The 2009 Google Zeitgeist Released: Top Searches Of The Year

Google has released its Google Zeitgeist list of top searches around the world today. Zeitgeist means "the spirit of the times" in German. And, Google's annual list of top searches is definitely reflective of what people's attention has been drawn to throughout the year. The way Google determines the most popular queries of the year is by looking at the most popular searches conducted every three months and than ranking them based on how much their popularity increased compared to the previous quarter.

For example, in the United States, the top searches of the year were Twitter, Michael Jackson and Facebook. Celebrities, dead and alive, took up the rest of the list with searches for Natasha Richardson, Farrah Fawcett and Lady Gaga in the top 10. Google News was dominated by swine flu, Susan Boyle, and Jon&Kate. The rest of the top news searches is celebrity centered with Barack Obama's inauguration being the only legit news story in the top 10 searches. 

Canada pretty much mirrored the U.S. trends, but Canadians were more technology conscious with terms like Twitter, blackberry, and yahoo mail in the top three Google searches.

The U.K. top searches were the most technology centric: all but one search in the top 10 are technology related. Among the top 10 news searches, there were two legit news stories -- swine flu and Iran. All the rest was, lo and behold, occupied by celebrity searches.

For comparison, I decided to look at top 10 searches in Honduras and Kenya.

Of course, Honduras had to deal with a political crisis this year that started with the expatriation of the country's President Manuel Zelaya in June of this year. The exile was followed by protests and military curfews. The political unrest was evidently preoccupying the minds of Hondurans who were actively seeking out any news and updates on the situation -- so, no wonder that the top Google search in Honduras this year was CNN. Also on the list - Honduran press and crisis in Honduras. Not to mention that Zelaya's name was the fastest rising term of the year.

In Kenya, Facebook was the top search term, followed KRA - the Kenya Revenue Authority, a government body that manages the nation's revenue income. The fourth most popular term was jobs in Kenya followed by Nairobi University. Of course, Kenya occupies No. 147 position in the 2007 Human Development Report with 40% unemployment and 74% adult literacy rate. The rest of the top 10 searches were taken up by Gmail, Bing, Twitter and Yahoo.

Here are the rest of Google Zeitgeist 2009 top searches.