In its annual zeitgeist of terms most queried on its search engine, Google has revealed ‘Sarah Palin’ to be one of the fastest-rising globally, while the Irish are mostly interested in Bebo.
Bebo was the most popular web search in 2008, while Facebook was the fastest rising search. Interestingly, one of the fastest-rising global searches was ‘nasza klasa’, a Polish social-networking site, which was also a fast-rising search in Ireland.
Web-based email services were the next most popular searches with Gmail, Hotmail and Yahoo! all ranking highly.
Our interest in news and current affairs remains strong in 2008 with the Lisbon Treaty and the US presidential election dominating. Nicholas Sarkozy and George Bush were the most popular politicians searched, followed by Irish politicians Mary Harney and Brian Cowen. Perhaps worryingly, none of the opposition politicians generated enough volume to register on the zeitgeist.
Our love of going out and enjoying ourselves is obvious, despite the recession. We continue to see high volume of searches for concert tickets and restaurants, while our tradition of singing is reflected in the search for lyrics on Google.
Singing their way through the recession are Dublin, Waterford, Mayo, Louth, Limerick, Cork, Galway, Laois, Carlow, and Donegal, which all register on Zeitgeist for song lyrics.
But we are also fond of looking for a bargain, searching for cheap holidays, flights and hotels. And it was Donegal and not Cavan which showed the highest volume of searches for ‘cheap’.
In a very telling take on the economy, searches for new cars have fallen by 75pc since the start of the year, with Cork topping the region with most searches for ‘new cars’, while Louth topped the search for used cars. Searches for used cars from Northern Ireland were among the fastest-rising search terms in this category in 2008.
According to the Google zeitgeist, the most popular search queries were:
Fastest Rising (Global)
Sarah Palin
Beijing 2008
facebook login
tuenti
heath ledger
obama
nasza klasa
wer kennt wen
euro 2008
jonas brothers
Fastest Rising Ireland
utube
google maps
Youtube
Nasza klasa
Wiki
RTE
Maps
Irish Times
Yahoo! mail
Most Popular Ireland
Bebo
Youtube
Hotmail
Yahoo
Games
You tube
News
Map
gmail
Politicians (Most Popular – Ireland)
Nicolas Sarkozy
George Bush
Mary Harney
Brian Cowen
Declan Ganley
Bertie Ahern
Barack Obama
John McCain
Hilary Clinton
Sarah Palin
Tickets
Oasis
Munster rugby
Westlife
Kings of Leon
The Killers
Top Gear
Heineken cup
Take That
Bruce Springsteen
Restaurants
Dublin Restaurants
Cork Restaurants
Restaurants London
Italian Restaurants
Galway Restaurants
Michelin Restaurants
Indian Restaurants
Cheap
Flights
Hotels
Holidays
Laptops
Lyrics
Song Lyrics
You tube
Music Lyrics
With you lyrics
Rhianna
Galway Girl
Kings of Leon
By John Kennedy
