Google's 15th Year

By: Sophie Curtis

Today marks exactly 15 years since Google was incorporated by founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin. To mark the occasion, The Telegraph has come up with a list of 15 things you probably didn't know about Google.

Originally known as BackRub, Google was founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin in a friend's garage while they were Ph.D. students at Stanford University. It has since grown to become the world's biggest search engine, and the name Google has become synonymous with search.

With the help of digital agencies TH_NK and Mindshare, The Telegraph has compiled a list of 15 weird and wonderful facts about the technology giant:

1. Google was named thanks to the misspelling of the word googol, which means a one followed by one-hundred zeros.

2. Google's first ever Tweet in February 2009 read: "I'm 01100110 01100101 01100101 01101100 01101001 01101110 01100111 00100000 01101100 01110101 01100011 01101011 01111001 00001010." For anyone not fluent in binary, it reads: "I'm feeling lucky."

3. The "I'm Feeling Lucky" button, which bypasses the results page and takes users directly to the first result of their search, is nearly never used. However, in trials it was found that removing it would somehow reduce the Google experience. It has been estimated to cost Google around $100 million in lost advertising revenue every year.

4. Google rents out goats from a company called California Grazing to help cut down the amount of weeds and brush at Google HQ. The operation of 200 goats (plus herder and a border collie) is kind to the environment, and as Google puts it: "A lot cuter to watch than lawn mowers.

5. Google loves food. Brin and Page have said that no Googler should ever be more than 100 feet from a micro-kitchen with snacks and food. The first chef that Google employed earned $26 million from his stock options.

6. The first Google doodle was a Burning Man symbol. Page Brin went to the Burning Man festival in 1998 and added the doodle to let users know they were away from the office that weekend.

7. The main reason the Google home page is so bare is due to the fact that the founders didn’t know HTML and just wanted a quick interface. In fact it was noted that the submit button was a long time coming and hitting the return key was the only way kick-start the search function.

8. At Google HQ there are a number of peculiar sights including a gigantic T-Rex skeleton – nicknamed "Stan" after a "real" dino found nearby – that looms menacingly at Googlers in Mountain View. There is also a scale replica of the SpaceShipOne, enormous Android-themed models, pink flamingos, a large LEGO man, Google-coloured phone boxes and grown-up size ball pits.

9. Google advocates bringing dogs to work and there is even a “company dog” called Yoshka. Yoshka accompanies Urs Holzle, senior VP operations and Google Fellow to the Googleplex.

10. Some core Google services went down recently for 5 mins, causing worldwide internet traffic to drop off by a pretty huge 40 per cent.

11. New employees, called Noogles, are initiated by having to wear a propeller beanie cap on their first Friday.

12. Until recently, Google employees were encouraged to use 20 per cent of their time working on their own projects. However, the innovative management technique – which gave rise to some of Google's biggest projects including AdSense, Gmail, Google Transit, Google News and Google Talk – has now been sidelined, according to sources.

13. Two searches on Google produces about 14g of CO2, or the same amount as boiling a kettle, according to a Harvard University academic. However, Google disputes this and say it’s closer to 0.2g (or 0.003kWh) per search.

14. If you go to www.google.co.uk/settings/ads you can see all the interest categories that Google have put you in based on your search history and browsing behaviours.

15. Company corporate philosophies include "you can make money without doing evil," "you can be serious without a suit," and "work should be challenging and the challenge should be fun."

"Google's contribution to the world is truly awesome. Not in the popularised version of the word, but in the etymological definition of 'that which inspires awe or terror'. They're living proof and inspiration that a single business can have a transformative impact on, not just a business sector but, how billions of people fundamentally live their lives… and still find time to add charming touches like the Google Doodle," said Ramzi Yakob, strategist at digital agency TH_NK.

"Its early days of setting the golden standard for searching for stuff online never even hinted at what it may, one day, become. With fingers in, what seems like, every conceivable pie, it has changed the shape of the mobile industry, led the charge on a proposed 'renewable energy tariff' and is pretty close to innovating and lobbying driverless cars into reality."

"With 45,000 people in their employ, there's no one person or small set of people that could take credit for this, and this is where a lesson for our industry, perhaps, lies. Should we look to icons, like Steve Jobs, for leadership inspiration to expertly craft a product? Or would we be better served by studying, and fostering a business culture that gives us license to creatively, and intelligently solve any problem that we feel passionate about?"

The Telegraph, Image: Google