Standalone applications Google

* AdWords Editor [1] (Mac OS X (10.4), Windows 2000 SP3+/XP/Vista)

Desktop application to manage a users Google AdWords account. The application allows users to make changes to their account and advertising campaigns before synchronising with the online service.

* Desktop [2] (Linux, Mac OS X, Windows 2000 SP3+/XP/Vista)

Desktop search application, that indexes e-mails, documents, music, photos, chats, Web history and other files. It allows the installation of Google Gadgets.

* Earth [3] (Linux, Mac OS X and Windows 2000/XP/Vista)

Virtual globe that uses satellite imagery, aerial photography and GIS over a 3D globe.

* Gmail/Google Notifier [4] (Mac OS X, Windows 2000/XP)

Alerts the user of new messages in their Gmail account.

* Hello [5] (Windows 98/ME/2000/XP)

Allows users to send images across the Internet and publish them to blogs.

* Pack [6] (Windows XP/Vista)

Collection of computer applications -- some Google-created, some not -- including Google Earth, Google Desktop, Picasa, Google Talk, Star Office and Mozilla Firefox.

* Photos Screensaver [7]

Slideshow screensaver as part of Google Pack, which displays images sourced from a hard disk, or through RSS and Atom Web feeds.

* Picasa [8] (Linux and Windows 2000/XP/Vista)

Photo organization and editing application, providing photo library options and simple effects.

* Picasa 2

Photo organization and editing application, providing even more options and effects than Picasa.

* Picasa Web Albums Uploader [9] (Mac OS X)

An application to help uploading images to the "Picasa Web Albums" service It consists of both an iPhoto plug-in and a stand-alone application.

* Secure Access [10] (Windows 2000/XP)

VPN client for Google WiFi users, whose equipment does not support WPA or 802.1x protocols

* SketchUp [11] (Mac OS X and Windows 2000/Windows XP)

Simple 3D sketching program with unique dragging interface and direct integration with Google Earth.

* Talk [12] (Windows 2000/Windows XP/Server 2003/Vista)

Application for VoIP and instant messaging. It consists of both a service and a client used to connect to the service, which uses the XMPP protocol.

* Video Player [13] (Mac OS X/Windows 2000/XP)

Video player to watch videos from Google Video, including unique resume and download features. (Also included in Google Pack.)

* Web Accelerator [14] (Windows 2000 SP3+/XP/Vista)

Uses various caching technologies to increase load speed of web pages.

[edit] Desktop extensions

These products created by Google are extensions to software created by other organizations.

* Blogger Web Comments [15] (Firefox extension)

Displays related comments from other Blogger users.

* Browser Sync [16] (Firefox extension)

Saves browser settings for backup and use on other installations of Mozilla Firefox.

* Dashboard Widgets for Mac [17] (Mac OS X Dashboard Widgets)

Collection of mini-applications including Gmail, Blogger and Search History.

* Pinyin IME [18] (Internet Explorer extension) (Google China)

Input Method Editor that is used to convert Chinese Pinyin characters, which can be entered on Western-style keyboards, to Chinese characters.

* Send to Phone [19] (Web and Firefox extension)

Allows users to send text messages to their mobile phone (US only) about web content.

* Toolbar [20] (Firefox and Internet Explorer extension)

Web browser toolbar with features such as a Google Search box, phishing protection, pop-up blocker as well as the ability for website owners to create buttons.

[edit] Mobile products

[edit] Online mobile products

These products must be accessed through a browser on a mobile device.

* Blogger Mobile [21]

Only available on some US networks. Allows you to post to your Blogger blog from a mobile device.

* Calendar [22]

Read a list of all Google Calendar events from a mobile device. There is also the option to quickly add events to your personal calendar.

* Gmail [23]

Access a Gmail account from a mobile device using a standard mobile web browser. Alternatively, Google provides a specific mobile application to access and download Gmail messages quicker.

* News [24]

Access Google News on a mobile device using a simpler interface compared to the full online application.

* Google Mobilizer[25]

Makes any web page mobile-friendly.

* iGoogle [26]

Simple version of iGoogle - you must visit the information page to choose which modules to display on your personal mobile version as not all modules are compatible.

* Product Search [27]

Updated version of the previous Froogle Mobile

* Reader [28]

View Google Reader on a mobile device.

* Mobile search [29]

Search web pages, images, local listings and mobile-specific web pages through the Google search engine. If a webpage is not tailored for a mobile device Google will provide a simple text version of the webpage generated using an algorithm.

* Picasa Web Albums [30]

Lets you view photo albums that you have stored online.

[edit] Downloadable mobile products

These products must be downloaded and run from a mobile device.

* Gmail mobile [31]

A downloadable application that has many advantages over accessing Gmail through a web interface on a mobile such as the ability to interact with Gmail features including labels and archiving. Requires a properly configured Java Virtual Machine, which is not available by default on some platforms (such as Palm's Treo).

* Maps Mobile [32]

Mobile application for viewing maps on a mobile device. Unlike other Mobile Google products, mobile Maps is available in non-Java versions, avoiding the difficulties with getting a Java Runtime Environment installed and properly configured on the mobile device. Maps mobile is currently available in versions for Blackberry devices, Windows Mobile and Palm OS smartphones.

