Some websites have been reporting that since an updated version of Google Chrome was released, search temporarily stopped working in the Omnibox (the combined address and search bar). This has since been fixed "for most users" though.
The issue, as reported by users in the Google Product Forums, was that when you typed in a search, you were taken to a blank page instead of the search result. Google has since announced that this has already been fixed with another update, if you"re on stable and experience this issue, simply shutting down Chrome and opening it again should merge the changes.
The Verge reached out to Google and received the following response:
"The issue that was affecting search in Chrome should be resolved for most users. The next order of business is figuring out the cause, and making sure it doesn"t happen again. Thanks for hanging with us through the rough patch."
The other issue has to do with the developer build of Chrome (21.0.1180.x dev-m branch), it is apparently blocking 3rd party extensions, there is a workaround though.
To get around it, simply start Chrome with the --enable-easy-off-store-extension-install command line flag.
Or as articuno1au points out in the comments: Spanner > Extensions > Drag the add-on file onto the page. The block has been up for at least 2 weeks; It was added as a security feature.
No mention has been made in the Release blog about this change, and it isn"t quite clear why a developer build would even need to block 3rd party test extensions, in a developer build.
Source: The Verge & Neowin Forums | Image: The Verge