planned for SXSW:

Are you headed to Austin for the massive interactive media, film, and music conference? Track us down to get your hands on some collectible cultural swag. We’re also hosting Hoot-ups, giving demos and exploring the streets with the Owl in tow. Find us via the #hootsxsw hashtag plus this handy SXSW Twitter list.

You don’t have to be on the ground in Texas to enjoy the fun – just add Foursquare and MySpace to your HootSuite social networks and learn locals-only tips and/or find where your favorite band is playing next – right from your beloved dashboard.

That ain’t all – Marketing and stats enthusiasts take note that the custom URL parameters tool was enhanced in this release along with a batch of bug fixes and performance enhancements. Learn more about this release on the HootSuite blog.

Skype will be releasing Android and Blackberry apps in March of this year!

Skype, along with Verizon Wireless, will be releasing the apps to many of Verizon’s devices including the BlackBerry Storm 9530, Storm2 9550, Curve 8330, Curve 8530, 8830 World Edition and Tour 9630 smartphones, as well as DROID by Motorola, DROID ERIS by HTC and Motorola DEVOUR.

Skype have listed the features the app will have. Among others, the features include:

Below is a video of Skype CEO Josh Silverman and Russ Shaw, VP and GM of Skype’s mobile division talking about the new collaboration:

According to TechCrunch, Facebook’s Chamath Palihapitiya of Facebook just finished a short speech about Facebook’s mobile strategy. Nothing mindblowing – but he did leave us with Facebook Zero – a text-only site for mobile carriers.

Robin Wauters of TechCrunch said that Chamath didn’t dwell on it too long – but the gist of it is that the site will be free to users as long as it’s text-only. “If a user then decides to switch from text-only to multimedia (e.g. view photos from their friends), mobile operators can start charging them for ‘premium’ data service.”

This is, apparently, a teaser to get more people to adopt social networking on mobile phones.

AppBoy.com has launched it’s Social Network aimed to connect end users and developers.

The goal of the Social Network is something that’s been long in the coming. It allows end users with ideas about Apps to suggest their ideas for a chance to win $250 if their idea is voted for and carried out.

App Developers would use the site to get inspiration, and promote their own already-developed apps.

“AppBoy was developed to help developers get their apps discovered and to help users navigate through the thousands of available apps to find the ones they like,” says Thorren Koopmans, Director of Operations for AppBoy.

The big news about this is that AppBoy has partnered with Best Buy Mobile as its sole provider of mobile apps for all platforms. That’ll definitely give them some leverage in creating traction in their first couple of days.

Check it out! www.appboy.com

Intel and Nokia have created a new mobile OS called Meego. Meego will be an open-source mobile operating system. The versatile OS will, according to the Nokia blog, work across a huge range of devices – mobile computers, netbooks, tablets, mediaphones, connected TVs and in-vehicle infotainment systems. The open-source platform will be hosted by the Linux Foundation, and they expect it will be adopted by many device manufacturers. The OS itself is supposed to hit devices sometime later this year.

Here’s Nokia CEO Olli-Pekka Kallasvuo’s statement about MeeGo:

“MeeGo will drive an even wider range of Internet computing and communication experiences for consumers, on new types of mobile devices. Through open innovation, MeeGo will create an ecosystem that is second to none, drawing in players from different industries. It will support a range of business models across the value chain, building on the experience and expertise of Nokia, Intel and all those who will join us. Simply put, MeeGo heralds a new era of mobile computing.”

According to the blog, MeeGo is designed to be “open in every way”. They’ve combined the best of Maemo and Moblin, have taken their developer communities to it, and considered the new mobile ecosystem. The result will deliver a “range of experiences for users, including internet-based, computing, communications, multitasking and multimedia.”

One big feature they’re stressing here is the fluidity of media and applications from one device to another.

UPDATE: Nokia and Intel will have a live Q&A session about MeeGo on Twitter tomorrow at 14.30 CET. Follow #NokiaMWC for details.

Yesterday, it was announced that Aardvark was being bought out by Google for $50 million. Today, both companies sent out their official blog posts and mass emailings, and immediately afterwards – TechCrunch broke the news that Aardvark was already live in Google Labs! And here it is:

Although clicking on Try Aardvark just gets you to www.vark.com – we can definitely expect to see big things from this collaboration later on. I think that Aardvark’s integration into Google will make Google undeniably more powerful than it was before – with a Social Q&A section!

Yesterday I wrote a long intricate rant against Google Buzz.  It’s not because I hate Google – it’s actually quite the opposite. I was mad at Google for Google Buzz because I love Google. And I think they can do so much better. Well – since most of the 9 million posts (in 2 days!) on Buzz have been complaints about it’s features, they caught on pretty fast and are doing a wicked-good job of cleaning up the mess they made!

In their Gmail blog this morning, Google admitted they had a long way to go with their pet-project-slash-extremely-important-Gmail-feature:

We’ve had plenty of feature requests, and some direct feedback. In particular there’s been concern from some people who thought their contacts were being made public without their knowledge (in particular the lists of people they follow, and the people following them). In addition, others felt they had too little control over who could follow them and were upset that they lacked the ability to block people who didn’t yet have public profiles from following them.

Later today, Google will be rolling out these fixes to their features (quoted from their blog):

1. More visible option to not show followers/people you follow on your public profile

If you don’t want to share the lists of people who are following you and people you are following publicly on your profile, you can always opt out during the profile set-up when you first use Buzz or at any time from the edit profile page. We are making this option more prominent in the set up process, to ensure everyone who wanted to hide these lists can do so easily.

2. Ability to block anyone who starts following you

We are making it easier to block anyone, by adding “Block” links to the list of people following you. Previously, you were only able to block people from following you after they had created a public profile. Now, you can block anyone, regardless of whether or not they’ve already created profiles for themselves.

3. More clarity on which of your followers/people you follow can appear on your public profile

Initially, we showed you a list of all the people who would be following you once they created a public profile. However, only those contacts who had already created a public profile would show up on your public follower list. We’re making this clearer by explicitly distinguishing which of your followers have public profiles and will show in your public list of followers. With this change you’ll be able to see who is on the public list of followers that everyone else sees.

Facebook chat was at first a dream, and a few years ago it became a reality – and a big one! It made Facebook more real time than it had ever been before.

Now, using Jabber technology, Facebook are taking it a step further by introducing Facebook Chat Anywhere – an integration service that lets you integrate Facebook Chat into AIM, Jabber, Adium, iChat and others. This is a great way for Facebook’s users to use Facebook chat even if they’re not logged in to Facebook! This is a long time in the coming.

Anyway – here is the link to the official page for Facbeook Chat Anywhere

If you want to set it up – just click on the appropriate link below:

• Connect your Client
  • Pidgin - Windows/Mac/Linux
  • Adium – Mac
  • iChat – Mac
  • Other – Windows/Mac/Linux

Bit.ly have released Bit.ly Pro to the public last night. The addition to the already-free bit.ly will be a tool to allow individuals and enterprises to use their URL shortening technology to create their own custom URL shorteners. A few days ago, Bit.ly sent an email out to their waiting lists requesting that they make initial preparations. First, users must get their short URL, and second – they need to set up the CNAME to point to the right address.

The bit.ly blog shows some of the features that will be included in bit.ly Pro:

If you’re thinking of setting up this bad boy, here is what you’ll need:

For a full Q&A list, visit the official Bit.ly Blog!