We have received very interesting inputs today from Google on its 18th birthday and take honour to carry the same in our blog as all our activites run courtesy the widespread use of Google. Whatever we have achieved today, it is all because of Google and hence our heartiest wishes to Google on its 18th Birthday. Can anyone now survive without Google? It has become an integral part of our life.
Eighteen years back Google Co-founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin began their mission to organize a seemingly infinite amount of information on the web giving birth to Google.com. Google.com was registered as a domain on September 15th 1997. The name—a play on the word “googol,” a mathematical term for the number represented by the numeral 1 followed by 100 zeros. Google.com since then has seen tremendous growth and expansion touching lives of millions of users around the world.
Some important milestones of Google’s journey to delight its users over the years:
- September 15, 1997: Google.com domain registered
- August 30, 1998: First Google-doodle inspired by Burning Man Festival in US
- May 9, 2000: The first 10 language versions of Google.com are released: French, German, Italian, Swedish, Finnish, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Norwegian and Danish. Today, search is available in 150+ languages.
- June 2000: In June 2000, Google became the world’s largest search engine.
- October 23, 2000: Launch of Google AdWords with 350 customers
- December 2000: Google Toolbar is released—a browser plugin that makes it possible to search without visiting the Google homepage.
- July 2001: Google Images launches, initially offering access to 250 million images. Today it offers the most comprehensive image search on the web
- September 2002: Google News launches with 4,000 news sources. Today Google News includes 50,000+ news sources, with 70 regional editions in different languages
- February 2003: Google acquires Blogger, includes synonyms in search
- February 2004: Google’s first-ever Twitter post was in February 2004. It was binary for “I’m feeling lucky.
- April 01, 2004: Google launched Gmail on April Fools’ Day. At first invite-only, today it boasts more than 425 million users.
- February 2005: Google Maps goes live. Just two months later, we added satellite views and directions to the product.
- April 2005: First video uploaded on YouTube. Today, 100+ hours of video are uploaded every minute and people watch 6 billion hours of video per month!
- June 2005: Google Mobile Web Search is released, specially formulated for viewing search results on mobile phones.
- June 2005: Google unveil Google Earth, a satellite imagery-based mapping service that lets you take a virtual journey to any location in the world. Google Earth has since been downloaded more than 1 billion times.
- November 2005: The first Doodle 4 Google contest takes place in the United Kingdom. Since then, we’ve run Doodle 4 Google contests in countries across six continents, with more than 1 million doodles submitted by students eager for the chance to see their artwork on the Google homepage.
- April 2006: Google Translate launches, offering translations between Arabic and English. Today Google machine translation service provides translations between 80+ different languages. The latest updates provides for real-time visual translations.
- November 2007: Android is announced; the first open platform for mobile devices—and a collaboration with other companies in the Open Handset Alliance.
- May 2008: Google host the first Google I/O, its annual developer conference, in San Francisco. I/O has grown since then; in addition to the thousands of developers who join in person every year, millions of people tune in via live stream to hear the latest news on products.
- September 2008: The G1, the first Android based smartphone is released
- September 02, 2008: Google Chrome becomes available for download. Chrome boasts more than 750 million users
- February 2009: Google launch Voice Search on Android. Android users can start searching by voice with the touch of a button, making mobile web surfing easy and fast. Today voice search works in 38+ languages.
- July 2009: Google starts developing Google Chrome OS, an open source, lightweight operating system initially targeted at laptops.
- October 2009: Introduction of Google Maps Navigation; a turn-by-turn GPS navigation system with 3D views, voice guidance and live traffic data.
- January 2010: Google introduced the Nexus One to show what’s possible on Android devices. The Nexus line of devices has since grown and now includes tablets as well as phones.
- December 2011: Android Market (now Google Play) exceeds 10 billion app downloads—with a growth rate of one billion app downloads per month.
- February 2012: Chrome launches on Android, so you can take the same simple, fast and secure web browsing experience with you wherever you go, across devices. Three months later we launch Chrome on iOS.
- June 2012: Google announced Google Now, which brings you the information you need, before you even ask, like what today’s weather will be like, how much traffic to expect on your way to work or your favorite team’s score while they’re playing.
- June 2013: Google unveils Project Loon (balloon-powered Internet access), an option for connecting rural, remote and underserved areas, and for crisis response communications.
- July 2013: Google releases the updated Google Maps app for smartphones and tablets.
- September 2013: Android passes 1 billion device activations—reflecting the work of the entire Android ecosystem and also a reflection of the enthusiasm of users all around the world.
- July 2014: Google Maps made available in Hindi language; added Hindi voice navigation
- September 2014: Introduction of Android One in India
- October 2014: Google Voice search now accepts Indian accents
- By 2020, Google expects 600 million online users with online videos being accessed by 500 million people.
- In 2004, Google started its India office with five people and now has more than 2,000 staff across Mumbai, Gurgaon, Hyderabad and Bangalore.
- In 1998, Google was serving ten thousand search queries per day
- Google now processes over 40,000 search queries every second on average
