First, though, Page and Brin headed to Burning Man. Then, as now, it’s what tech bros do. To let people know what they were up to they incorporated the famous Burning Man character into their logo. The first Google Doodle had been created. Today, Google owns over half of the festival — mud and all.
Word quickly spread that this new search engine delivered superior results. As I wrote in December 1998 for PC Magazine, “Google “has an uncanny knack for returning extremely relevant results.”
By the end of 1999, Google was processing over 3 million daily search queries. With its clean interface, lightning-fast searches, and relevant results, Google rapidly became the go-to search engine for internet users worldwide. Nothing else could compete. AltaVista struggled until 2010, but it had long been a dead service walking.
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Ironically, another of the early search giants, Excite, could have had Google for the bargain price of $750-thousand in 1999. But, Excite CEO George Bell rejected Page and Brin’s offer. You could argue this was the biggest tech acquisition misfire of all time.
Of course, it wasn’t until 2000 that Google turned search into gold by selling keyword-based advertising. While its rivals were faltering and crashing with the dot com bubble, Google was minting money.
It was also well on its way into popular culture. In the same year on Buffy The Vampire Slayer, Willow asks Buffy, “Have you Googled her yet?” By 2006, the word “Google” had made it into the Oxford English Dictionary.
But Google didn’t stop at search and advertising. As the company grew, so did its ambitions. Google introduced a slew of innovative products and services. These included Gmail in 2004, and via acquisition, Google Maps and the Android operating system in 2005. Each offering further entrenched Google’s position at the forefront of the technology revolution.
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In 2004, Google went public with one of the most anticipated Initial Public Offerings (IPOs) in tech history. This move solidified its financial standing and marked its transition from a startup to a major corporate player. Today, Google, under its new name Alphabet, has a market cap of over $1.7 trillion. If you’d bought $1,000 worth of Google stock when it IPOed on August 19, 2004, it would be worth well over a million dollars today.
It hasn’t all been good news. Google has had its share of problems and scandals. “Don’t be evil,” its motto from the IPO, which was also in its corporate code of conduct, sounds more ironic than aspirational these days.
As it expanded, the company grappled with issues related to privacy, data collection, and antitrust concerns. Critics argued that Google’s vast reach and influence posed potential threats to user privacy and market competition.
Also: How to stop Google from selling your browser history for ad targeting
With the rise of generative AI, particularly Microsoft and OpenAI’s ChatGPT, some people believe that Google may finally be knocked off its throne as the king of the search hill. However, according to research company Statista, as of July 2023, market leader Google still dominates the desktop search market with 83.49%. The OpenAI-powered Bing, with 9.19% of the global desktop search market, is growing, but Google is in no danger of losing its top rating.
Google is 25 now, and I expect it will easily keep going for another 25 years. Love it or hate it, it’s a big part of our lives.
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Article source: https://www.zdnet.com/article/google-turns-25-from-garage-startup-to-global-giant/#ftag=RSSbaffb68