Here's the story behind Google Doodles commemorating Google's birthday today
What's the story
The world's most used search engine by a landslide margin, Google, is celebrating its 23rd birthday today. The company has even designed a commemorative Google Doodle for the occasion. The commemorative Google Doodle has us asking what exactly is the story behind Google Doodles? And how did Google start creating Doodles? Well, read on to find out.
Origin story
Google's name is a play on the word 'Googol'
Technically, Google was founded by Sergey Brin and Larry Page on September 4, 1998. For the first seven years, the company observed its birth anniversary on the said date. Google was built to index the large set of information that the internet was becoming. The name Google is also a play on the mathematicians' name for the large number 10^100, called googol.
Shift
Google's 23rd birthday Doodle is a simple two-tier cake
In 2005, Google decided to arbitrarily shift its birthday celebrations to September 27 to coincide with the date of the announcement of the record number of pages the company had indexed. Google's birthday Doodle today is a simple two-tier birthday cake animation that has a candle replacing the "L" in Google. The cake has an animated face and tips its upper-tier as a greeting.
Google Doodle
Google Doodles were conceptualized in the year 1998
The first-ever Google Doodle was conceptualized as a modification of the company logo that Google founders Brin and Page used to tell employees they were away, attending the Burning Man Festival, in 1998. In the year 2000, the founders asked then-intern Dennis Hwang to make the first-ever Google Doodle for Bastille Day. Today, Hwang is a Chief Doodler.
Celebrations
Google Store offering special deals in some regions
Now, Google Doodles are created by a team of experienced artists and graphic design professionals to commemorate several global events, milestones for Google, and anniversaries and birthdays of internationally-renowned celebrities. In some parts of the world, Google is celebrating its birthday with special deals on the Google Store. The deals will also unlock promotional items or discount codes possibly when the Pixel 6 launches.