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Culture June 22, 2017
We still remember you, BackRub.
According to a lot of articles on the evolution of Google, its first logo was created in 1998 when Google was first introduced to the modern world.
Not many people know this, but the first Google logo was a part of a Stanford University research project in 1996. So what happened to Google in the gap between 1996 and 1998?
The first Google logo in 1996 was created by Larry Page and Sergey Brin and was only used in Stanford. According to Business Insider, Google was initially called “BackRub” because it analyzed the web’s “back links” and how important a website was and related links to that site.
The search engine was getting too big to just be used internally at Stanford so Page and Brin felt the need to change the name to something that would make present what BackRub was really capable of.
The name “Google” was constructed by the help of Sean Anderson who suggested the name “Googolplex.” Page thought “Googol” would be a better fit as Googol is the number one followed by 100 zeroes.
Anderson checked to see if that domain was taken but accidentally searched “Google” which Page ended up liking better. Page and Brin registered the domain on September 15. 1997. With that, the first Google logo was created.
When Page showed up to Stanford he chose Terry Winograd as his advisor who pushed for the idea of BackRub for Page’s research project. According to Wired, Page was first attracted to the mathematical side of the web. Page didn’t like that you didn’t know what sites were linking back to whatever you were searching and he wanted to know what was linking to what.
Page and Brin created a system that rewarded links that were important and penalized the ones that were not. They wanted to manage the number of links in a particular site and the number of links into each of the linking sites. They found a way to put the more popular sites on top and the least popular sites on the bottom.
The difference between BackRub and other search engines of that time was that if you searched something in let’s say, AltaVista or Excite, irrelevant websites would come up. BackRub used PageRanking instead of just looking at the text of the website.
Page transformed his room into an equipment room and Brin’s room was turned into an office and programming center. They quickly learned that managing a search engine isn’t easy peasy if you didn’t have an efficient number of funds available, so they borrowed money. Offers of turning Google into a bigger company emerged and Page and Brin took a risk and decided to go with it. Google is now the most popular search engine in the world.
Google is constantly making changes to their logo and has even changed their name a few times. BackRub to Google to Alphabet, who knows what changes they’re going to be making next?
But all in all, Google has remained a prominent search engine and it all started with two young students. Makes me really believe that you are capable of whatever you set your mind to.
Who knows, you might just be the next Page and Brin.
