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Google blogging (and beyond) in 2011
December 31, 2011
With just a few hours of 2011 remaining in Mountain View, Calif., we’re taking our
traditional look
at the past year on the Official Google Blog, as well as Google’s presence on Google+ and Twitter.
On the blog this year, we published 471 posts (including this one)—17 more than 2010. Those posts were read by nearly 20 million people; we had 19,905,679 unique visitors between January 1 and December 31. We find a few themes in the most popular posts: Google+ was a favorite topic, as well as greater focus and simplicity across Google, and search quality. The top 10 posts are:
Ten years later
- 1,731,280 unique pageviews. Our post for the 10th anniversary of September 11, 2001 recognized a few online spaces for remembering the day. (This post was linked from google.com.)
Introducing the Google+ project: real-life sharing, rethought for the web
- 909,537 unique pageviews. In June, we launched Google+ to bring the nuance and richness of real-life sharing to the web.
Microsoft’s Bing uses Google search results—and denies it
- 538,764 unique pageviews. We posted about how our experiments determined that Bing was using Google web search results.
Supercharging Android: Google to acquire Motorola Mobility
- 431,366 unique pageviews. In August we announced an agreement to acquire Motorola.
Evolving the Google design and experience
- 352,254 unique pageviews. We began to bring greater consistency to the Google experience, revamping first the homepage, then
Gmail
and
more
.
Games in Google+: fun that fits your schedule
- 265,995 unique pageviews. Less than two months after we launched the Google+ project, we brought games to the platform.
More wood behind fewer arrows
- 310,912 unique pageviews. As part of the process of prioritizing our product efforts, we announced the winding down of Google Labs.
Advanced sign-in security for your Google account
- 281,385 unique pageviews. It’s not often we can say that a post about online security is one of the top posts of the year. 2-step verification, an opt-in feature that helps verify that you're the real owner of your account, was an exception.
Google+ Pages: connect with all the things you care about
- 237,467 unique pageviews. The third most popular Google+ post on the blog was about pages for brands and businesses to connect with people on Google+.
Finding more high-quality sites in search
- 258,974 unique pageviews. A major change to our ranking algorithm, known as
Panda
, is aimed at helping people find even higher quality in our search results.
Other popular posts included the
announcement that Larry Page was becoming CEO
, a
project to help Egyptians communicate during the January protests
,
Google+ updates
and
+1
news
, a
keeping your information safe from phishing campaigns
,
patents and Android
,
practical steps toward greener computing
, more
search
news
and the debut of
Google Wallet
. We shared special
doodles
(from Lucy to Les Paul to the lunar eclipse, and Jules Verne to Jim Henson) and stories from unique
Google
users
. We brought
music to the cloud
,
Ice Cream Sandwich
to your pocket, and
great works of art
and
pieces of history
to your computer screens. We worked to help those affected by disasters in
Japan
and
elsewhere
, told some
history
tales
, and, as always, had
some
fun
along
the
way
.
Like many of you, we were excited to start using Google+ Pages when they launched in November. We’re now running
22 pages for Google products and teams
; nearly 100,000 of you have the flagship page,
+Google
, in your circles. Popular posts there include
photos of our L.A. office
,
holiday
,
New Year
and
Marie Curie doodles
, the
year-end Zeitgeist
,
Google Photography Prize
and
Sebastian Thrun on self-driving cars
.
We’ll soon celebrate
@google
’s third anniversary on Twitter, and we hit the 4 million follower mark this month. Popular tweets include the
Les Paul doodle
,
patents and Android
,
Motorola
,
Larry and Sergey remembering Steve Jobs
,
Google Wallet
,
Google+
and
Wael Ghonim
.
As the clock ticks toward the close of 2011, we thank our readers for following along—by feed reader, phone app or however you please—and hope you join us for the next year of Google news. Happy 2012!
Posted by Emily Wood, Google Blog Editor
Labels
accessibility
41
acquisition
26
ads
131
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19
Android
58
apps
419
April 1
4
Asia
39
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48
commerce
12
computing history
7
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33
culture
12
developers
120
diversity
35
doodles
68
education and research
144
entrepreneurs at Google
14
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46
faster web
16
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61
google.org
73
googleplus
50
googlers and culture
202
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102
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18
maps and earth
194
mobile
124
online safety
19
open source
19
photos
39
policy and issues
139
politics
71
privacy
66
recruiting and hiring
32
scholarships
31
search
505
search quality
24
search trends
118
security
36
small business
31
user experience and usability
41
youtube and video
140
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