[COFF] Happy birthday, Google...

[Greg 'groggy' Lehey]

On Tuesday,  4 September 2018 at 10:45:14 +1000, Dave Horsfall wrote:
> Google was founded on this day in 1998, by a couple of uni students who
> went on to become millionaires; the verb "to google" has in fact entered
> the lexicon, but these days I use DuckDuckGo (remember: you are not
> Google's customer, but their product).
>
> There is some confusion over the name "Google"; some say that someone
> couldn't spell the mathematical number "googol" (10**100), and others
> claim that is was a joke on their part, which I suspect is revisionist
> history.
>
> I would appreciate a correction, and need I point out that a web
> reference may not cut the mustard?

In case of doubt about English words, I refer to the Oxford English
Dictionary.  This time they have surpassed themselves:

google, v.1

  intr. Of the ball: to have a ‘googly’ break and swerve. Of the
  bowler; to bowl a googly or googlies; also (trans.), to give a
  googly break to (a ball).

They do, however, have a second entry.  Note capitalization:

Google, v.2

   Etymology: < Google, a proprietary name for an Internet search engine launched in 1998.

   The name of the search engine was perhaps conceived as an
   alteration of googol n., with allusion to the large amount of
   information contained on the Internet.

    1. intr. To use the Google search engine to find information on
    the Internet.

     2. trans. To enter (a search term) into the Google search engine
     to find information on the Internet; to search for information
     about (a person or thing) in this way.

Greg
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