A Decade in Search – 2007

2007. Sun was shining, skies were blue, and SEO was relatively quiet. By 2007 I had been working in SEO for a while now, and enjoying it more every day in sunny Madrid.

The most significant change of 2007 would be the launch of the iPhone. The revolutionary device from Apple would change mobile search forever. With unlimited internet access everywhere, it has never been easier to search on the go. Yahoo!, Live and Google would start redesigning its engines for mobile and starting adding functionalities such as personalised results depending on your location.

Google would quickly react by announcing Android OS, an operating system that would make its debut the following year.

2007 is also the year that Google reaches 1 trillion (1 000 000 000 000) pages indexed. Everyone knew that the web was a big place, but no search engine had ever indexed that many URLs. By doing that Google shows to the world that they are the leading search engine.

Street View was launched in Google Maps. With only 5 cities from the USA available, it was the first time that something similar had seen the light. The ability of seeing streets as if you were there was a breakthrough. Many people complained because the lack of privacy, but the functionalities of Street View would quickly silence the complaints.

Lastly, Google announced Google Gears, an application that would let you download content from GReader (and GMail in a later stage) so you can read them offline. Gears would be later rolled out to several more applications so these can be used offline.

As I was saying at the start, 2007 was a really quiet year compared with 2006, especially for Yahoo! and Live. But it would all change in the following years.

What about you? Where were you in 2007? Do you think I have missed something important? Let me know in the comments!