From the post Google Base Was Sort of Live on Google Blogoscoped we learn

Several people report Google Base (as predicted yesterday) went live, or at least, its login-screen. I can’t reach it at the moment as it seems Google took it down again, but Dirson posted a screenshot to Flickr. So what is it? Quoting from Dirson’s screenshot of the login screen:

Post your items on Google.

Google Base is Google’s database into which you can add all types of content. We’ll host your content and make it searchable online for free.

Examples of items you can find in Google Base:

• Description of your party planning service
• Articles on current events from your website
• Listing of your used car for sale
• Database of protein structures

You can describe any item you post with attributes, which will help people find it when they search Google Base. In fact, based on the relevance of your items, they may also be included in the main Google search index and other Google products like Froogle and Google Local.

This reminds me of Amazon Simple Queue Service except they started with a web page instead of an API. I can't imagine that Google Base will be terribly useful without an API so I expect that one will show up with the release or shortly thereafter. I'm still unclear as to why this is an interesting idea although I'm sure some clever geek will find some way to build something cool with it. I also wonder if this will spur Amazon into doing more interesting things with their service as well.

Who would have thought that online lists would be a hot area? I guess it's time for some BigCo to snap up Ta-da Lists for a couple million dollars. ;)