* Google Talk (Blackberry Exclusive) [33]

A Mobile application to stay connected your contacts while you're away from your computer. The Google Talk application for BlackBerry® smartphones, is offered by BlackBerry®. Just browse to http://www.blackberry.com/GoogleTalk (from your blackberry browser) to download the free application. Google Talk on the BlackBerry® smartphone uses the same familiar interface for your Google Apps contact list, so you can quickly see who's online and instant message with them from anywhere (in real time). This application is free, but carrier charges may apply. (If you have a data plan with your carrier, this is sufficient, Google Talk only uses data.)

[edit] Web products

These products must be accessed via a Web browser.

[edit] Advertising

* AdSense [34]

Advertisement program for Website owners. Adverts generate revenue on either a per-click or per-thousand-ads-displayed basis, and are adverts shown are from AdWords users, depending on which adverts are relevant.

* AdWords [35]

Google's flagship advertising product, and main source of revenue. AdWords offers pay-per-click (PPC) advertising, and site-targeted advertising for both text and banner ads.

* AdWords Website Optimizer [36]

Integrated AdWords tool for testing different website content, in order to gain to the most successful advertising campaigns.

* Audio Ads [37]

Radio advertising program for US businesses. Google began to roll this product out en masse on 15 May 2007 through its exisiting AdWords interface.

* Click-to-Call [38]

Calling system so users can call advertisers for free at Google's expense from search results pages.

* Grants [39]

Scheme for non-profit organizations to benefit from free Cost-Per-Click advertising on the AdWords network.

* TV Ads [40]

CPM-driven television advertising scheme available on a trial basis, currently aimed towards professional advertisers, agencies and partners.

[edit] Communication & Publishing

* 3D Warehouse [41]

Google 3D Warehouse is an online service that hosts 3D models of existing objects, locations (including buildings) and vehicles created in Google SketchUp by the aforementioned application's users. The models can be downloaded into Google SketchUp by other users or Google Earth.

* Apps [42]

Custom domain and service integration service for businesses, enterprise and education, featuring Gmail and other Google products.

* Blogger [43]

Weblog publishing tool. Users can create a custom, hosted blogs with features such as photo publishing, comments, group blogs, blogger profiles and mobile-based posting with little technical knowledge.

* Calendar [44]

Free online calendar. It includes a unique "quick add" function which allows users to insert events using natural language input. Other features include Gmail integration and calendar sharing. It is similar to those offered by Yahoo! and MSN.

* Docs [45]

Document, spreadsheet and presentation application, with document collaboration and publishing capabilities.

* Dodgeball [46]

Social networking site built specifically for use on mobile phones. Users text their location to the service, which then notifies them of crushes, friends, friends' friends and interesting venues nearby.

* FeedBurner [47]

News feed management services, including feed traffic analysis and advertising facilities.

* Gadgets [48]

Mini-applications designed to display information or provide a function in a succinct manner. Available in Universal or Desktop format.

* Gmail [49] (Also known as Google Mail)

Free Webmail and POP e-mail service provided by Google, known for its abundant storage and advanced interface. It was first released in an invitation-only form on April 1, 2004. Mobile access and Google Talk integration is also featured.

* GrandCentral [50]

Free voice communications product that includes a POTS telephone number. It includes a follow-me service that allows the user to forward their GrandCentral phone number to simultaneously ring up to 6 other phone numbers. It also features a unified voice mail service.

* iGoogle [51] (Previously Google Personalized Homepage)

Customizable homepage, which can contain Web feeds and Google Gadgets, launched in May 2005. It was renamed to iGoogle on April 30, 2007 (previously used internally by Google).

* Joga Bonito [52]

Soccer community site, similar to services such as MySpace, in that each member has a profile, and can join groups based on shared interests. The service allows a user to meet other fans, create games and clubs, access athletes from Nike, and watch and upload video clips and photos.

* JotSpot [53]

Application wiki company that offers enterprise social software and was founded by Joe Kraus and Graham Spencer, co-founders of Excite. The product is targeted mainly to small and medium-sized businesses. It was acquired by Google on October 31, 2006.

* Notebook [54]

Web clipping application for saving online research. The tool permits users to clip text, images, and links from pages while browsing, save them online, access them from any computer, and share them with others.

* Marratech e-Meeting

Web conferencing software, used internally by Google's employees. Google acquired the software from creator Marratech on April 19, 2007. Google has not yet stated what it will do with the product.

* Orkut [55]

Social networking service, where users can list their personal and professional information, create relationships amongst friends and join communities of mutual interest. In November 2006, Google opened Orkut registration to everyone, instead of being invitation only.

* Page Creator [56]

Webpage-publishing program, which can be used to create pages and to host them on Google's servers.

* Picasa Web Albums [57]

Online photo sharing, with integration with the main Picasa program..

* Reader [58]

Web-based news aggregator, capable of reading Atom and RSS feeds. It allows the user to search, import and subscribe to feeds. The service also embeds audio enclosures in the page. Major revisions to Google Reader were made in October 2006.

