September 27: Google celebrates its 21st birthday

Google celebrated its 21^st birthday on September 27, 2019, with a doodle of a vintage computer and a Google homepage on it.

When was Google founded?

Google was founded by PhD students Larry Page and Sergey Brin at Stanford University. They named its “Googol”. Googol is a mathematical term and it equals to 10 raised to the power of 100.

The controversy

Google registered its company on September 15, 1997. Hence, many consider that this is the official birth date of Google. It filed for an incorporation on September 4, 1998 and hence it is also considered as one of its birth dates by many others.

However, since 2006 Google has celebrated its birthday on September 27. In 2005, it was on September 26 and on September 7 the year before. The previous years had different dates.

Traditionally Google makes its birthday on the Google home page on September 27. This is because, Google actually is unaware of its exact launch date.

Why was September 27 chosen?

Google agreed to the confusion over its birthday in 2013. It assented to the fact that it celebrated its birthday on four different dates! However, September 27 had been stuck because the first birthday doodle was used on that day in 2002.

When was the first Google Doodle launched?

The first Doodle was launched on August 30, 1998. Google was young then with Yahoo and Bing as its heavy competitors. The first doodle marked the Burning man festival.

About Burning man festival

Burning man is an annual festival held in the western US. Every year a temporary city is erected in the Black Rock desert in Nevada. It is being celebrated since 1986. At the festival, the community explores various artistic expressions. The purpose of the event is to generate a society that connects individuals to his or her creative powers.

Google in India and China

Over 75% of 25 million regular internet users prefer Google search engine over other search engines.

On the other hand, Google is banned in China. The other websites banned in China include Facebook, YouTube, Picasa, Maps, Docs, drive, Dropbox, Flickr, etc. China has strict censorship policy. This is because the Chinese government controls the internet, restricts, bans and deleted content that are not in the interest of the state. China has legal and administrative regulations for internet surfing. The Cyberspace administration of China takes care of the blocking and censorship.

Month: Current Affairs - September, 2019