With 2015 drawing down, Google has once again produced its “Year in Search” feature, highlighting the topics users of the internet giant’s search engine looked for the most. While the main “Year in Search” splash features interactive insights into some of the year’s biggest news events—the terror attacks in Paris, the discovery of liquid water on Mars, and corruption within FIFA, to name a few—the company also sent out lists of the most popular search terms in major US cities.
But Washingtonians shouldn’t feel very special about their Googling in 2015. The most-trending phrases entered in Google from DC users largely ape national trends—heavy on celebrity deaths, celebrity near-deaths, and news events that captivated global audiences. Google finds its top trending topics by compared to how they’ve ranked in previous years, and this year’s top trending search in DC was the same as the nation’s: Lamar Odom, the former NBA forward who in October was found unconcious in a Nevada brothel. In fact, DC’s top ten trending searches in 2015 were all national or international stories:
Lamar Odom
Bobbi Kristina Brown
American Sniper
Caitlyn Jenner
Jurassic World
Paris
Ronda Rousey
Hurricane Joaquin
Charlie Sheen
Chris Kyle
The top ten trending news events, celebrity searches, and films—the only other localized results Google released—also don’t feel very local. The only potential exceptions are on the list of news events, with Baltimore in the wake of the death of Freddie Gray and Pope Franciscracking the list.
Benjamin Freed joined Washingtonian in August 2013 and covers politics, business, and media. He was previously the editor of DCist and has also written for Washington City Paper, the New York Times, the New Republic, Slate, and BuzzFeed. He lives in Adams Morgan.
Washington’s Most Googled Terms in 2015 Were Basically the Same as Everywhere Else’s
With 2015 drawing down, Google has once again produced its “Year in Search” feature, highlighting the topics users of the internet giant’s search engine looked for the most. While the main “Year in Search” splash features interactive insights into some of the year’s biggest news events—the terror attacks in Paris, the discovery of liquid water on Mars, and corruption within FIFA, to name a few—the company also sent out lists of the most popular search terms in major US cities.
But Washingtonians shouldn’t feel very special about their Googling in 2015. The most-trending phrases entered in Google from DC users largely ape national trends—heavy on celebrity deaths, celebrity near-deaths, and news events that captivated global audiences. Google finds its top trending topics by compared to how they’ve ranked in previous years, and this year’s top trending search in DC was the same as the nation’s: Lamar Odom, the former NBA forward who in October was found unconcious in a Nevada brothel. In fact, DC’s top ten trending searches in 2015 were all national or international stories:
The top ten trending news events, celebrity searches, and films—the only other localized results Google released—also don’t feel very local. The only potential exceptions are on the list of news events, with Baltimore in the wake of the death of Freddie Gray and Pope Francis cracking the list.
Top trending news events:
Top trending people:
Top trending films:
Benjamin Freed joined Washingtonian in August 2013 and covers politics, business, and media. He was previously the editor of DCist and has also written for Washington City Paper, the New York Times, the New Republic, Slate, and BuzzFeed. He lives in Adams Morgan.
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