* Shared Stuff [59]

Web page sharing system, incorporating a Share bookmarklet to share pages, as well as a page for viewing the most popular shared items. Pages can also be shared through third party applications, such as del.icio.us or Facebook.

* Questions and Answers [60] (Google Russia Only)

Community-driven knowledge market website. Launched on June 26, 2007 that allows users to ask and answer questions posed by other users. [61]

* YouTube [62]

Popular free video sharing Web site which lets users upload, view, and share video clips. In October 2006, Google, Inc., announced that it had reached a deal to acquire the company for $1.65 billion USD in Google's stock. The deal closed on 13 November 2006.

[edit] Development

* Code [63]

Google's site for developers interested in Google-related development. The site contains Open Source code and lists of their API services.

* Co-op [64]

Platform for users to expand and apply Google Search to specific sites and topics, using Custom Search Engine, Subscribed Links and Topics.

* Gears [65]

An extension for Firefox and a plug-in for Internet Explorer that supports offline access to web applications.

* Mashup Editor [66]

Web Mashup creation with publishing facilities, as well as syntax highlighting and debugging.

* OpenSocial [67] A set of common APIs for building social applications on many websites.

* Webmaster Tools [68] (Previously Google Sitemaps)

Sitemap submission and analysis for the Sitemaps protocol. Renamed from Google Sitemaps to cover broader features, including query statistics and robots.txt analysis.

[edit] Mapping

* Maps [69]

Mapping service that indexes streets and satellite imagery, providing driving directions and local business search.

* Mars [70]

Imagery of Mars using the Google Maps interface. Elevation, visible imagery and infrared imagery can be shown. It was released on March 13, 2006, the anniversary of the birth of astronomer Percival Lowell.

* Moon [71]

NASA imagery of the moon through the Google Maps interface. It was launched on July 20, 2005, in honor of the first manned Moon landing on July 20, 1969.

* Ride Finder [72]

Taxi, limousine and shuttle search service, using real time position of vehicles in 14 US cities. Ride Finder uses the Google Maps interface and cooperates with any car service that wishes to participate.

* Transit [73]

Public transport trip planning through the Google Maps interface. Google Transit was released on December 7, 2005, and is now fully integrated with Google Maps.

(For Google Earth, see "Standalone applications")

[edit] Search

* Accessible Search [74]

Search engine for the blind and visually impaired. It prioritises usable and accessible web sites in the search results, so the user incurs minimal distractions when browsing.

* Alerts [75]

E-mail notification service, which sends alerts based on chosen search terms, whenever there are new results. Alerts include web results, Groups results news, and video.

* Base [76]

Google submission database, that enables content owners to submit content, have it hosted and make it searchable. Information within the database is organized using attributes.

* Blog search [77]

Weblog search engine, with a continuously-updated search index. Results include all blogs, not just those published through Blogger. Results can be viewed and filtered by date.

* Book Search [78] (Previously Google Print)

Search engine for the full text of printed books. Google scans and stores in its digital database. The content that is displayed depends on the arrangement with the publishers, ranging from short extracts to entire books.

* Catalogs [79]

Search engine for over 6,600 print catalogs, which are acquired through Optical character recognition.

* Checkout [80]

Online payment processing service provided by Google aimed at simplifying the process of paying for online purchases. Webmasters can choose to implement Google Checkout as a form of payment.

* Code Search [81]

Search engine for programming code found on the Internet.

* Directory [82]

Collection of links arranged into hierarchical subcategories. The links and their categorization are from the Open Directory Project, but are sorted using PageRank.

* Directory [83] (Google China)

Navigation directory, specifically for Chinese users.

* Experimental Search [84]

Options for testing new interfaces whilst searching with Google, including Timeline views and keyboard shortcuts.

* Finance [85]

Searchable US business news, opinion, and financial data. Features include company-specific pages, blog search, interactive charts, executives information, discussion groups and a portfolio.

* Groups [86]

Web and e-mail discussion service and Usenet archive. Users can join a group, make a group, publish posts, track their favorite topics, write a set of group web pages updatable by members and share group files. [87]. In January, 2007, version 3 of Google Groups was released. New features include the ability to create customised pages and share files.

* Image Labeler [88]

Game that induces participants to submit valid descriptions (labels) of images in the web, in order to later improve Image Search.

* Image Search [89]

Image search engine, with results based on the filename of the image, the link text pointing to the image and text adjacent to the image. When searching, a thumbnail of each matching image is displayed.

* Language Tools [90]

Collection of linguistic applications, including one that allows users to translate text or web pages from one language to another, and another that allows searching in web pages located in a specific country or written in a specific language.

* Life Search [91] (Google China)

Search engine tailored towards everyday needs, such as train times, recipes and housing.

* Movies [92]

A specialised search engine that obtains Film showing times near a user-entered location as well as providing reviews of films compiled from several different websites,

* Music Trends [93]

Music ranking of the songs played with iTunes, Winamp, Windows Media Player and Yahoo Music. Trends are generated by Google Talk's "share your music status" feature.

