Below is what happened in search today, as reported on Search Engine Land and from other places across the web.

Back in February, there was some speculation about Microsoft having a very good chance at landing a deal with Apple to become its default search engine for the iPhone. Apple was reportedly receiving about $100 million a year in search revenue from Google with the deal it previously had inked with them. As of yesterday CEO Eric Schmidt told Charlie Rose that their search contract had been “ recently extended “, but didn’t get into any particulars: CR: You no longer serve on the Apple board

Back in February, there was some speculation about Microsoft having a very good chance at landing a deal with Apple to become its default search engine for the iPhone.

WPP Group’s CEO Sir Martin Sorrell was the one who coined the term “froe” to describe Google. He said in 2008 that Google had gone from being a “frenemy” to a “froe” of the agency holding company. Presumably “froe” is a more direct competitor than a “frenemy”– at least that’s the implication

It seems Elmo’s not the only one that is hot and cold towards Katy Perry.

It’s been a rough week for two of the bigger players in the social voting space. Propeller, an AOL-owned property that grew out of the old Netscape website, has announced on its home page that the site is shutting down on October 1st.

Warning of higher advertiser competition and that you could see a decline in your search campaign performance, the adCenter blog has published five recommendations for the mid-October ad-serving transition. Their recommendations: Increase your monthly spend to at least one-third of your overall SEM budget (U.S

After receiving reports from marketers and businesses stretching from the U.K. to Hawaii, Google says they have fixed a technical issue that caused some business listings to vanish from Google Maps. According to a post in Google Places Help last night from a Google employee: “We’re aware some of the business listings were not appearing on Google Maps earlier today.

With every online marketing channel and discipline, there must be tools to make the task of marketing more efficient and effective. Social Media Marketing is no different. Over the past 6-9 months, I’ve been researching and reviewing a variety of social media management tools that help with everything from source network connections to campaign & social content management to monitoring & measurement

The 2010 retail holiday season kicks off in just 60 days. If you’re like me, you already sense the Christmas shopping budget is sunk, having to decide not which mobile device to purchase, but how many. Kindles for the kids