EOTO Presentation on The History of Internet Search

The emergence of internet search began in 1990 with the start of the first internet search engine Archie. Four years later, Yahoo was founded followed by Backrub two years after that. In 1998 Backrub changed its name to the regularly used search of Google.

Archie 1990: Alan Emtage created Archie, short for archive. It is considered the first internet search engine, which automated the process of finding files on FTP (file transfer protocol) sites. It allowed users to search for file names and directory listings on these FTP servers.

Yahoo 1994: Founded by two Stanford University students, Jerry Yang and David Filo. The name Yahoo is an acronym 

for "Yet Another Hierarchical Officious Oracle. It quickly 

became one of the most popular web directories. They broke the world record for the largest simultaneous yodel in 2003 and 2015. 

Backrub 1996: This is now regarded as the predecessor of Google search engine, developed by Google founder Sergey Brin and Larry Page who studied at Stanford University. It was named Backrub because the search engine used backlinks to rank pages. By the time Google was created, 25 million pages were already indexed by Backrub. The foundation for SEO (search engine optimization) was laid by the search engine Backrub. 

Google 1998: Backrub was renamed to Google which is a 

play on mathematical expression reflecting Brin and Page's mission to organize the world's information making it 

accessible and useful universally. Soon after, it caught the attention of Silicon Valley investors prompting Sun co-founder Andy Bechtolsheim to write Brin and Page a check for $100,000. This investment began the birth of 

Google. 

Nowadays, 70% of online search requests are handled by Google and it is worth 1.84 trillion dollars. Internet searches have impacted our society in so many ways including educating the public, access to research, remote job opportunities, digital marketing, and allowed for rapid growth in technology.