* News [94]

Automated news compilation service and search engine for news. There are versions of the aggregator for more than 20 languages. While the selection of news stories is fully automated, the sites included are selected by human editors.

* News Archive Search [95]

Feature within Google News, that allows users to browse articles from over 200 years ago.

* Patent Search [96]

Search engine to search through millions of patents, each result with its own page, including drawings, claims and citations.

* Product Search [97] (Previously Froogle)

Price engine that searches online stores, including auctions, for products.

* Rebang [98] (Google China)

Google China's search trend site, similar to Google Zeitgeist. Currently part of Google Labs.

* Scholar [99]

Search engine for the full text of scholarly literature across an array of publishing formats and scholarly fields. Today, the index includes virtually all peer-reviewed journals available online, except those published by Elsevier, the world's largest scientific publisher.

* SearchMash [100]

Search engine that means to "test innovative user interfaces." Among its features are the ability to display image results on the same page as web results, feedback about features, and continuous scrolling results. Aside from its privacy policy and terms of service, there is no Google branding on the site.

* Sets [101]

List of items generated when the user enters a few examples. For example, entering "Green, Purple, Red" produces the list "Green, Purple, Red, Blue, Black, White, Yellow, Orange, Brown."

* SMS [102]

Mobile phone short message service offered by Google in several countries, including the USA, Japan, Canada, Germany, Spain and formerly the UK. It allows search queries to be sent as a text message. The results are sent as a reply, with no premium charge for the service.

* Suggest [103]

Auto-completion in search results while typing to give popular searches.

* University Search [104]

Listings for search engines for University websites.

* U.S. Government Search [105]

Search engine and Personalized Homepage that exclusively draws from sites with a .gov TLD.

* Video [106]

Video search engine and online store for clips internally submitted by companies and the general public. Google's main video partnerships include agreements with CBS, NHL and the NBA. Also searches videos posted on YouTube.

* Voice Local Search [107]

Non-premium phone service for searching and contacting local businesses

* Web History [108] (Previously Google Search History / Personalized Search)

Web page tracking, which records Google searches, Web pages, images, videos, music and more. It also includes Bookmarks, search trends and item recommendations.

* Web Search [109]

Web search engine, which is Google's core product. It was the company's first creation, coming out of beta on September 21, 1999, and remains their most popular and famous service. It receives 1 billion requests a day and is the most used search engine on the Internet.

[edit] Statistics

* Analytics [110]

Traffic statistics generator for defined websites, with strong AdWords integration. Webmasters can optimize their ad campaigns, based on the statistics that are given. Analytics is based on the Urchin software and the new version released in May 2007 integrates improvements based on Measure Map.

* Gapminder [111]

Data trend viewing platform to make nations' statistics accessible on the internet in an animated, interactive graph form.

* Trends [112]

Graph plotting application for Web Search statistics, showing the popularity of particular search terms over time. Multiple terms can be shown at once. Results can also be displayed by city, region or language. Related news stories are also shown.

* Zeitgeist [113]

Collection of lists of the most frequent search queries. There are weekly, monthly and yearly lists, as well as topic and country specific lists. Closed 22 May 2007 and replaced by "Hot Trends, a dynamic feature in Google Trends".

[edit] Hardware products

* Google Search Appliance [114]

Hardware device that can be hooked to corporate intranets for indexing/searching of company files.

* Google Mini [115]

Reduced capacity and less expensive version of the Google Search Appliance

[edit] Previous products

Applications that have been discontinued by Google, either because of integration with other Google products, or through lack of support.

* Answers [116]

Question and answer service, allowing users to pay researchers to answer questions. Google announced the closing of service on November 28, 2006. All past discussions have been publicly archived.

* Deskbar

Bar on your desktop with a minibrowser build into it. It was discontinued when a very similar feature was added to Google desktop. Some people preferred Google deskbar for its ability to add custom searching and the mini-browser so you wouldn't have to open an actual window. The last release, version 9.95, had a .NET plugin for it.

* Free Search [117]

Free code to embed either web search or site search into another website. Discontinued in favour of Google Co-op's Custom Search Engine.

* Local

Local listings service, before it was integrated with mapping. The merged service was then called Google Local, which was further renamed to Google Maps due to popular demand.

* Personalized Search

Search results personalization, now fully merged with Google Accounts and Web History.

* Public Service Search [118]

Non-commercial organization service, which included free SiteSearch, traffic reports and unlimited search queries. Discontinued in February 2007 and re-directed to Google Co-op.

* Related Links

Script that places units for related Web content, including pages, searches and videos, on the owner's Website, through embedded code. Discontinued in July 2007.

* Spreadsheets

Spreadsheet management application, before it was integrated with Writely to form Google Docs & Spreadsheets. It was announced on 6 June 2006.

* Voice Search [119]

Automated voice system for searching the Web using the telephone. Now called Google Voice Local Search [120], it is currently integrated on the Google Mobile web site [121].

* Writely

Web-based word processor created by software company Upstartle, who were acquired by Google on March 9, 2006. On October 10, 2006, Writely was merged into Google Docs & Spreadsheets.

