As the year draws to an end, all the large search engines have now published their year-end roundups of the most popular search queries on their sites. On almost every service, these include Michael Jackson, Twitter, Lady Gaga and terms related to Twilight. Google also just released its annual Zeitgeist survey, which features lists of the fastest rising search terms on Google's properties worldwide. Among the top queries related to technology and the Web, Facebook (#2) leads the charge ahead of Twitter (#4) and Windows 7 (#8) in the global survey. In the US, Twitter was the fastest rising search term of 2009, followed by Michael Jackson, Facebook, Hulu and hi5.
Here are Google's and Bing's lists of top search queries of 2009:
| Google - Fastest Rising Search Queries in the US | Google - Fastest Rising Search Queries Globally | Bing - Top Trending Topics |
| 1. Twitter | 1. Michael Jackson | 1. Michael Jackson |
| 2. Michael Jackson | 2. Facebook | 2. Twitter |
| 3. Facebook | 3. tuenti | 3. Swine Flu |
| 4. Hulu | 4. Twitter | 4. Stock Market |
| 5. hi5 | 5. sanalika | 5. Farrah Fawcett |
| 6. Glee | 6. New Moon | 6. Patrick Swayze |
| 7. Paranormal Activiy | 7. Lady Gaga | 7. Cash for Clunkers |
| 8. Natasha Richardson | 8. Windows 7 | 8. Jon and Kate Gosselin |
| 9. Farrah Fawcett | 9. dantri.com.vn | 9. Billy Mays |
| 10. Lady Gaga | 10. torpedo gratis | 10. Jaycee Dugard |
Some of these are pretty straightforward (Twitter, Michael Jackson, Facebook), while others, like 'torpedo gratis' (which refers to a free SMS service) and 'tuenti' left us slightly puzzled at first. It is also interesting to note that a lot of these search terms in Google's list are basically just URLs (Twitter, Facebook, Hulu, dantri.com.vn).
Fastest Falling Terms on Google (Global)
It's important to note that Bing's list was mostly scrubbed of obvious URL searches, so a direct comparison between Bing and Google is sadly impossible. Neither Google, Bing or Yahoo made lists of their actual top queries available this year. All we got so far are highly sanitized lists of "trending topics." While these reflect the current mood, they don't really give us a good idea of what people search for on a day-to-day basis.
If you have Google Web History feature turned on, you can find a list of your personal top queries of 2009 here.
Ask.com also just published its top questions of 2009 - though questions like "What is Miley Cyrus' phone number?" make us wonder about the validity of this list.
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As the year draws to an end, all the