How Google Grows...and Grows...and Grows

Googleshare The invention of blogger Steven Berlin Johnson. Search Google for one word. Then search those results for the name of a person. Divide the number of results delivered for your second search by those from the first to get that person's "semantic mindshare" of the word.

Googlism Type in your name, someone else's name, or a date, place, or thing at www.googlism.com. The application, written by a team at Domain Active in Australia, uses Google to deliver Web-based definitions of your phrase. Bill Gates, for example, is "the anti-Christ," "a thief," "a hero," and "a wanker."

Google Smackdown Two queries. One search engine. A "terabyte tug-of-war," as its creator, Paul Bausch, calls it. Just plug in two competing words or phrases at www.onfocus.com/googlesmack/down.asp, and see which delivers more Google results. (Google, with 17.5 million, suffers a rare embarrassment at the hands of God, with 42.6 million.)

Sidebar: How does Google keep innovating?

One big factor is the company's willingness to fail. Google engineers are free to experiment with new features and new services and free to do so in public. The company frequently posts early versions of new features on the site and waits for its users to react. "We can't predict exactly what will happen," says senior engineer Nelson Minar.

Keith H. Hammonds (khammonds@fastcompany.com) is a Fast Company senior editor based in New York.