Google turns 25; celebrates with a special Doodle
Google celebrates several important occasions with its creative Doodles designed by artists across the world. It is also no different when it comes to celebrating its own birthday! Yes, today's Doodle marks the search giant's 25th birthday, with its theme being "Walk down memory lane." Let's participate in the festivities by learning some quirky facts about Google.
The name 'Google' was a result of a spelling mistake
Launched in 1998 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, the search engine's name was initially thought of as "Backrub." However, they wanted to change the name and shortlisted "Googol" (a mathematical term for the digit 1 followed by 100 zeroes) suggested by Sean Anderson. Anderson rushed to check if a domain was available with this name and mistakenly typed "Google." They registered, and voila!
Gmail was launched on April Fool's Day
On April 1, 2004, when the world was celebrating April Fool's Day, Google launched Gmail and announced its release as if it was a prank. The statements were worded in such a way that people gave in to it and asked if it was a joke. Today, it is among the top products by the search engine with millions of users using it.
Google wanted to sell its search engine to Yahoo
Yes, you read that right! Back in 1998 when it was launched, Page and Brin wanted to sell Google for $2 million as it was low-scale and new to the market. The duo reached out to Yahoo, which declined their offer. However, in 2002, it reconsidered buying Google for $3 billion and was rejected by Google. A decision worth regretting? Absolutely!
Google Translate is available in 133 distinct languages
When it comes to diversity, Google leaves no stone unturned in being a mass favorite. Its Translate feature is available in 133 languages of the world, most of which we are sure you haven't even heard of. The latest to join the list were Turkmen, Tatar, Twi, Tsonga, Tigrinya, Quechua, Sepedi, Meiti, Maldivian, Lingala, Kurdish, Kinyarwanda, Ilocano, Guarani, etc.
Google lost 40% of traffic worldwide in just 5 minutes
On August 16, 2013, Google services went down for five minutes, which caused them a significant drop of 40% of the worldwide traffic. Although the services were restored, it caused several users and brands heavy losses. Such is the search engine giant's reach!
