The Twitter-verse continues to get interesting. I've always felt that the returns are to be found around Twitter rather than with Twitter itself, and the venture capital community seems to be acting from the same position. Twitter interaction platform HootSuite just announced a new round of venture capital funding, with $1.9 million in fresh money coming in the door to support its growth efforts.

HootSuite, which was started by Invoke Media in November 2008, has evolved into a brand monitoring, file-sharing and social media integration utility. Only a year later, it has attracted more than 300,000 users, from Time (TWX) to Martha Stewart to the White House to Aol (AOL).BloggingStocks is among the Aol blogs using HootSuite.

Looking back on what became a tough end to a tough year for the retail sector, the one bright spot was the online sector. Shoppers whipped out their plastic at a record rate on Black Friday, a trend that continued throughout the season.

The Amazon (AMZN) Kindle killed the competition, reinforcing the status of the online channel as the future of the retail business. Social media, in particular, had its first real test this year, as many companies -- including Best Buy (BBY), JCPenney (JCP) and Target (TGT) -- used the likes of Twitter and Facebook to engage customers, publicize sales and generally increase revenue. The next stage in the evolution, of course, is to use shopping behavior to trigger viral results.

Venture capital funds found 612 companies in which to invest $3.67 billion in Q2. Of this, $1.5 billion (41%) was first-time financing, according to a report by PricewaterhouseCoopers and the National Venture Capital Association. This is only slightly ahead of the action in Q1, in which 141 transactions were first-time, and far behind the pace we enjoyed earlier this decade.

The biotech sector was the big winner in a shrinking market, with funding up 54% to $888 million over 85 deals. The software business was flat quarter-over-quarter at 4644 million over 135 transactions. Investments in internet companies fell 15% to $524 million via 124 deals. Clean technology showed considerable growth, up 15% to $274 million, with 42 transactions closed.

The venture capital (VC) industry demonstrated its commitment to the clean technology space in the second quarter of 2009, pumping $1.2 billion into the sector, according to a report by GTM Research. VC investments in cleantech are up 43.5% from the first quarter of the year, when $836 was put into play in the cleantech space.

The number of transactions increased, as well. In the first quarter, 59 deals were completed, and deal-flow surged 44% to 85 in the quarter just finished. Average deal size remained fairly consistent: $14.2 million for the first quarter and $14.1 for the second.

This week, a startup company -- adap.tv -- raised $10 million from Redpoint Ventures and Gemini Israel Funds.

The company is trying to get a piece of the growing ad market for video. Hey, with the huge success of Google's (NASDAQ: GOOG) YouTube, it seems like a pretty good idea, right?

The founder of the company, Amir Ashkenazi, does have a lot of credibility. After all, he's the former cofounder of Shopping.com, which sold out to eBay (NASDAQ: EBAY).

But does his new venture really have a chance? I talked to Chase Norlin, who is the CEO of Pixsy, which is a search engine for multimedia. According to him:

"Adap.tv looks a lot like ScanScout, and a variety of other startups looking to become the next 'Adsense for Video.' That space is starting to feel a little crowded to me, not to mention the fact that Google hasn't even entered this market yet. Also, expect the major ad networks and online advertising companies to offer competitive products here as well. I'm sure adap.tv's technology is interesting, but that's not what matters in the online ad space. What matters is publisher reach and a large pool of advertisers to provide solid monetization. That's why companies like ValueClick continue to get stronger despite their non-groundbreaking technology: their advertiser and publisher pool continues to grow and the bigger they get the harder they become to displace."

And, to see more recent venture capital deals, click here.

Tom Taulli is the author of various books, including the Complete M&A Handbook and the EDGAR-Online Guide to Decoding Financial Statements.