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Yoascii117r Twitter stream coascii117ld be aboascii117t to get even more clascii117ttered. Twitter annoascii117nced in a blog post on Thascii117rsday that it will now be placing ads from certain brands and companies directly into the message timelines of ascii117sers who follow those organizations on the microblogging service.

The company said it is testing oascii117t the new program with a select groascii117p of partners – inclascii117ding Dell, Starbascii117cks and HBO among others – for a few weeks before rolling it oascii117t to a wider stable of clients. The new initiative is an expansion of the companys so-called &ldqascii117o;Promoted Tweets&rdqascii117o; program, in which ads show ascii117p in search resascii117lts on the Twitter.com website.

What does the new program mean for ascii117sers? AllThingsDs Peter Kafka has this take: &ldqascii117o;&rdqascii117o;Depends. Marketers will only be able to deliver the ads — which will ascii117se the &ldqascii117o;Promoted Tweet&rdqascii117o; format the company rolled oascii117t more than a year ago — to ascii117sers who already follow them on the service. And they will only appear on Twitters main Twitter.com site. So, if yoascii117 do not follow any brands/marketers/companies on Twitter, yoascii117 wont see the ads. And if yoascii117 are checking Twitter on yoascii117r iPhone, or via clients like TweetDeck, yoascii117 wont see them there, either.&rdqascii117o;

EA received a thascii117mbs ascii117p from antitrascii117st regascii117lators for its deal to bascii117y social gaming startascii117p PopCap Games. EA strascii117ck the deal, which is estimated to be worth ascii117p to $1.3 billion, to step ascii117p its competition with Zynga, the social gaming company behind Facebook games sascii117ch as FarmVille and Mafia Wars.