Ye Olde Google Gallery

[schild]

So, I was going through my old backups just to find out what was on a bunch of discs. Actually got to throw away about 70 discs. Yay spindles. Anyway, for your consideration:

The graphical stylings of Google from start to April 2000.

lolololol AWESOME ART

[schild]

Looks like some of these are fan art from back in the day. Still - hilarious and HORRIBLE

[Chenghiz]

Wow, some of those are really bargain basement.

[stray]

Just the original Google logo was crap to me at first (it's grown on me though). I remember when they first came out, I never thought they'd get anywhere.

[Krakrok]

I never used Google or even heard of them until around 2002. Except I think they were the backend for Yahoo's search.

[Righ]

Very briefly. Yahoo! started as a directory only, and Yahoo! Search was initially a search interface to their edited directory. Their first pukka search engine was Inktomi's product. They switched to Google for a couple of months, and then bought out the ailing Inktomi.

Pants logos and questionable name notwithstanding, Google was very obviously digital crack from the earliest public beta on Stanford's site. Valid criticisms were made of its simpler interface which didn't allow savvy researchers to make highly sophisticated boolean queries. However, the fact that simple searches yielded better results than those of its competitors along with the impressive speed on unremarkable hardware meant it was more useful for most people.

[Sky]

We were using Google pretty early here at the library for exactly that reason. While 'right-thinking' librarians were using engines with more sophisticated search controls, I think mostly because they could pontificate on the controls rather than the results. Librarians...they funny. Dogpile was a big one for a while, too.

[Signe]

Those were fun.  I enjoyed Schildy's stroll down memory lane.   

[Murgos]

However, the fact that simple searches yielded better results than those of its competitors along with the impressive speed on unremarkable hardware meant it was more useful for most people.

This, most probably don't remember the shit-tastic-ness of internet search before Google cleaned the place up.  Search engines to search other search engines so that you could sort through thousands of responses in the hopes that one actually had something close to useful.  Basically, any search just lead you to 50 pages of spam sites, Google tends to give you something reasonably close to what you are looking for.  Considering all the millions and millions of pages out there, whole libraries online, ridiculous quantities of technical papers, blogs and etc... we still do not really have a truly adept search engine.

[voodoolily]

I used to use Dogpile for all of my searched, ell oh ell. 

[stray]

I think I used Hotbot quite a bit.

I actually browsed directories a lot back then too (like Yahoo).

[Xuri]

Hotbot --> Altavista --> AlltheWeb --> Google --> AlltheWeb for me

I prefer AlltheWeb over Google, as I feel it has a cleaner interface and better presentation of search results.

Actually started using it back in the day when it rivalled Google for database size and search speed. Also, it was made by Norwegians, so I thought I ought to support them ;)

To quote Wikipedia:

AlltheWeb had a few advantages over Google, such as a fresher database, more advanced search features, search clustering and a completely customizable look.

They were bought up by Overture though, which itself was taken over by Yahoo!, so nowadays they use the Yahoo! database. But I still like it =P

[Fordel]

I went something like AOL default ( ), Yahoo, then Alta Vista when I got 'serious' about searching. I honestly can't pin point when or where Google became the default for me.

I think when my browser's new built in search bar defaulted to Google might be it... but really, I can't say.


This is going to bother me now.

[FatuousTwat]

I think Altavista was my first... It was around 18 years ago, so it's hard to remember. Used Dogpile, Ask Jeeves, Metacrawler, and now Google.

[HaemishM]

Lycos to Hotbot to Altavista to Google for me. There were a few other nonentities in there that I can't remember but Google has pretty much been THE search engine for as long as I can remember. Most of the original search engines got bought by somebody and turned into shitty portals like Yahoo.

[Samwise]

I think I went from Yahoo to Webcrawler to Altavista to Alltheweb to Google.  I'm actually surprised to hear that alltheweb is still around; I'd assumed Google had completely eaten their lunch.

[Fraeg]

webcrawler to hotbot to google for me.  Though I think there were some other random things sprinkled in there.

I can remember searches being like a puzzle as i kept rewording my searches in the hopes of actually getting something useful.