Big Three agree on sitemaps standard

From TechCrunch:

In an encouraging act of collaboration, Google, Yahoo and Microsoft announced tonight that they will all begin using the same Sitemaps protocol to index sites around the web. Now based at Sitemaps.org, the system instructs web masters on how to install an XML file on their servers that all three engines can use to track updates to pages. This should make it easier to get your pages indexed in a simple and standardized way. People who use Google Sitemaps don’t need to change anything, those maps will now be indexed by Yahoo and Microsoft.

The protocol is offered under an Attribution-ShareAlike Creative Commons License, so it can be used by any search engine, derivative variations using the same license can be created and it can be used for commercial purposes.

Google acquires iRows, shuts it down

Via TechCrunch:

iRows may be remembered as the first Israeli company to be acquired by Google but that's all. Their iRows site will be shut down and founders Yoah Bar-David and Itai Raz will go to work for Google, clearly on Docs & Spreadsheets. The company is providing instructions for its users to move their data to Google Documents.