Google celebrates 20 years, walks down memory lane
New Delhi, Sep 27: Google on Thursday turned 20 and celebrated it with a nostalgic video feature of interesting searches through the years -- from holidays, events, achievements and people to the best dance moves, food to eat, planets and languages.
Google has answered all our queries since it came into being in 1998 as a research project by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, both Ph.D. students at the Stanford University, US.
The new search engine had a bold mission to organise the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful.
Over the years it changed drastically -- going from being a simple search engine to a global tech titan and offering searches in more than 150 languages in over 190 countries -- though there has been one thing that that has remained constant from the very first day: the homepage Doodle.
Thursday's video Doodle took a stroll down the memory lane exploring popular searches all over the world throughout the last two decades -- whether it be the status of your favourite object orbiting the sun, the latest on the world's biggest events, or the meaning of love.
Although more than 2,000 Doodles have adorned its homepage, Google has kept its site looking fresh by creating different variations of its logo, inspired by cultural icons, events and phenomena such as Pac-Man, the birth of hip-hop and more, Google said in a statement.
Its first Doodle was created before the company was even incorporated. A few days before its official launch, the Burning Man-inspired logo was put on the homepage as an away message -- that's how Page and Brin let people know they were heading to the festival.
It had taken two years for Google Doodles to get animated. On October 31, 2000, the first Doodle with motion graphics arrived to celebrate Halloween. The O's in the logo were replaced by tiny jack-o'-lanterns, and a spider dangled between the "L" and "E".
On November 13, 2009, it celebrated the discovery of water on Moon, on August 11, 2017, it celebrated 44 years of the birth of Hip-Hop. Going coutry specific it has over the years celebrated national and cultural icons.
In 2018, Google made its first VR Doodle celebrating the life of Georges Melies, an early film pioneer. It was a 360-degree experience that did not need a VR headset to enjoy. It was nominated for an Emmy in 2018.
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Ex-minister Ramanath Rai hits out at BJP leader Ashoka for ‘irresponsible’ comments on KC Venugopal
Mangaluru: Congress leader and former minister B Ramanath Rai slammed BJP leader R Ashoka for calling AICC General Secretary KC Venugopal an agent of the party high command, and asked if the general secretary and other office-bearers in the BJP were commission agents too.
Rai, who addressed a press meet at the Congress office in the city on Friday, expressed fury over the recent comments of the BJP leader that Chief Minister Siddaramaiah was presenting himself in a shameless manner in public life. Ashoka, who is also Leader of the Opposition (LoP) in the Karnataka Legislative Assembly, had said that the Congress government had ‘broken every previous record on corruption-related controversies’.
“Ashoka has spoken with sheer ignorance and displays his lack of maturity, as he often does while facing the media. KC Venugopal has been working at organization of the party and it is unbecoming of Ashoka to criticize Venugopal as he did,” Rai told reporters.
“Being in a responsible position, how acceptable is it for Ashoka to pass disrespectful, random comments about another leader who also holds a responsible position? If KC Venugopal is indeed an agent of the party high command, what should we consider BJP leaders to be? Are they brokers?” he asked
Commenting on Ashoka’s allegations of corruption in the Congress government in Karnataka, Rai pointed out, “The KSRTC land was sold to private parties when he (Ashoka) was transport minister. We can find several such cases across the state, which need to be probed.”
The former minister, however, refused to comment on the incident that occurred at Mangaluru airport during CM Siddaramaiah’s visit to the city recently.
Former mayors Ashraf and Shashidhar Hegde, Congress activists Vishwas Kumar Das, Subhodaya Alva, Shabeer, Baby Kundar, Padmanabha, Nazeer Bajal and Prem were present.
