Expedia has launched a new free iPhone application, TripAssist, that links to its mobile website to allow users to mange their travel itineraries. TripAssist allows users to research flights, destinations, hotels, cars and activities. Once they make a reservation, they can manage and update their itineraries, find an alternative flight, research their seats and access real-time flight information. The app also offers real-time SMS and email updates for free. "Travel,

How the Yahoo! and Microsoft Search Alliance works for advertisers Yahoo! and Microsoft have received U.S. and E.U. regulatory clearance for their search transaction. The Yahoo! and Microsoft Search Alliance will provide a competitive search platform that we believe will drive innovation in search and search advertising, offer a more engaging and personalized experience for consumers, and create greater value for advertisers and publishers.

This has not been a great week for American tech companies trying to do business in Europe. First, Google got in trouble over allegedly anticompetitive search practices and its policy on Street View data retention. Now, German antitrust authorities are looking at the way in which eBay has supported PayPal. John Oates explained earlier today, "eBay.de recently asked sellers with low feedback points to offer PayPal.

Back in April of last year, Matt posted here on the dev blog about the release of BuddyPress 1.0, a plugin that adds a social networking layer to an installation of WordPress MU. Many people were excited about the idea, but were unable to experiment with BuddyPress because they ran single installations of WordPress rather than the multi-site WordPress MU. To those people, good news! A little over a week ago Andy Peatling, founder and lead developer of BuddyPress, announced the release of BuddyPress 1.2, which can be used on single installations of WordPress. Congratulations, BuddyPress! And congratulations to all the people who’ve been waiting with bated breath for this to happen.

The first thing I thought when I heard the news was, “Awesome! Now everyone can put BuddyPress on their site if they want it.” The second thought I had was, “Shoot! Average WordPress users won’t want to try BuddyPress if they have to switch their site themes over to the BuddyPress default theme just to try it out.” The third thought I had was, “That can’t be right. I’ll ask Andy.”

As it turned out, you could keep your current theme with BuddyPress if you added a couple of files and made a few file edits. There was even a link on the BuddyPress site to download the necessary files. That still seemed a little clunky, though, so Andy, super awesome guy that he is, went ahead and made a plugin to get you started. The BuddyPress Template Pack can be installed directly from your WordPress admin (Plugins > Add New), and will walk you through the theme additions step by step.*

Now you can use BuddyPress with your single site installation of WordPress, and you can keep your existing theme. Seriously, could BuddyPress have made it any easier for you to add social networking to your site? I know I can’t wait to try it out this weekend, how about you?

* Don’t forget to install BuddyPress itself, or the template pack plugin won’t do anything!

I am no web designer (I have neither time nor talent to learn web design), however for SEOs it is essential to know some basic tools and tips to test a website design when it is delivered. Thus this post is not intended to share some advanced tips for web developers: instead it lists three quick ways to test a web design in FireFox: 1.

Tell us your favorite search engine for Olympic information. Click to read the rest of this post.

Stefan has been in the UK this week talking with the Bing UK team and he has sent us this weeks theme and video from across the water. The Bing UK team is doing some great work trying to raise money for Sport Relief, for more information and you are in the UK go to www.givewithbing.com for more information. So take a look and make sure you catch the theme for this weeks Free t-Shirt Friday at the end.

With March rapidly approaching, that means one thing for sports fans and retailers: March Madness is almost here! This event offers ticket sellers, retailers and fantasy sports sites, the chance to create search campaigns aimed at target demographics. This post offers tips and concepts to think about when building out your PPC campaigns. Note: Not all of the tips may apply due your business structure and campaign objectives.

Move is latest in location-based features for the search giant. Click to read the rest of this post.

State Farm has introduced a new free iPhone and iPod touch application aimed at helping young drivers stay safe on the road. The "Steer Clear" application is part of State Farm's safe drivers discount program. The app gives young drivers a way to complete the Steer Clear discount program and encourages supervised driver education.