I just caught this via @chrisbrogan on Twitter but it looks like the “best of the web” aggregator Alltop has taken a new look live. According to the head guy at Alltop, Guy Kawasaki, and his post about the new look by Out:Think actually went live August 17.

Here is a before and after shot courtesy of the team at Out:Think

I kind of like the new look but then I’m a big fan of the clean and simple look.

Alltop goes for the clean look is a post from: The Inquisitr

Wow, makes me almost glad that I don’t follow Mr. Kawasaki on Twitter, unlike Guy’s other 139,000 followers who were left open to a possible malware threat from one of his automated tweets. According to the report on CNet News Security blog a Twitter message sent by Kawasaki advertised a sexy video of TV star Leighton Meester of Gossip Girl. The problem was that if you clicked on the link and then tried to view the video you would find yourself the proud owner of a trojan.

Under the guise of needing to install a required codec to view the video, Kawasaki fans would instead download and install OSX/Jahlav-C for the Mac. Kawasaki has stated that his account is set up to redistribute spam updates from user generated news site NowPublic.

While Kawasaki’s account wasn’t the only one to send out the message (it also went out on less popular accounts), Guy’s popularity on Twitter means many of his messages are ReTweeted, resulting in even further promotion of the malware.

But then again it was a trojan for Macs and we all know there is no such thing so I guess this isn’t really that important so go ahead and carry on with what you were doing …………….

Way to go Guy Kawasaki, thanks for the malware tweet is a post from: The Inquisitr

“If I am going to speak, it will come from me. It’s 140 characters. It’s so few characters. If you need a ghostwriter for that, I feel sorry for you.” Shaquille O’Neal.

Twitter is the hot social service networking this year, but how social is it really? We’ll if your an ex-Apple executive and VC by the name of Guy Kawasaki, it’s apparently not all that social, because it’s a marketing tool that is best complimented with ghostwriters

“Why does it matter who is doing the tweeting? Either the content is good or not good. I’d rather follow a smart intern tweeting for a CEO than an dumb CEO tweeting for himself or herself. Twitter is great that way: Everybody, no matter who they are, gets 140 characters. Then you have to earn your followers and keep earning their allegiance with every tweet.” Guy Kawasaki

The problem here is that Kawasaki sees Twitter as a content platform vs a social networking platform. Stowe Boyd: “Connectedness is king: it’s social media, right? The social is supposed to equate to real live human beings communicating with each other. Not ‘bots, and ghosts, and things that go bump in the night.”

The New York Times deals with who is using, and not using ghostwriters here.

To quote someone who DM’d me about this yesterday (not sure if I can disclose the name) “why follow guy when we don’t even know when its really him?”

Why indeed.

If it’s good enough for Lance Armstrong, Shaq or Ashton Kutcher to use Twitter directly, why not an ex-Apple executive?

I’d also rather see a poorly written Tweet from a company CEO or celebrity than a polished ghostwritten one if that tweet reflected a real connection, not a canned response. Celebrities are using Twitter to communicate directly with fans, cutting out the middle man and making real connections, but for some, once a tool, always a Twitter fail.

Twitter fail: the rise of the ghostwriters is a post from: The Inquisitr