World map with "hot" spots

[ItsMeOnly]

I was asked by my friend to implement a "gizmo" for her growing list or stories from travels, a world map that would have points and areas that trigger sections to appear. I realized that first with a flash map and you can see the result here:
http://alicja-sl.republika.pl/podroze.htm

Yet it's not what she really wanted (and neither I am really satisfied with).
What I'm thinking of is to make a draggable clipped image with imagemap attached, or better a javascript that would convert latitude and longitude of objects to coordinates on the image and overlay objects (something like flags with short description), that upon clicking would trigger the sections to appear.

Can anyone suggest how to make it?

PS.: Before anyone suggests GoogleMaps API, it has a fatal flaw- that makes it work for only one website address, and my friends site actually has three- and people use all of them.

[Medyman]

Have you looked into the APIs for the other services -- Yahoo Maps, for example. I'm not personally familiar with it so I don't know if the same domain restriction exists.

Really, those kinds of services are the only way you can accomplish something like this. Geocoding isn't an easy thing to do, and is 100% outside any free script you're going to find.

You should be able to display one map created with the Google Maps API on the other pages via an iframe. Have you considered that option?

[ItsMeOnly]

just tried Yahoo, and it looks promising, although the way they handle geoRSS is pain in the neck so to speak- in fact after adding the xml file, I can't make the map call javascript function, because it opens a link in new window. I look for any advice of how to make it simpler though.