THE ETYMOLOGY NERD
  • Home
  • ALGOSPEAK
  • Infographics
    • Interactive Map
  • EVENTS
  • MORE
    • Shop
    • Media/publicity
    • Blog (Archived)

GOOGLE IT

11/15/2016

0 Comments

 
 Some of you may have read Andrew Clement's The Frindle as a kid. Turns out that's pretty much what happened with google.  The term googol (note the different spelling) was invented by a nine year old in the 1940s (kind of makes sense if you think about it), whose mathematician father "borrowed" the term to describe a number one followed by a hundred zeroes. Googolplex was also coined at the same time, describing ten raised to the power of googol. Later, in 1997, as Alphabet founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin were aspiring to create a search service, Larry suggested the name googolplex for their new site. Sergey agreed, after they both decided to shorten it to googol, however he misspelled it when entering the new domain name. The rest is history. Meanwhile, there's an apocryphal story that Microsoft's Bing search engine stood for "But It's Not Google." Microsoft has not commented on this, but it is likely false. "Bing" came from French around the nineteen hundreds and means "a small bang." Compared to google, maybe that's what it is.
0 Comments



Leave a Reply.

    AUTHOR

    Picture
    Hello! I'm Adam Aleksic. I have a linguistics degree from Harvard University, where I co-founded the Harvard Undergraduate Linguistics Society and wrote my thesis on Serbo-Croatian language policy. In addition to etymology, I also really enjoy traveling, trivia, philosophy, board games, conlanging, and art history. 

    Archives

    December 2023
    May 2022
    March 2022
    February 2022
    January 2022
    December 2021
    November 2021
    July 2021
    June 2021
    May 2021
    April 2021
    March 2021
    February 2021
    January 2021
    December 2020
    November 2020
    October 2020
    September 2020
    August 2020
    July 2020
    June 2020
    May 2020
    April 2020
    March 2020
    February 2020
    January 2020
    December 2019
    November 2019
    October 2019
    September 2019
    August 2019
    July 2019
    June 2019
    May 2019
    April 2019
    March 2019
    February 2019
    January 2019
    December 2018
    November 2018
    October 2018
    September 2018
    August 2018
    July 2018
    June 2018
    May 2018
    April 2018
    March 2018
    February 2018
    January 2018
    December 2017
    November 2017
    October 2017
    September 2017
    August 2017
    July 2017
    June 2017
    May 2017
    April 2017
    March 2017
    February 2017
    January 2017
    December 2016
    November 2016

    TAGS

    All
    Interview
    Satire

Picture
CONTACT: [email protected]
SUBSTACK • TIKTOK • INSTAGRAM • YOUTUBE
I do not have a facebook account that's an impostor
  • Home
  • ALGOSPEAK
  • Infographics
    • Interactive Map
  • EVENTS
  • MORE
    • Shop
    • Media/publicity
    • Blog (Archived)