Obama's inauguration helped to drive search engine traffic
Wednesday, 21, Jan 2009 11:53
Google and Yahoo! have released data on the most popular search queries related to this week's US presidential inauguration.
According to Google, top US searches included those for 'live inauguration coverage', 'inauguration day 2009 streaming' and 'listen to inauguration live'.
Meanwhile, popular queries from users based outside of the US made up 12 per cent of all inauguration-related searches yesterday (January 20th).
A number of searches centred on some of the main people involved in the ceremony aside from president Barack Obama, including Dr Rick Warren, who gave the invocation, and Reverend Dr Joseph Lowery, who gave the benediction.
Data from Yahoo! also uncovered similar trends, with interest in the inauguration reflected in the popularity of queries for information on Abraham Lincoln, Michelle Obama's outfit, the oath of office and the inaugural lunch menu.
Jeffrey Oldham and Fred Leach of Google noted that searches for inauguration-related terms have increased significantly over time, with those containing references to video streaming rising sharply in recent times.
"Today, technology has become so prevalent that queries such as 'YouTube live inauguration', 'live blogging inauguration', 'inaugural podcast' and 'Obama inaugural speech mp3' formed one-third of all inauguration-related queries," they said on the Official Google Blog.