In the 2008 action movie, "Wanted," the underdog Wesley Gibson (played to perfection by up-and-coming actor James McAvoy…drool!) types his name in the Google search box — and comes up with zero hits. To him, this signifies a sad truth about his existence in this world: he’s nothing. A nobody. An insignificant being living a meaningless life of drudgery. Zilch.
It’s as if Google has become the ultimate scale that weighs how significant someone is, not just in the virtual world of the internet, but in the real world as well. After all, isn’t the internet a microcosm of the real world we live in? It used to be that someone is considered significant when mentioned in a local newspaper or any published material. Well, the internet changed all that.
The word "google" has itself been transformed into a verb, as in: "Just google it, and you’ll find out," or "Google the information you want." These days, if you’re not on the internet in some form (anonymous or otherwise), it seems as if you don’t exist.
Call it the process of googlification. How googlificant (google + significant) you are is directly indicated by the number of hits you get from googling your own name. 😀