Facebook has soared past Yahoo as the Number 2 place to watch online videos. More great news for the dominant social network? Well, maybe not: people still spend more time watching videos on Yahoo, and there are nagging doubts about how Facebook can actually make money from video content.

Companies plan to invest more in social media next year, a new Econsultancy survey shows. That’s the promising bit. The less inspiring part? Not all of these companies actually know how they are going to track this investment. This comes even as a new report shows how one aspect of social media spend – a Facebook strategy – really does have a pay-off.

The global social media landscape continues to shift in surprising ways. Two new Forrester reports show – as expected – a continuing rise in social media usage, but there is no substantial growth in social media-inspired content-creation. Meanwhile, we note another significant (though hardly surprising) development, as Twitter overtakes MySpace in unique visitors.

It’s no surprise that increasing numbers of retailers are establishing a presence in social media. The surprise lies in their reasons for going social – most say they were pushed into it by customers and rivals.

It’s no surprise that Asia is one of the biggest growth markets in social networking. So you might think that’s where Facebook is gaining its new ground, right? Well, actually no. In much of Asia, and some other parts of the world, Facebook is trailing badly in the social network stakes.

Facebook’s virtual currency, Credits, has emerged, seemingly from nowhere, as a huge potential money-spinner for the social network. Now we are getting a picture of just how big it could be, but can it ever hope to eat into PayPal’s lucrative market as the de-facto online payment system?

Games on Facebook such as Farmville or Mafia Wars: chances are you either love them or hate them. Either way, the announcement of a dedicated games team for the social platform looks set to be good news. For the haters, say goodbye to annoying updates about your friends headed to the country market to sell virtual pies. For the gamers, there’s more reason to talk up your latest gaming exploits.

American Express is the latest brand to embrace social media publishing as a way of connecting with potential customers. The credit card giant has recruited money experts to help in its launch of a new financial services site called, simply enough, Currency, aimed specifically at helping recent university graduates better manage their income.

Social searching is getting smarter all the time (or so we hope), and Microsoft announced some further interesting developments on Bing Social this week. But how do the two heavyweights of social search, Google and Bing Social, match up? We measure them up here.

Whatever happened to Blockbuster? The movie-rental giant is closing stores in neighborhoods across the U.S., U.K. and parts of Europe, while online-only Netflix continues to flourish. The New York Times wraps up the story neatly today, pointing out Blockbuster failed to understand the market had moved beyond neighborhood stores. We look a bit closer and see another problem: a fraction of the public is talking up Blockbuster.