Google

Google Ranks Second In Merriam-Webster’s Word Of 2006 List

Gary Price reports Google, the verb, was the second most popular word in Merriam-Webster’s Word of the Year survey that just came out.

Merriam-Webster published the top ten words over here. The top word is “truthiness” by Stephen Colbert.


I wonder how Google is feeling about this given efforts this year to get people not to use Google as a word.

Answer? They don’t have a problem, since the definition is about doing a search on Google itself. From a recent blog post at Google:

Usage: ‘Google’ as verb referring to searching for information on, um, Google.

Example: “I googled him on the well-known website Google.com and he seems pretty interesting.”

Our lawyers say: Well, we’re happy at least that it’s clear you mean searching on Google.com. As our friends at Merriam-Webster note, to “Google” means “to use the Google search engine to find information about (as a person) on the World Wide Web.”

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About the author

Barry Schwartz
Barry Schwartz is a technologist and a Contributing Editor to Search Engine Land and a member of the programming team for SMX events. He owns RustyBrick, a NY based web consulting firm. He also runs Search Engine Roundtable, a popular search blog on very advanced SEM topics.

In 2019, Barry was awarded the Outstanding Community Services Award from Search Engine Land, in 2018 he was awarded the US Search Awards the "US Search Personality Of The Year," you can learn more over here and in 2023 he was listed as a top 50 most influential PPCer by Marketing O'Clock.

Barry can be followed on X here and you can learn more about Barry Schwartz over here or on his personal site.