How Google is like the dictionary

I remember an episode of M*A*S*H from my youth in which Hawkeye Pierce (Alan Alda) is being interviewed by a war documentarian. One of the questions is "what's your favorite book?" Hawkeye, in his smart-alecky way, answered that he would choose the dictionary because "you know, it has all the other books in it."

In the same way I think if I were asked what my favorite website is, my answer would have to be what George Bush dubbed "The Google." Not for how it looks, but for what it does and what it provides me. In a fraction of a second. For free.

Now I realize there are other, arguably better search engines, and not everything is findable through Google. But our ability to find and access information - facts, statistics, opinions, images - is greater now than at any other point in history. And to me, no other site exemplifies that achievement of mankind more than Google.

With hundreds of millions of searches per day, I don't think I'm alone in this sentiment.