11 Searching Methods We Used to Do To Get Information Before Google Was Introduced 20 Years Ago

September 27 is a big day for one of the biggest tech corporations in the world Google as it marked the 20th anniversary of the corporation that changes the ways we utilize the Internet. Just remember how Google has changed the way we do things on the Internet every day.

Google’s search engine has grown to become the top search engine on the Internet as it currently occupies around 86% of the search engine market share (Statista.com 2018). Even users type “let me Google it” when they use another search engine and the name Google has even turned into a synonymous with the Internet. So let’s remember how far we have gone through from just simple methods of doing things.

1. Researching for the class project

Before the birth of the Internet, if you hadn’t started your school project until very close to the deadline, you would be a big trouble. Researching in that time did not relate to going online to research but you had to go through your encyclopedias relating to the topic you were looking for. And you may have to sit in your local or school library for at least a couple of hours if you did not have any book in your bookshelf.

2. Sharing your pictures

Back in the old day when you had to wait until your family or friends come over just to share with them your birthday's photos. It can be a nightmare if you wanted to look for reference photos when picking types of furniture or dress design. Then the common thing you should do is going through tons of magazines and saving cutout pictures.

3. Looking for a phone number

It would be better for you to write numbers of someone you know somewhere like a notepad if you wanted to save time in finding their numbers when you needed to make a phone call. If you wanted to call a company or someone to fix your electricity or plumbs, you might have to go through the published phone-book.

4. Choose what and where to eat

Ordering food now is just easy with the bits of help from many apps like Zomato, Swiggy or other apps like those. However, it was a different case 20 years ago as every India families had a bunch of restaurant flyers in their houses. Then, whenever you wanted to go out for a treat, you simply just put all the flyers out and decided what and where to eat.

5. Looking at cute and adorable furballs like cats

Surely this was not a thing people considered to do when the Internet was born. Who would want to go through a bunch of magazines just to look for photos of cute animals? Moreover, you would probably see a dog, cat or bird wandering in your neighbor houses when you went out to their houses so often. But do you even visit your neighbors often now? Or do you even know any of your neighbors?

6. Reading movie reviews

So what you have been seeing a new movie’s posters everywhere. It looks great and you are considering to watch it. But you are still hesitating as you do not know whether or not it worths watching. Obviously, you could not have access to online reviews or Youtube trailers back then, so you have to wait for it to launch and look for reviews in the newspapers. Now there are even torrent or pirate sites for you to download and watch movies without going to the cinema.

7. Updating information about new technologies.

If you lived in India twenty years ago and you were really interested in technologies, then your sources of news of upcoming technologies and such were probably are magazines like Digit and Chip. If not, you may have no idea about those technologies until you saw ads for imminent launches of new technologies, new desktop or whatever relating to technology.

8. Looking for good music

You surely had MTV and Channel V 20 years ago but their playlists were not really up to date. Besides from Bollywood music, not all the song included in an album had its own music video. Instead, the most recent music was usually played on the radio. And if you wanted to keep records of your favorite songs and you were short on budget to buy CDs or cassettes from the music store, you might, depends on the generation you were in, either record them on tape decks or copy CDs to your computer.

9. Making decisions regarding your vacation plans

Without the help of the Internet, looking for locations, hotel and prices of ticket were so much harder back then. You might need helps from people you know to tell you about their own vacation’s experiences and decided or you might even give up and either go to the resort you had gone for a few years or just paid for a travel package from a travel agent.

10.  Watching sport matches

Most people now or in the past do make time to watch sport matches like cricket or football, and that was the only option you got if you wanted to keep tracks of the scores. For example, if you were not free when the matches were live, you could not keep track of the scores without the bits of help from TV broadcast or radio. Now with the help of the Internet, you are just a few clicks away from getting the scores you need or even watch highlights of those matches online.

11. Getting directions

If you are on the way to a location that you have never been to before, you can simply open Google Maps and search for directions. However, this is obviously not possible 2 decades ago. And if you could not get the help of your family or a friend to guide you, you had to constantly look for trees being used as landmarks or asked a random person on the street or paanwalas and got answers like “Idhar hi hain, paas mein.”