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Twitter has just announced some photo news, as rumors circulating over the Memorial Day holiday weekend hinted it would. The big reveal isn't exactly a new photo-sharing or photo-storage service - Twitter will not be hosting the photos you Tweet now. But that doesn't mean that today's announcement is irrelevant or unimportant.

Today's announcement actually has two part: one dealing with search and one dealing with photos. It also involves two new partners for the company: Firefox and Photobucket.

Photobucket, the most popular photo sharing site in the U.S., just announced a number of new features that will give its users easier ways to share their photos and videos across multiple web services like MySpace, Facebook, or Blogger. Photobucket also introduced a new version of its mobile site, which features a streamlined interface, as well as easier ways to access comments, ratings, and subscriptions.

According to the latest data from HitWise, Photobucket, the leading photo sharing site in the United States, saw a rapid decline in its market share over the last twelve months. Photobucket commanded 36% of the photo sharing market in February 2008, but this number dropped to 27% last month. Most of this loss, according to Hitwise, can be attributed to a decline in visits to MySpace, which has always been the main source of traffic for Photobucket.