Google: A Selective History
January 16, 2017
If you want a selective history of Google, you will want to print out and hang on your wall “Almost Everything You Need to Know About Google’s History.” I would not be surprised is the pride of place goes to a diploma from a University of Phoenix type outfit, but that’s just an assumption on my part. I would point out that there are a few omissions which the Google watchers of the world might want to note. I pulled a few from my back file but I think these are important:
- The idea for Web search which actually included more than a small percentage of accessible Web servers was an old one. The Googley part of Google took inspiration from AltaVista and Jon Kleinberg, one of the IBM Almaden team which did Clever
- Google bought Applied Linguistics, formerly Oingo. That was an important deal just like Google’s purchase of Transformic
- The monetization of Google via AdWords was “inspired” by GoTo.com/Overture.com which Yahoo owned. Prior to the IPO, the GOOG settled out of court for about $1 billion.
Three omissions of this magnitude give you a good idea of how many pivot points have been left out of the carnival ride. Almost covers a great deal of ground, just like some roller coaster cars which jump off tracks.
Stephen E Arnold, January 16, 2017
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