Great post over on BBSpot covering new “premium” accounts on Twitter. From the article:

Premium accounts will come in four tiers: Sparrow, Dove, Owl and Eagle.

The details of the accounts are as follows:

• Sparrow ($5/month) – Users get 145 character limit, 5 extra random followers.

• Dove ($15/month) – Users get 160 character limit, 25 extra random followers, 1 random celebrity follower, auto-spell check, “Fail Whale” T-shirt.

• Owl ($50/month) – Users get 250 character limit, 100 extra random followers, 2 random celebrity followers, 30 minutes on recommended list, auto-spell check, “Fail Whale” hoodie.

• Eagle ($250/month) – Users get 500 character limit, 1000 extra random followers, 3 celebrity followers of their choice, 5 hours on recommended list each month, Twitter Concierge for Tweeting while user is asleep or busy (and more), auto-spell check, “Fail Whale” tuxedo, custom “Fail Whale” page when service is down.

“It was widely assumed that Twitter was being used exclusively by self-centered navel-gazers with an unrepentant desire to share their every thought and action with whoever would listen,” said MIT Professor Ron Sharkowski, who led a six-week study of the “micro-blogging” service that allows members to communicate in 140-character tweets. “But in at least one instance that seems not to be the case.”

From the excellent CAP News site – you can read the entire story here.

[youtube=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PN2HAroA12w]

Strikes a little close to home, but hilarious. Favorite part:

“Okay, but I don’t care what other people are doing every second of the day”

“Look, no, neither do I! But we do want other people knowing what we’re doing, right?”

Our exclusive Twitternomics Quant Study has revealed that a remarkable 72% of Twitter users believe it’s a great place to find marketing advice. In response to this result one of the most active users, whom in order to maintain anonymity we will call the “uber-twit”, noted that “This really proves the power of micro blogging and associated social media. Hey – if I follow you, will you follow me? I’ll link to you on my blog if you do. I’d tell you more, but I start to hyperventilate beyond 140 characters. Want to buy some marketing?” before passing out. Other findings include that 81% of Twitter users are marketers themselves, and 9% of Twitter users suffer from serious self-confidence issues.