Is Google Evil? The First Five Years

OK, now I’m sure this is a great way to lose my ranking from Google!

I figured we’d start with where this monster originated.

I found this from the “official Google source”

1995

* Larry Page and Sergey Brin meet at Stanford; they disagree about most everything during this first meeting.

1996

* Larry and Sergey, now Stanford computer science grad students, begin collaborating on a search engine called BackRub.

* BackRub operates on Stanford servers for more than a year — eventually taking up too much bandwidth to suit the university.

1997

* Larry and Sergey decide that the BackRub search engine needs a new name. After some brainstorming, they go with Google — a play on the word “googol,” a mathematical term for the number represented by the numeral 1 followed by 100 zeros. The use of the term reflects their mission to organize a seemingly infinite amount of information on the web.

1998
* Sun co-founder Andy Bechtolsheim writes a check for $100,000 to an entity that doesn’t exist yet: a company called Google Inc.

* Google files for incorporation in California on September 4. Shortly thereafter, Larry and Sergey open a bank account in the newly-established company’s name and deposit Andy Bechtolsheim’s check.

* “PC Magazine” reports that Google “has an uncanny knack for returning extremely relevant results” and recognizes us as the search engine of choice in the Top 100 Web Sites.

1999

* First press release announces a $25 million round from Sequoia Capital and Kleiner Perkins;

2000
* The first 10 language versions of Google.com are released: French, German, Italian, Swedish, Finnish, Spanish, Portuguese, Dutch, Norwegian and Danish.

*Forge a partnership with Yahoo! to become their default search provider. (Yahoo is still ranked as the top visited page according to Alexa.com)

*Announce the first billion-URL index and therefore Google becomes the world’s largest search engine.

* Google AdWords launches with 350 customers. The self-service ad program promises online activation with a credit card, keyword targeting and performance feedback.

* Google Toolbar is released. It’s a browser plug-in that makes it possible to search without visiting the Google homepage.