Inform Technologies, the New York City-based news search and publisher services company, has raised a biggish $15 million third round. The round was done by Spark Capital, which has been very active in investment in digital media space over the last year (and is also involved in the proxy fight over CNET (NSDQ: CNET) Networks along with Jana Partners...Spark says it has committed $20 million in CNET equity).

The company tells me that it has taken in approximately $25 million - $27 million to date, and Inform’s valuation as a result of this investment is “well north of $50 million”.

The company started as a consumer news search site in 2004 by the founder of CapitalIQ, then after a rethink (and a round of general panning from users and bloggers, including us) changed its focus to serving publishers with white-label services. Its main service is serving up relevant editorial links on a publisher’s story pages from third party sites. It says it now works with 100 major media brands, including Conde Nast (for Portfolio.com), Crain Communications, IDG, The New York Sun and Washington.Post.Newsweek Interactive (for WaPo website). It is in competition with the likes of Pluck, Aggregate Knowledge and many others in the publisher services sector. More in release.

• Inform.com Gets $10 Million Funding; Appoints New CEO