Amazon, Virgin and the penguins at Calgary Zoo

This Week Virgin Media has sparked a frenzy on social media after a broadband bill was sent to a deceased man including a fine for late payment. The bill which has been shared more than 53,000 times by Facebook users included a £63.89 charge, a "late payment charge" of £10 and stated "D.D Denied-Payer deceased", a reference to the fact the dead man’s bank had declined payment. The bill was posted by the man’s son-in-law, along with a message addressed to Virgin Media, however it seems the business giant did not respond quickly enough as the bill went viral. Virgin Media has now offered its sincere apologies to the family of the deceased for the wording that was used on the bill. One social media expert has commented on the story saying that "while the unfortunate action of bills being sent to those who have recently died is far from new, the viral nature of this complaint should serve as a warning to companies".

Proving just how influential social media is, when the Twitter account of world news agency the Associated Press was hacked this week, a false news alert stating that the US President had been injured in explosions at the White House caused an instant reaction on Wall Street. The Dow Jones fell by 143 points, before recovering quickly as AP apologised for the security breach and the White House’s press team confirmed Obama was fine. Calls for enhanced security to Twitter accounts have escalated, and the social media platform is expected to announce a two-factor authentication process soon.

One of the internet’s largest retail outlets, Amazon, has applied for ownership of the ‘.amazon’ top-level domain but has met some unlikely dispute from Brazil and Peru. The South American governments are trying to halt the web address ownership as they believe it will defer from any environmental or public interest uses for the rainforest region as the new top-level domains come into play. As only one entity can claim ownership of any top-level domain, this has seen some interesting battles for the popular choices. The most popular being .app (which both Amazon and Google have applied for), followed by .home, .inc, .art and .blog. Whether the online retailer or the world’s biggest rainforest and longest river will win out is yet to be seen.

Some forward thinking organisations are trying to breathe new life into the traditional annual report format with mobile-optimisation, infographics or in the Calgary Zoo’s case, Instagram. Earlier this week, the Canadian zoo became the first company to entirely release their annual report on the fast growing social media platform. Highlights in what has been universally acclaimed as a ‘beautiful report’ include the opening of the Penguin Plunge exhibit, the arrival of two new tiger cubs, a record year for sales revenue and countless public events and training programmes. Companies looking to bolster their social media credentials can view the whole annual report here or by searching for @CalgaryZoo2012AR on Instagram.