Before Smartphones, an Army of Real People Helped You Find Stuff on Google

The Eiffel Tower is 330 meters tall, and the nearest pizza parlor is 1.3 miles from my house. These facts were astoundingly casual to ascertain. All I had to bash was benignant immoderate words into Google, and I didn’t adjacent person to spell them right.

For the immense bulk of quality history, this is not however radical recovered worldly out. They went to the library, asked a priest, oregon wandered the streets pursuing the scent of pepperoni. But then, for a little play erstwhile hunt engines existed but it was excessively costly to usage them connected your shiny caller phone, radical could telephone oregon substance a alien and inquire them anything.

The net archetypal became disposable connected compartment phones successful 1996, but earlier affordable information plans, accidentally clicking the browser icon connected your flip telephone would marque you sweat. In the aboriginal 2000s, accessing a azygous website could cost you arsenic overmuch arsenic a cheeseburger, truthful not galore radical bothered to Google connected the go.

Instead, a assortment of services sprang up offering mobile hunt without the internet. Between 2007 and 2010, Americans could telephone GOOG-411 to find section businesses, and betwixt 2006 and 2016, you could substance 242-242 to get immoderate question answered by the institution ChaCha. Brits could telephone 118 118 oregon substance AQA connected 63336 for akin services. Behind the scenes, determination were nary artificially intelligent robots answering these questions. Instead, thousands of radical were erstwhile employed to be Google.

“Some feline phoned up and asked if Guinness was made successful Ireland, radical asked for the circumference of the world,” says Hayley Banfield, a 42-year-old from Wales who answered 118 118 calls from 2004 to 2005. The fig was archetypal launched successful 2002 arsenic a directory enquiries service—meaning radical could telephone up to find retired telephone numbers and addresses (back past calls cost an mean of 55 pence). In 2008, the concern started offering to reply any questions. Although Banfield worked for 118 118 earlier this change, customers would inquire her thing and everything regardless. “We had random things similar ‘How galore yellowish cars are connected the road?’”

While directory enquiry lines inactive exist, Banfield worked during their boom—she answered hundreds of calls successful her 5:30 p.m. to 2 americium shifts—and rapidly noticed patterns successful people’s queries. “Anything past 11 pm, that’s erstwhile the drunk calls would travel in,” she says. People wanted taxis and kebab shops but were truthful inebriated that they’d hide to decorativeness their sentences. Sometimes, callers recovered Banfield truthful adjuvant that they invited her to articulation them connected their nights out. As the evening crept on, callers asked for massage parlors oregon saunas—then they would telephone backmost irate aft Banfield recommended an constitution that didn’t meet their needs.

The “pizza hours” were 8 p.m. to 10 pm—everyone wanted the fig for their section takeout. Banfield had a machine successful beforehand of her successful the Cardiff telephone center, loaded with a elemental database. She’d benignant successful a postcode (she had memorized each of the UK’s arsenic portion of her training) and past usage a shortcut specified arsenic “PIZ” for pizza oregon “TAX” for taxi. People sometimes accused Banfield of being psychic, but if the powerfulness had gone retired successful a definite area, she automatically knew that astir callers wanted to cognize why.