Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin originally named their revolutionary search engine algorithm "BackRub" in 1996 because the system checked backlinks to estimate the importance of a site.

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Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin originally named their revolutionary search engine algorithm "BackRub" in 1996 because the system checked backlinks to estimate the importance of a site. They operated under this somewhat creepy, massage-parlor-sounding moniker on Stanford's servers for over a year before realizing it wasn't exactly boardroom material and rebranding to Google. Just take a moment to imagine a timeline where you have to tell your aging parents to go "BackRub" their medical symptoms, inadvertently making the internet sound even more like a chaotic digital fever dream than it already does

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Google founders Larry Page and Sergey Brin originally named their revolutionary search engine algorithm "BackRub" in 1996 because the system checked backlinks to estimate the importance of a site.

A closer look

A bigger world.One discoveryat a time.

Keep exploring

Why internet lag is rare in South Korea

Astronauts aboard the International Space Station experience severe internet lag, dealing with connection speeds that are often worse than dial-up.

Google handles billions of frantic questions every day

Larry Page and Sergey Brin built the first Google server storage enclosure entirely out of Lego bricks in 1996 because they were broke Stanford students who needed a cheap,…

Every Google search leaves a carbon footprint

Russell Seitz, a physicist, calculated that the physical weight of all the moving electrons that make up the entire internet is roughly fifty grams, which is approximately the same mass as a single strawberry.

A bigger world.
One discovery
at a time.