How did google become the lead search engine?

[rumguy]

A few years ago I hadn't even heard of it...I always used Yahoo.

[Syrinx]

1. because it's the best at finding stuff?

[rumguy]

3. who is that in your avatar?

[Spider Jerusalem]

6. That is Paul "Bear" Bryant...

the Vince Lombardi of college football (coach for University of Alabama; dead since 1983).

[Syrinx]

19. No

Vince Lombardi was the Bear Bryant of pro football. :P

A reporter once asked Lombardi, after the Packers won the championship (I'm not sure if the Super Bowl had started yet) how did it feel to be the best football team in the world. He said "I don't know if we are, we haven't played Alabama yet." Heh heh. Hey, I know I'm living in the past with this stuff, but Bama's coming back baby. Mike Shula will lead us back to the promised land. :)

[Syrinx]

7. Coach Paul "Bear" Bryant.

The greatest football coach of all time. Why do you ask?

[rumguy]

8. just curious

[arcos]

2. the others simply failed...

they decided the way to succed was becoming 'portals' that provide you with all kind of services. Google actually decided to improve search...

[LastKnight]

4. speed and accuracy. nt

[Bill McBlueState]

5. no extra crap

I love going to the google page and just finding a box that you type stuff into and hit a button.

And, they're good at finding stuff.

Simplicity!!

[huellewig]

10. ditto

It's clean and fast.

[Rar]

9. Simplicity...

It's a search engine. And that's it.

[Endangered Specie]

11. Well, the toolbar sealed the deal for me.

[disgruntled_goat]

12. they were the first

to rank their links by how many links there were to a given page. "weighted indexing" or some such.

it turns up the best search results. made altavista et al look like the chumps they are.

[theoceansnerves]

13. it works

i went from altavista, to inktomi, to google. google works good, but i'm looking for a new search engine because google could give a rats ass about your privacy. i don't know if there will ever be a replacement for their image search though.

[Imperialism Inc.]

14. try the image search at ask jeeves

http://www.ask.com/

I don't know if it is better but it is certainly different result sets. Whenever I can't seem to get google to understand what iwant a picture of Jeeves usually has it first try.

[theoceansnerves]

15. thanks!!

i never use that site so i didn't even know that existed!

[huellewig]

16. Gigablast

You could give http://gigablast.com/ a try. I have seen a few articles on Slashdot about it. The guy who runs it seems like he knows his stuff.

[LDS Jock]

17. Sergey Brin, one of the founders

is a cutie. Look at his hotornot.com listing and rate him.

http://www.hotornot.com/r/?eid=OYNZN8K&key=JUB

[LWolf]

18. quick, easy,

accurate, the toolbar...

Except that I am now wanting something else. Recently, everytime I search, I get a string of links under each site, directing me to "find ___________ here!" that is extremely irritating. I don't get many actual hits on the front page, because it is all filled up with "find it here" sites.