* Google X

Re-designed Google search homepage, using a Mac OS style interface. It appeared in Google Labs, but was removed the following day for undisclosed reasons.

Google Your Mind

Google Inc. (NASDAQ: GOOG and LSE: GGEA) is an American public corporation, specializing in Internet search and online advertising. The company is based in Mountain View, California, and has 15,916 full-time employees (as of September 30, 2007).[3] Google's mission statement is, "to organize the world's information and make it universally accessible and useful."[4] Google's corporate philosophy includes statements such as "Don't be evil", and "Work should be challenging and the challenge should be fun", illustrating a somewhat relaxed corporate culture. Google was co-founded by Larry Page and Sergey Brin while they were students at Stanford University and the company was first incorporated as a privately held company on September 7, 1998. Google's initial public offering took place on August 19, 2004, raising $1.67 billion, making it worth $23 billion. Through a series of new product developments, acquisitions and partnerships, the company has expanded its initial search and advertising business into other areas, including web-based email, online mapping, office productivity, and video sharing, among others.


History

Google in 1998Main article: History of Google
Google began as a research project in January 1996 by Larry Page and Sergey Brin, two Ph.D. students at Stanford University, California.[5] They hypothesized that a search engine that analyzed the relationships between websites would produce better results than existing techniques, which ranked results according to the number of times the search term appeared on a page.[6] Their search engine was originally nicknamed "BackRub" because the system checked backlinks to estimate a site's importance.[7] A small search engine called Rankdex was already exploring a similar strategy.[8] Convinced that the pages with the most links to them from other highly relevant web pages must be the most relevant pages associated with the search, Page and Brin tested their thesis as part of their studies, and laid the foundation for their search engine. Originally the search engine used the Stanford University website with the domain google.stanford.edu. The domain google.com was registered on September 15, 1997,[9] and the company was incorporated as Google Inc. on September 7, 1998 at a friend's garage in Menlo Park, California. The total initial investment raised for the new company eventually amounted to almost $1.1 million, including a $100,000 check by Andy Bechtolsheim, one of the founders of Sun Microsystems.[10]

In March 1998, the company moved into offices in Palo Alto, home to several other noted Silicon Valley technology startups.[11] After quickly outgrowing two other sites, the company leased a complex of buildings in Mountain View at 1600 Amphitheatre Parkway from Silicon Graphics (SGI) in 2003.[12] The company has remained at this location ever since, and the complex has since become known as the Googleplex (a play on the word googolplex, a 1 followed by a googol zeros). In 2006, Google bought the property from SGI for $319 million.[13]

The Google search engine attracted a loyal following among the growing number of Internet users, who liked its simple design and usability.[14] In 2000, Google began selling advertisements associated with search keywords.[5] The ads were text-based to maintain an uncluttered page design and to maximize page loading speed.[5] Keywords were sold based on a combination of price bid and clickthroughs, with bidding starting at $.05 per click.[5] This model of selling keyword advertising was pioneered by Goto.com (later renamed Overture Services, before being acquired by Yahoo! and rebranded as Yahoo! Search Marketing).[15][16][17] While many of its dot-com rivals failed in the new Internet marketplace, Google quietly rose in stature while generating revenue.[5]

The name "Google" originated from a misspelling of "googol,"[18][19] which refers to 10100 (the number represented by a 1 followed by one-hundred zeros). Having found its way increasingly into everyday language, the verb "google", was added to the Merriam Webster Collegiate Dictionary and the Oxford English Dictionary in 2006, meaning "to use the Google search engine to obtain information on the Internet."[20][21]

A patent describing part of Google's ranking mechanism (PageRank) was granted on September 4, 2001.[22] The patent was officially assigned to Stanford University and lists Lawrence Page as the inventor.


Financing and initial public offering
The first funding for Google as a company was secured in the form of a USD100,000 contribution from Andy Bechtolsheim, co-founder of Sun Microsystems, given to a corporation which did not yet exist.[23] Around six months later, a much larger round of funding was announced, with the major investors being rival venture capital firms Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers and Sequoia Capital.[23]

Google's initial public offering took place on August 19, 2004. 19,605,052 shares were offered at a price of $85 per share.[24] Of that, 14,142,135 (another mathematical reference as v2 ˜ 1.4142135) were floated by Google and 5,462,917 by selling stockholders. The sale raised $1.67 billion, and gave Google a market capitalization of more than $23 billion.[25] The vast majority of Google's 271 million shares remained under Google's control. Many of Google's employees became instant paper millionaires. Yahoo!, a competitor of Google, also benefited from the IPO because it owned 8.4 million shares of Google as of August 9, 2004, ten days before the IPO.[26]

Google's post-IPO stock performance has been very good as well, with shares surging to $500 by 2007, due to strong sales and earnings in the advertising market, as well as the release of new features like the desktop search function and personalized home page.[27] The surge in stock price is fueled primarily by individual investors, as opposed to large institutional investors and mutual funds.[27]

The company is listed on the NASDAQ stock exchange under the ticker symbol GOOG.


