It was interesting to me to discover today that the exact same Tour de France tracker is being used by almost every web-based media outlet I can find — Sports Illustrated and CNN use it, ESPN uses it, the New York Times uses it, and even Le Monde uses it. It’s a Flash-based applet that looks to be distributed by AFP, and it’s not too bad. In the past, with most major sports events, each news site has tended to develop its own little applet to provide results and information; I wonder what motivated everyone to jump on the same bandwagon for the Tour this year.