Now that Google is ten years old (depends on where you measure from, of course), the search engine really is old enough to be keeping its room nice and tidy, especially if it expects to keep getting pocket money on a regular basis. So, Google started to do a spring clean and found an old index from 2001, buried beneath a Klingon-English dictionary and some of Brin’s old Razzles.

Apparently, in 2001, if you were looking for an iPod, you were probably after an Image Proof of Deposit Document Processing System rather than a music player. And, if you’re searching for iPhone, then you were after an internet telephony product rather than an Apple device. You’d have been on a pointless search if you were looking for Youtube as the term, let alone the site didn’t exist. You may have heard of Facebook at the time, but it was still limited to Harvard users rather than being the global phenomenon it is today. Club Penguin was a hockey club, but the kids social media site Club Penguin was “coming soon”.

Searching for “Michael Phelps,” would have taken you to the page of the D. Maynard Phelps Collegiate Professor in Business Administration at the University of Michigan, rather than the swimmer. At the time “Wikipedia” was brand new, so would’ve found that and if you’re into politics and rigged elections you will recall only too well the term “hanging chads”.

You can do a search on Google wayback when using this link, that search will give you the archive page for Sciencebase; Sciencetext did not exist as the tips & tricks site you know and love.

Try your own searches for 2001 and let me know what you find.