Growth
While the company's primary market is in the web content arena, Google has begun to experiment with other markets, such as radio and print publications. On January 17, 2006, Google announced that it had purchased the radio advertising company dMarc, which provides an automated system that allows companies to advertise on the radio.[28] This will allow Google to combine two niche advertising media—the Internet and radio—with Google's ability to laser-focus on the tastes of consumers. Google has also begun an experiment in selling advertisements from its advertisers in offline newspapers and magazines, with select advertisements in the Chicago Sun-Times.[29] They have been filling unsold space in the newspaper that would have normally been used for in-house advertisements.

Google was added to the S&P 500 index on March 30, 2006. Google replaced Burlington Resources, a major oil producer based in Houston which was acquired by ConocoPhillips.


Philanthropy
In 2004, Google formed a non-profit philanthropic wing, Google.org, giving it a starting fund of $1 billion.[30] The express mission of the organization is to help with the issues of climate change (see also global warming), global public health, and global poverty. Among its first projects is to develop a viable plug-in hybrid electric vehicle that can attain 100 mpg. The current director is Dr. Larry Brilliant.[31]


Acquisitions
See also: List of Google acquisitions
Since 2001, Google has acquired several small start-up companies, often consisting of innovative teams and products. One of the earlier companies that Google bought was Pyra Labs. They were the creators of Blogger, a weblog publishing platform, first launched in 1999. This acquisition led to many premium features becoming free. Pyra Labs was originally formed by Evan Williams, yet he left Google in 2004. In early 2006, Google acquired Upstartle, a company responsible for the online word processor, Writely. The technology in this product was used by Google to eventually create Google Docs & Spreadsheets.

In February 2006, software company Adaptive Path sold Measure Map, a weblog statistics application, to Google. Registration to the service has since been temporarily disabled. The last update regarding the future of Measure Map was made on April 6, 2006 and outlined many of the service's known issues.[32]

In late 2006, Google bought online video site YouTube for $1.65 billion in stock.[33] Shortly after, on October 31, 2006, Google announced that it had also acquired JotSpot, a developer of wiki technology for collaborative Web sites.[34]

On April 13, 2007, Google reached an agreement to acquire DoubleClick. Google agreed to buy the company for $3.1 billion.[35]

On July 9, 2007, Google announced that it had signed a definitive agreement to acquire enterprise messaging security and compliance company Postini.[36]


Partnerships
In 2005, Google entered into partnerships with other companies and government agencies to improve production and services. Google announced a partnership with NASA Ames Research Center to build up 1,000,000 square feet (93,000 m²) of offices and work on research projects involving large-scale data management, nanotechnology, distributed computing, and the entrepreneurial space industry.[37] Google also entered into a partnership with Sun Microsystems in October to help share and distribute each other's technologies.[38] The company entered into a partnership with Time Warner's AOL,[39] to enhance each other's video search services.

Also in 2005, the company became a major financial investor of the new .mobi top-level domain for mobile devices, in conjunction with several other companies, including Microsoft, Nokia, Ericcson, and others.[40] In September of 2007, Google launched, "Adsense for Mobile", a service to its publishing partners providing the ability to monetize their mobile websites through the targeted placement of mobile text ads,[41] and acquired the mobile social networking site, Zingku.mobi, to "provide people worldwide with direct access to Google applications, and ultimately the information they want and need, right from their mobile devices."[42]

In 2006, Google and News Corp.'s Fox Interactive Media entered into a $900 million agreement to provide search and advertising on the popular social networking site, MySpace.[43]


Products
Main article: List of Google products
Google has created services and tools for the general public and business environment alike; including Web applications, advertising networks and solutions for businesses.


Advertising
Most of Google's revenue is derived from advertising programs. For the 2006 fiscal year, the company reported $10.492 billion in total advertising revenues and only $112 million in licensing and other revenues.[44] Google AdWords allows Web advertisers to display advertisements in Google's search results and the Google Content Network, through either a cost-per-click or cost-per-view scheme. Google AdSense website owners can also display adverts on their own site, and earn money every time ads are clicked.


Applications
Google is well-known for its web search service, which is a major factor of the company's success. As of August 2007, Google is the most used search engine on the web with a 53.6% market share, ahead of Yahoo! (19.9%) and Live Search (12.9%).[45] Google indexes billions of Web pages, so that users can search for the information they desire, through the use of keywords and operators. Google has also employed the Web Search technology into other search services, including Image Search, Google News, the price comparison site Google Product Search, the interactive Usenet archive Google Groups, Google Maps and more.

In 2004, Google launched its own free web-based email service, known as Gmail.[46] Gmail features spam-filtering technology and the capability to use Google technology to search email. The service generates revenue by displaying advertisements from the AdWords service that are tailored to the content of the email messages displayed on screen.

In early 2006, the company launched Google Video, which not only allows users to search and view freely available videos but also offers users and media publishers the ability to publish their content, including television shows on CBS, NBA basketball games, and music videos.[47] In August 2007, Google announced that it would shut down its video rental and sale program and offer refunds and Google Checkout credits to consumers who had purchased videos to own.

