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Google Doodle Celebrates Birthday of Douglas Adams

Posted by samzenpus on from the bring-a-towel dept.

mikejuk writes "Today's Google Doodle celebrates the fact that today would have been Douglas Adam's 61st birthday. For any fans of Adam's Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy this isn't to be missed. The interactive doodle takes us aboard the Heart of Gold spaceship where the towel — the essential travel item for any intergalactic voyager sits on the console besides the, also very necessary cup of tea, which is also a reference to a Dirk Gently novel, The Long Dark Teatime of the Soul. There are lots more tributes hidden including Marvin — the real one not the one in the film, a Babel Fish and more. Have fun exploring but make sure you click on the search symbol to find out more about Douglas Adams and his work."

1 of 104 comments (clear)

  1. Non-rounded, often obscure and "deathdays"... by rklrkl · · Score: -1, Troll

    Google Doodles like this do rub me up the wrong way. For a start, the person concerned is often an obscure one (or at least obscure outside the US - the US-centric doodles end up on Google UK, where they probably don't belong). OK, Adams isn't obscure because of Hitchhikers', but an awful lot of Doodle people are.

    Secondly, if they're going to choose to celebrate someone's life, do it on a rounded number of years either since their death or birth. Not "161st birthday of <insert_obscure_Hungarian_physicist_here>". In this case, why wasn't the 60th year since Adams' birth celebrated last year, rather than the 61st this year?

    And, finally, I must take massive umbrage with the Google tooltip that says "Douglas Adams' 61st birthday". I'm sorry, but once someone dies, they can no longer have birthdays after their death. It should be "61st anniversary of his birth", but I guess that's too long and not so catchy. I now call them "deathdays" when Google does this :-)

    Now get off my lawn!