Hearsay from "people close to the negotiations" report Google is in late-stage talks to purchase Twitter, the trendy microblogging site of the moment.

The rumor spins forth from TechCrunch, which speculates the price will be north of the $250 million valuation it won in its most recent funding round. Armchair speculators have stated a liaison between Google and Twitter would be powerful, because at present Twitter boasts a feature the search giant lacks: the ability to search user sentiment in real-time.

At the same time, AdAge reported that Google now offers ad units that enable marketers to stream their five most recent "tweets" across the AdSense network. The first company to try the service was Intuit, parent company of online tax filing service TurboTax.

Late last year, acquisition talks between Twitter and Facebook fizzled when the latter made a lowball offer composed of Facebook stock.

As of February '09, Twitter posted 1382% year over year growth, according to Nielsen Online.