Google has also developed several desktop applications, including Google Earth, an interactive mapping program powered by satellite and aerial imagery that covers the vast majority of the planet. Google Earth is generally considered to be remarkably accurate and extremely detailed. Many major cities have such detailed images that one can zoom in close enough to see vehicles and pedestrians clearly. Consequently, there have been some concerns about national security implications. Specifically, some countries and militaries contend the software can be used to pinpoint with near-precision accuracy the physical location of critical infrastructure, commercial and residential buildings, bases, government agencies, and so on. However, the satellite images are not necessarily frequently updated, and all of them are available at no charge through other products and even government sources (NASA and the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, for example.) Some counter this argument by stating that Google Earth makes it easier to access and research the images.

Many other products are available through Google Labs, which is a collection of incomplete applications that are still being tested for use by the general public.

Google has promoted their products in various ways. In London, Google Space was set-up in Heathrow Airport, showcasing several products, including Gmail, Google Earth and Picasa.[48][49] Also, a similar page was launched for American college students, under the name College Life, Powered by Google.[50]

In 2007, some reports surfaced that Google was planning the release of its own mobile phone, possibly a competitor to Apple's iPhone.[51][52][53] The project may be a collaboration between Google and Orange, HTC, Samsung, or another manufacturer. However, very little is known about the project and most of the information available is speculation. In October 2007, Google SMS service is launched in India allowing users to get business listings, movie showtimes and information by sending an SMS message.[54]


Enterprise products
In 2007, Google launched Google Apps Premier Edition, a version of Google Apps targeted primarily at the business user. It includes such extras as more disk space for e-mail, API access, and premium support, for a price of USD50 per user per year. A large implementation of Google Apps with 38,000 users is at Lakehead University in Thunder Bay, Ontario, Canada.[55]


Platform
Main article: Google platform
Google's services are run on several server farms, each consisting of thousands of low-cost commodity computers running stripped-down versions of Linux. While the company does not provide detailed information about its hardware, a 2006 estimate consisted of over 450,000 servers, racked up in clusters located in data centers around the world.[56]


Corporate affairs and culture

A license plate seen in the Googleplex parking lot.Google is particularly known for its relaxed corporate culture, reminiscent of the Dot-com boom. In January 2007, it was cited by Fortune Magazine as the #1 (of 100) best company to work for.[57] Google's corporate philosophy is based on many casual principles including, "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." A complete list of corporate fundamentals is available on Google's website.[58] Google's relaxed corporate culture can also be seen externally through their holiday variations of the Google logo.

Google has been criticized for having salaries below industry standards[59]. For example, some system administrators earn no more than $35,000 per year – considered to be quite low for the Bay Area job market.[60] However, Google's stock performance following its IPO has enabled many early employees to be competitively compensated by participation in the corporation's remarkable equity growth.[61] Google implemented other employee incentives in 2005, such as the Google Founders' Award, in addition to offering higher salaries to new employees. Google's workplace amenities, culture, global popularity, and strong brand recognition have also attracted potential applicants.

After the company's IPO in August 2004, it was reported that founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page, and CEO Eric Schmidt, requested that their base salary be cut to $1.00.[62] Subsequent offers by the company to increase their salaries have been turned down, primarily because, "their primary compensation continues to come from returns on their ownership stakes in Google. As significant stockholders, their personal wealth is tied directly to sustained stock price appreciation and performance, which provides direct alignment with stockholder interests."[62] Prior to 2004, Schmidt was making $250,000 per year, and Page and Brin each earned a salary of $150,000.[62]

They have all declined recent offers of bonuses and increases in compensation by Google's board of directors. In a 2007 report of the United States' richest people, Forbes reported that Sergey Brin and Larry Page were tied for #5 with a net worth of $18.5 billion each.[63]


Googleplex

The GoogleplexMain article: Googleplex
As a play on Google's name, its headquarters, in Mountain View, California, is referred to as "the Googleplex" — a googolplex being 1 followed by a googol of zeros, and the HQ being a complex of buildings (cf. multiplex, cineplex, etc). The lobby is decorated with a piano, lava lamps, old server clusters, and a projection of search queries on the wall. The hallways are full of exercise balls and bicycles. Each employee has access to the corporate recreation center. Recreational amenities are scattered throughout the campus and include a workout room with weights and rowing machines, locker rooms, washers and dryers, a massage room, assorted video games, Foosball, a baby grand piano, a pool table, and ping pong. In addition to the rec room, there are snack rooms stocked with various cereals, gummy bears, toffee, licorice, cashews, yogurt, carrots, fresh fruit, and dozens of different drinks including fresh juice, soda, and make your own cappuccino.[citation needed]


Sign at the GoogleplexIn 2006, Google moved into 311,000 square feet (28,900 m²) of office space in New York City, at 111 Eighth Ave. in Manhattan.[64] The office was specially designed and built for Google and houses its largest advertising sales team, which has been instrumental in securing large partnerships, most recently deals with MySpace and AOL.[64] In 2003, they added an engineering staff in New York City, which has been responsible for more than 100 engineering projects, including Google Maps, Google Spreadsheets, and others.[64] It is estimated that the building costs Google $10 million per year to rent and is similar in design and functionality to its Mountain View headquarters, including Foosball, air hockey, and ping-pong tables, as well as a video game area.[64] By late 2006, Google also established a new headquarters for its AdWords division in Ann Arbor, Michigan.[65]

