It's no secret that Google missed the boat when Facebook released it's Like button a little over a year ago. The little button is now so ubiquitous that it's the norm rather than the exception to see a blog, product or service with some kind of Facebook integration.
But what Facebook has, Google wants and after the demise of it's Buzz network, it was only a matter of time before the search kings came back fighting. In March, Google released it's +1 button to accentuate it's search results and yesterday they rolled it out for integration into 3rd party sites. That's you and me!
Here's a quick video by Google explaining the concept and what it does.
If you're interested in adding the +1 button to your own site, it's pretty straight forward. You can follow the instructions on the +1 page or you can use a 3rd party tool such as AddThis.com which will allow you to add a bunch of share icons within one easy to use tool.