If you were thinking of stabbing yourself in the eye after reading the data from Yahoo’s 2012 search trends, we don’t blame you. Google has the perfect antidote. Humanity did actually attain achievements that were greater than the iPhone 5.

Just a quick post for your coffee break, but this video is so good that we had to share it. Today, Google published their search trend data as an interactive summary called, as always, Zeitgeist.

If you were thinking of stabbing yourself in the eye after reading the data from Yahoo’s 2012 search trends, we don’t blame you.

Google has the perfect antidote – reminding you that humanity did actually achieve something greater than producing the iPhone 5 and did more important things than fawn over the Kardashians or wondering if Robert Pattinson & Kristen Stewart will get back together?

Google’s Zeitgeist data can be drilled down by country into multiple top 10 lists. For instance, the hottest fashion/apparel brands in the USA for 2012 were:

1. Tory Burch
2. J Crew
3. Fubu
4. Uniqlo
5. Adidas
6. Theory
7. Tommy Hilfiger
8. Mossimo
9. Forever 21
10. Levis

There are two types of lists compiled in Zeitgeist:

• Trending Searches: What was hot and unique to this year? The “trending” queries are the searches that had the highest amount of traffic over a sustained period in 2012 as compared to 2011.
• Most Searched: What topped Google’s charts? The “most searched” queries are simply the most popular terms for 2012, ranked in order by volume of searches.

Top Trending Global Searches:

1. Whitney Houston
2. Gangnam Style
3. Hurricane Sandy
4. iPad 3
5. Diablo 3
6. Kate Middleton
7. Olympics 2012
8. Amanda Todd
9. Michael Clarke Duncan
10. BBB12

Trending Events in 2012 (Global):

1. Hurricane Sandy
2. Kate Middleton Pictures Released
3. Olympics 2012
4. SOPA Debate
5. Costa Concordia crash
6. Presidential Debate
7. Stratosphere Jump
8. Penn State Scandal
9. Trayvon Martin shooting
10. Pussy Riots

Trending People in 2012 (Global):

1. Whitney Houston
2. Kate Middleton
3. Amanda Todd
4. Michael Clarke Duncan
5. One Direction
6. Felix Baumgartner
7. Jeremy Lin
8. Morgan Freeman
9. Joseph Kony
10. Donna Summer

Trending Consumer Electronics (Global):

1. iPad 3
2. Samsung Galaxy S3
3. iPad Mini
4. Nexus 7
5. Galaxy Note 2
6. Play Station
7. iPad 4
8. Microsoft Surface
9. Kindle Fire
10. Nokia Lumia 920

It’s interesting that Morgan Freeman made number 8 on the people list, as the “Morgan Freeman is Dead” hoax hit the web again this year – which just shows the power of online word of mouth.

This article was originally published in Search Engine Watch on 12th December 2012