'Royal wedding' tops Google list of search terms for 2011
Apple's much-anticipated iPhone 5 came second in Google's 'Zeitgeist' survey
By Carrie-Ann Skinner | PC Advisor | Published: 11:41, 15 December 2011
The Royal Wedding, which took place in April this year, has been named the fastest rising search term of 2011, by Google.
According to the search engine's Zeitgeist list, which charts the phrases, words and people web users have searched for online throughout the year, the nuptials between Prince William and Kate Middleton was the most popular new search term for this year.
Apple's iPhone 5 - the name everyone expected Apple to give to the next iteration of its smartphone which was released this year - came in second. Ironically, when Apple finally came to unveil the device in October this year, it named the handset the iPhone 4S.
Related Articles on Techworld
Computer game Fifa 12, discount site Groupon and Apple's tablet PC, the iPad 2, all featured in the top 5 fastest-rising search terms. The Top 10 was also heavily peppered with celebrities including Jackass star Ryan Dunn, who died in a car crash earlier this year, along with singers Adele and Ed Sheeran.
Social network Facebook was named the most popular search term in the UK, closely followed by video-sharing site YouTube, Microsoft's free webmail service Hotmail and online auction site eBay.
Google also offered a list of the most popular 'How tos' and 'What is' searches, and both featured technology phrases. 'How to revise' was the most searched for 'How to' term but 'How to geek' made an appearance at number eight
Meanwhile 'What is AV' (the alternative voting system proposed by the Liberal democrats) came out top in the most searched 'What is' terms. However 'What is iCloud', Apple's cloud-based storage system that works with iOS and Windows, came in at number nine.