The size of Google's search system is presently unknown; the best estimates place the total number of the companies servers at 450,000, spread over twenty five locations throughout the world, including major operations centers in Ireland and Atlanta, Georgia. Google is also in the process of constructing a major operations center in The Dalles, Oregon, on the banks of the Columbia River. The site, also referred to by the media as Project 02, was chosen due to the availability of inexpensive hydroelectric power and a large surplus of fiber optic cable, left over from the dot com boom of the late 1990s. The computing center is estimated to be as large as two football fields, and it has created hundreds of construction jobs, causing local real estate prices to increase 40%. Upon completion, the center is expected to create 60 to 200 permanent jobs in the town of 12,000 people.[66]

Google is also making steps to ensure that their operations are environmentally sound. In October 2006, the company announced plans to install thousands of solar panels to provide up to 1.6 megawatts of electricity, enough to satisfy approximately 30% of the campus' energy needs.[67] The system will be the largest solar power system constructed on a U.S. corporate campus and one of the largest on any corporate site in the world.[67] In June 2007, Google announced that they plan to become carbon neutral by 2008, which includes investing in energy efficiency, renewable energy sources, and purchasing carbon offsets, such as investing in projects like capturing and burning methane from animal waste at Mexican and Brazilian farms.[68]


"Twenty percent" time
All Google engineers are encouraged to spend 20% of their work time (one day per week) on projects that interest them. Some of Google's newer services, such as Gmail, Google News, Orkut, and AdSense originated from these independent endeavors.[69] In a talk at Stanford University, Marissa Mayer, Google's Vice President of Search Products and User Experience, stated that her analysis showed that half of the new product launches originated from the 20% time.[70]


Easter eggs and April Fool's Day jokes
Main article: Google's hoaxes
Google has a tradition of creating April Fool's Day jokes — such as Google MentalPlex, which allegedly featured the use of mental power to search the web.[71] In 2002, they claimed that pigeons were the secret behind their growing search engine.[72] In 2004, they featured Google Lunar (which claimed to feature jobs on the moon),[73] and in 2005, a fictitious brain-boosting drink, termed Google Gulp was announced.[74] In 2006, they came up with Google Romance, a hypothetical online dating service.[75] In 2007, Google announced two joke products. The first was a free wireless Internet service called TiSP (Toilet Internet Service Provider) [76] in which one obtained a connection by flushing one end of a fiber-optic cable down their toilet and waiting only an hour for a "Plumbing Hardware Dispatcher (PHD)" to connect it to the Internet.[76] Additionally, Google's Gmail page displayed an announcement for Gmail Paper, which allows users of their free email service to have email messages printed and shipped to a snail mail address.[77]

Some thought the announcement of Gmail in 2004 around April Fool's Day (as well as the doubling of Gmail's storage space to two gigabytes in 2005) was a joke, although both of these turned out to be genuine announcements. In 2005, a comedic graph depicting Google's goal of "infinity plus one" GB of storage was featured on the Gmail homepage.

Google's services contain a number of Easter eggs; for instance, the Language Tools page offers the search interface in the Swedish Chef's "Bork bork bork," Pig Latin, ”Hacker” (actually leetspeak), Elmer Fudd, and Klingon.[78] In addition, the search engine calculator provides the Answer to Life, the Universe, and Everything from Douglas Adams' The Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy.[79] As Google's search box can be used as a unit converter (as well as a calculator), some non-standard units are built in, such as the Smoot. Google also routinely modifies its logo in accordance with various holidays or special events throughout the year, such as Christmas, Mother's Day, or various birthdays of notable individuals.[80]


IPO and culture
Many people speculated that Google's IPO would inevitably lead to changes in the company's culture,[81] because of shareholder pressure for employee benefit reductions and short-term advances, or because a large number of the company's employees would suddenly become millionaires on paper. In a report given to potential investors, co-founders Sergey Brin and Larry Page promised that the IPO would not change the company's culture.[82] Later Mr. Page said, "We think a lot about how to maintain our culture and the fun elements. We spent a lot of time getting our offices right. We think it's important to have a high density of people. People are packed together everywhere. We all share offices. We like this set of buildings because it's more like a densely packed university campus than a typical suburban office park."[83]

However, many analysts are finding that as Google grows, the company is becoming more "corporate". In 2005, articles in The New York Times and other sources began suggesting that Google had lost its anti-corporate, no evil philosophy[84][85][86] In an effort to maintain the company's unique culture, Google has designated a Chief Culture Officer in 2006, who also serves as the Director of Human Resources. The purpose of the Chief Culture Officer is to develop and maintain the culture and work on ways to keep true to the core values that the company was founded on in the beginning — a flat organization, a lack of hierarchy, a collaborative environment.[87]