25 years ago, in history on this day – Sept. 4, Google was founded.
Google is a household name for the internet, and it is more than just a search engine. Most of us know Google as a search engine, but it’s bigger than that – not just a giant, but rather a behemoth. From Android to YouTube – Google owns it all. The number goes up to more than 200, as per reports.
Sept. 4 or Sept. 24?
Per a 20th-anniversary blog post, it has a better explanation, “Google Inc. was incorporated on September 4, but for more than a decade we’ve celebrated our birthday on September 27, with an annual Doodle, of course.”
Two friends, one research project and that’s how Google was born
Two Standford students – Larry Page and Sergey Brin – who happened to first see each other at Standford University shared an idea of building a search engine technology, and that’s how Google – formerly BackRub – came into existence. The company’s name – Google – was a play on the word “googol” (a mathematical term for the number 1 followed by 100 zeros).
Larry Page and Sergey Brin published a research paper in April 1998, titled “The Anatomy of a Large-Scale Hypertextual Web Search Engine” that outlined the PageRank algorithm, which is the basis for Google’s search engine.
Not every rejection is bad, proves Google’s story
At once, the founders – Larry Page and Sergey Brin approached rival Yahoo to acquire Google for $1 million, and Yahoo turned down the offer. The question is had Yahoo acquired Google, would it reach the current heights?
Google tops the chart
It doesn’t just end here, Google also tops the list of most visited websites with an average user time spent of around 10 minutes, as noted by website analyzing firm SimilarWeb.
Google’s popularity can be attributed to its many features and services, such as Gmail, Hangouts, Google News, and Android.
Google pays its rival a hefty amount to be the “default search engine”
Google also makes hardware, such as Google Pixel phones – formerly Nexus – where Google attempts to power up both the hardware and software. Quite the purest Android experience, a tech aficionado would say.
And, there are two mobile OS that primarily dominate the globe – Android and iOS. Google reportedly pays about $15 million annually to remain the iPhone’s “default search engine” so if you own an iPhone and you search about random stuff on the web, it takes you to Google. Guess what Apple is minting money out of it.
Google is officially a verb since 2006
This couldn’t be explained any better than saying that I googled this information while writing. The verb “Google” is so common that it is now often used even when people are not using Google as their search engine. This not only shows its acceptance to the pages of the dictionary but also Google’s dominance in the search engine space.
Google is a constantly evolving company, and it is hard to say what the future holds. However, one thing is for sure: Google will continue to be a major player in the internet landscape for many years to come.
https://www.financialexpress.com/life/technology-google-turns-25-heres-the-story-of-two-standford-students-who-built-the-most-visited-website-top-search-engine-important-facts-3232853/
