Tomgooglery

Few would deny that Google is the most useful website on the internet. Many would agree that it is also one of the most fun destinations on the web.

There are more ways to kill time with Google than you can click a mouse at. Below is a starter list of them. Click EasyEdit to add new ones to the list.

Google Bombing

A so-called Google Bomb is a means to influence the ranking of a web page in Google search returns to create an amusing result (some people also create ego bombs and justice bombs, to propel their websites up the ranks or mete out web justice, respectively). Bombs are created by "gaming" Google's PageRank algorithm; this effect is achieved by a large number of sites linking to a target page by using consistent anchor text. Try these Google Bomb classics to get the sense of it, and click EasyEdit to add other Google Bombs to the list.

1.Type miserable failure into the Google search field and click the "I Feel Lucky" button

2. French Military Victories + "I'm Feeling Lucky"

3. liar + "I'm Feeling Lucky"


Other fun Google Hacks from Google engineer Douwe Osinga's website:

Poetry in Translation

Poetry in Translation uses Google's Automatic Translation service to translate copy strings from English to German to French and then back, occasionally with humorous results.

Google Talk

Google Talk answers the question what Google would say if it could talk? Enter a short text string and Google will complete the thought.

Swedish Chef Google

Type "bork bork bork" into Google and the first result is Google translated into "Swedish Chef" language. Not only is the homepage in Swedish Chef, but so are all the sub pages, such as Advanced Search.

Visual Poetry

Visual Poetry uses Google image search to translate text strings into a slideshow of relevant results. (Try: "Invention, my dear friends, is 93% perspiration, 6% electricity, 4% evaporation, and 2% butterscotch ripple.")

World Color

Word Color uses Google image search to determine the color of a word or string of words. The app snags the top nine image results and loops through all pixels, calculating the average hue, which is later converted to a color.

Google as historian

Google Date lets you enter a date and then returns "this day in history" results. Random returns. Google History can help you find out in what year something happened.

Google Best Time to Visit

Google Best Time to Visit helps you time a visit anywhere in the world.

Oodles of Doodles

The Official Google Blog features "Googler insights into product and technology news and our culture." That may not sound fun, but what is fun is the oddles of Google logo doodles archived (some 150) here by the very person (Dennis) who created them!

See also:

• Froogle
• Gmail
• Google Book Search
• Google Calendar
• Google Groups

• Google Maps
• Google News
• Google Search Tips
• Google Zeitgeist
• Image Search