Information Technology Reference
In-Depth Information
Note
The name “Google” is derived from a mathematical term “googol.”
That term was created in 1938 by a nine-year-old boy named
Milton Sirota. A googol was defined by Sirota as 10^100 power.
But Milton Sirota also proposed a bigger number called a
goo-
golplex
. That was first defined by Sirota as “one followed by writ-
ing zeros until you get tired.” Sirota was the nephew of the well-
known mathematician Edward Kasner, who narrowed the goo-
golplex value to 10^10^100. No matter how they are defined, goo-
gols and googolplexes are very big numbers.
In 1996, Page and Brin were graduate students at Stanford University in Menlo
Park. They were working on an interesting project called the Stanford Digital
Library Project. The goal of the project was to create an integrated universal digit-
al library.
As part of the research on the Stanford library project, Page and Brin explored
web links and developed interesting and powerful algorithms for web searching
based on back links. They were not quite alone in the field since another researcher
named Robin Li had a similar idea. Later, Li would patent his algorithms and cre-
ate Baidu, his own company and search engine in China.
There were other and competing methods of web searching besides Google, but
Google tended to provide good results quickly, and it gained prominence. Google
also began to generate serious revenues by allowing ads that were related to spe-
cific keyword searches. Although Brin and Page had originally opposed ads, they
finally decided that revenues were needed and ads were the most effective way of
getting it.
Google had several rounds of private and venture funding prior to going public
with an IPO. Most Google employees were also stockholders, so the reporting re-
quirements for Google were already quite strenuous.
On August 19, 2004, Google had a successful IPO and sold more than 19 mil-
lion shares at $85 per share. Google was on its way to becoming a software giant.
By the end of 2004, Google and its partners were processing almost 85% of all
web searches. There were competitors such as Yahoo, but Google was the elephant
in the room. Later, Microsoft would create its own Bing search engine. Yet other
sophisticated forms of search engines are emerging such as Wolfram Alpha.
Search WWH ::
Custom Search