Search Forum Digest: Google Addresses Index Quality, Apple Restricts Home Services Ads, Shopping Policy Consolidation Coming

Barry Schwartz's daily forum recap highlights several key developments in search and ads. Google addressed quality and AI-generated content issues in its indexing report, while Gary Illyes advised against using incorrect lastmod dates in XML sitemaps. Apple Maps Ads has banned home service categories—a policy distinction from Google's approach. On the ecommerce front, Google is merging Shopping ads and free listings policies into a single document by September 2026 and will enable local inventory ads by default in Shopping campaigns, with a deadline of August 31 to adjust settings. The recap also notes updates to Performance Max reporting and the removal of manual product updates in Google Manufacturer Center, with changes requiring use of the API or file uploads instead.