I think Google turns seven today. I recently ran across an email from our second birthday in 2000. Here it is:
From: Matt Cutts
To: (most Googlers)
Date: Thu 9/7/00 9:51pmIn celebration of Google’s two year anniversary of September 7, 1998, there’s a bunch of donuts tonight in the Soul Calibur room.
Matt, Lxxxx, and Dxxx
Krispy Kreme had just opened a store up in Mountain View barely three minutes from Google. Before that, you had to drive to Union City to get your donut fix. So three of us made a donut run and got 2-3 boxes of hot glazed goodness. The email was sent out at 10 pm because a bunch of us were working late. Back then, everyone was in one small building. The biggest room served as a conference room, and in the corner was a TV and a Sega Dreamcast. I’m sure it could play other games, but you only saw people playing Soul Calibur back then, so people called it the Soul Calibur room.
This morning as I walked in I passed a large meeting room. The “Lxxxx” from the email above was teaching an orientation class to a new group of engineers. I watched him for a minute and saw new engineers soaking up Google infrastructure and Google culture at the same time. It energizes me to see great new people join Google and start pushing to make the web and the world better from their perspective.
The past several years have been something to see, from Raging Search to Scientology to Deja and everything else. When I look back, the wild thing is that I’m more excited about Google now than I was back then. I get to work with amazing people on things that I think will improve the web. I’m honored and grateful to work with the people I work with because they’re so damn smart, capable, and they care about what they’re doing. Happy B-day, Google.
{ 16 comments… read them below or add one }
I’d have liked a logo or an index increment as B-day present (for us).
BTW… Happy birthday!
You have/had a room called the ‘Soul Calibur’ room? o.O
Congratulations Matt … and Google. Really enjoy the “insider” stories.
Happy Birthday from germany. But why did you xxx the names at the bottom of your mail. Makes me curious. Lxxxx makes me thinking that it could have been Larry himself, and Dxxx, who knows, perhaps is the nickname of Sergey
Happy Birthday indeed! Google has changed the world, and the world is changing Google. A beautiful thing!
Hey Matt,
Consider yourself one of the lucky ones, you get up and goto a job that you truly enjoy. Most people can never attest to that. ( I can ) If even a few of the team at Goog have that attitude, then there is real hope for the future of search
Happy b day Goog and Team
I used to hold meetings in a Soul Calibur room too. Actually, it wasn’t a Soul Calibur room so much as it was a toolshed, and it wasn’t meetings so much as it was me screaming at paint cans…
Happy B’day Google.
I expected a special google logo today
Quite concerned however about the idea of Scientology. Was Google linked in any ways with Scientology at some stage? That could hammer seriously your credibility…
Happy birthday anyway.
I think he was referring the controversy over Xenu. The Scientologists had Google remove Xenu from their index. However, Google later added them back.
Great blog Matt. We all appreciate you sharing your Google experiences with us. Speaking of having a job you really enjoy, I would just like to say that I now have a job (if I can even call it that) that I really love, thanks to Google. Of course, it’s Adsense and it’s the best thing that’s ever happened to me. I can’t tell you how much I love Google for what they have done for my life. They even send out Christmas gifts. Isn’t that sweet? Last year, I got that light-up radio that turns different colors. I think everyone got that. My husband just put his two-week notice in at his “real” job today because we have no need for a real job now that Google is in our lives. Thanks Matt and THANKS GOOGLE. You’re the best!
Heather Landry
Two important notes:
1. you should really control the keyword: septmeber 7th – there’s an apple event mentioned there and no googles birthday?! and a msn blog site and all that is on googles’ search engine……. the embarasement.
2. how come in http://www.tnl.net/when/9/7 the googles birthday is not mentioned?
I thought that a couple of months of this post being in the air it would already become 1st on google search results!
congrats google ! I almost forgot about your bday !
Hi
My name is ambrish and i have read on the net that the google company is founded in the 15 sept 1997, but now every one is not telling same, can any one help me in this, means i wan to know the real foundation date of the google, is it 15 sept or othet.. please .
Ambrish, I believe that is the correct date. Anyway, amazing blog, keep up the good work!