On Tuesday, Google unveiled its 13th annual
Zeitgeist, a breakdown of around 1.2 trillion
searches, which revealed one pressing question that
people just couldn't ask enough times in 2013:
"WHAT IS TWERKING"
This year in search had plenty of other drama as
well, from the birth of the royal baby to the death
of anti-apartheid icon Nelson Mandela. So what
else were Google users curious about in 2013?
GOOGLE EXPLAINS THE NEWS:
Snapchat, DOMA, Molly, bitcoin. All of these terms
popped up regularly in news stories in 2013. The
problem? Apparently people didn't know what they
meant. (They are, respectively, a photo-sharing
app, the Defense of Marriage Act, a nickname for
the newly popular club drug MDMA, and a virtual
currency).
The number one "What is?" question, however,
centered around pop singer Miley Cyrus and her
controversial grind-it-out performance at the
2013 MTV Music Video Awards.
In case you were wondering, the
Oxford Dictionaries' answer to "What
is twerking" is: a sexually provocative
dance "involving thrusting hip
movements and a low, squatting
stance." (Yeah, you kind of need to
see it to understand. Warning:
Cannot be unseen).
Here are the rest of Google's top 10
"What" questions from 2013:
1. What is twerking?
2. What is ricin?
3. What is DOMA?
4. What is Molly?
5. What is gluten?
6. What is sequestration?
7. What is Obamacare?
8. What is lupus?
9. What is Snapchat?
10. What is bitcoin?
DEALING WITH TRAGEDY:
The world mourned the death of
multiple notable names this year,
including Nelson Mandela, the
revered civil rights leader and first
black president of South Africa, who
died in December at the age of 95.
His name was the top global trending
search term (meaning it had the
highest amount of traffic over a
sustained period in 2013 compared with 2012).
Behind him in Google's search rankings was Paul
Walker, the "Fast and the Furious" star who died
at age 40 in a single-car accident near Los
Angeles. Next, after the iPhone 5S, was Cory
Monteith, the former "Glee" actor who died at age
31 in a Vancouver hotel room after reported
alcohol and "intravenous drug use."
And in the U.S. rankings, James Gandolfini from
"The Sopranos," who died while on vacation in Italy
at age 51, was the seventh most-searched term of
2013.
Here, overall, are the top trending searches in
2013 from around the world:
1. Nelson Mandela
2. Paul Walker
3. iPhone 5S
4. Cory Monteith
5. Harlem Shake
6. Boston Marathon
7. Royal baby
8. Samsung Galaxy S4
9. PlayStation 4
10. North Korea
GOOGLE GIVES LIFE ADVICE:
How many of Google's users are awkward teenage
boys? Apparently, plenty of them, because three
of the top 10 "How to" questions were people
asking how to tie a tie, kiss and flirt. A few other
things U.S. users wanted to know:
1. How to tie a tie
2. How to file
3. How to get a passport
4. How to blog
5. How to knit
6. How to kiss
7. How to flirt
8. How to whistle
9. How to un-jailbreak
10. How to Vader Source: http://t.today.com/tech/twerking-nelson-mandela-how-tie-tie-googles-top-searches-2013-2D11744553#plants-zombies-stealing-cars-best-video-games-2013-2D11741583 |
