searching

“?”

Who do you think you are
Who do i vote for
Who do i look like
Who do you love
Who does she think she is
Who done it
Who do you want to be

What could be better
What could happen to the target cells in an animal that lack receptors for local regulators
What could cause dizziness
What could happen in 2012
What could cause a missed period
What could cause a false positive pregnancy test
What could he be thinking
What could cause blood in stool
What could you buy with 700 billion

When will i die
When will the world end
When will i get married
When will we know who is president
When will i see you again
When will i be loved
When will twilight be on dvd

Where the wild things are
Where the hell is matt
Where the red fern grows
Where the heart is
Where the sidewalk ends
Where the buffalo roam
Where the light is
Where the truth lies
Where the streets have no name

Why do cats purr
Why do men have nipples
Why do dogs eat grass
Why do leaves change color
Why do men cheat
Why do we dream
Why do we yawn
Why do people smoke
Why do dogs eat poop
Why do fools fall in love

How to tie a tie
How to kiss
How to get pregnant
How to make money
How to lose weight
How to draw
How to make a website
How to cook a turkey
How to write a resume
How to lose friends and alienate people

Where is the love lyrics
Where is dubai
Where is chuck norris
Where is my mind
Where is the g spot
Where is waldo
Where is my polling place
Where is my stimulus check
Where is the love

– LW/Google, 2009

“every thing you wanted to know but weren’t afraid to google…”

As you might have already guessed, the lines above are not the product of my teeming brain, but rather the questions and concerns of millions of people as typed into a search window. All I did was type in the first two words and wait until those questions popped up as part of the “auto-complete” or “auto-fill” function, which attempts to finish your question based on what countless people have already run searches for. What you see above is almost exactly what came up in the search fields when I compiled this in February 2009, though I’m sure it would be slightly different now.

We read a similar version of this at a Fifth Fridays event a couple summers back. I cut the phrases up on little scraps of paper and put them in a pile and we went around the room reading them out loud. Having a lot of different voices really brought it to life, especially Red, because after he read his line he would literally chew it up and swallow it.