Zeitgeist 2.0
December 2, 2009
It may be just a word, a name, or a short phrase - but the search terms we enter in a web portal like Google can say a lot about the society we live in.
With "Vienna" as their number one search term, Austrians could be considered self-absorbed. Germany appears to have a crush on Hollywood newcomer Megan Fox, while the world in general is losing interest in America's first black president.
Released Monday, Google's statistics offer data on the search behavior of Internet users in more than 50 nations, broken down into subcategories that vary by country.
"It's quite a valuable set of data because it shows what affects Internet users," Jo Groebel, president of the German Digital Institute in Berlin, told Deutsche Welle. The search lists "depict a so-called 'mental map' and show what the top priorities are."
User-made Internet
Four of the 10 fastest growing search terms in Germany - compared to 2008 - are social networking sites. The trend is similar in other European countries. While the US social network giant Facebook is the most-searched-for site in countries including France, Italy, and Switzerland and the fastest rising site in the UK, it's clear from the Google statistics that national networking portals are holding their own.
The find-old-friends website "Nasza klasa" is number one on Poland's search list. Germany's top ten list of fastest rising sites includes Facebook (number two) and three other German-based social network portals: "meinVZ" (number four), "wer kennt wen" (number seven) and "hi5" (number 10). "Netlog" ranked eighth in Italy's most-searched list and 10th in Austria.
Other user-generated-content websites like YouTube and Wikipedia also ranked highly. In Germany, they were the first and ninth most searched terms respectively. YouTube reached the fourth position on Poland's most-googled list, coming in second in Austria, Switzerland, Italy, and France, and third in the UK.
Groebel pointed out that the Internet portals - like YouTube or other search engines - that landed on the list only indicate that the Internet user searched further. To get a more complete perspective on the zeitgeist, search statistics would need to be collected from those portals as well.
Google searches represent pop culture, he said, not politics. Wikipedia searches, on the other hand, would likely cover a broader range of intellectual topics.
Pigs and pop stars
As for the news topics that got the most attention in 2009, swine flu and Michael Jackson ranked first and second respectively in Germany. The swine flu also topped news searches in the UK, Switzerland and Austria.
"I expected Michael Jackson to rank even higher," said Groebel, adding that the other statistics didn't surprise him at all.
As for the most-searched people, Megan Fox bumped last year's winner in Germany, Britney Spears, down to second place. She was trailed by actress Angelina Jolie. As for male celebrities, US actor Zac Efron and fictional movie character Brueno were the only ones to make Germany's top 10 list.
Both the King of Pop and the swine flu will likely find themselves on the 2010 list of rapidly falling search terms. They'll be in the company of Heath Ledger and Barack Obama, who place third and fourth respectively on this year's worldwide list of searches that are losing popularity, compared to 2008.
Ledger passed away last year and apparently Obama's election was more closely followed than his presidency.
Author: Kate Bowen
Editor: Sam Edmonds