Computing, IT & AI

Google News, automated news aggregation

2002 CEKrishna BharatGoogle News launched September 2002Diaspora (work abroad)

2002

A service that automatically groups news stories from thousands of publishers by topic.

Dated: 2002
As scholars put it: 2002 CE
Originator: Krishna Bharat
Source text: Google News launched September 2002
Region: Diaspora (work abroad)
Discipline: Computing, IT & AI
Evidence: Documented
Confidence: High
Verification: Verified-web

Background

Krishna Bharat, an IIT Madras graduate who had worked on web search at DEC, built the first version of Google News after the 11 September 2001 attacks, to follow coverage of the attacks. Launched in 2002, it clustered articles from many sources by story without human editors.

Significance

One of the first large-scale automated news aggregators and one of Google's first products beyond search.

Fair to say

Publishers have disputed its use of their content.

Path to modern innovation

Aggregates news from about 50,000 publishers in more than 30 languages.

Global impact

Algorithmic news feeds.