Google Logo Abducted by Aliens

Google's doodles are always the subject of a fair amount of discussion but lately it looks like they've become so common place they've lost some of their initial charm. Still, they provide a unique way of educating the public on some important or at least interesting events or people. Google's latest doodle though is a little different. It doesn't mark a holiday, a great scientist or thinker, not even Tetris' birthday, in fact, no one knows what exactly Google is saying with the new doodle of a flying saucer “abducting” the letter “o” from its name.

The doodle links to a Google search for “unexplained phenomenon” which, in an ironic twist, shows the news results about the fresh Google doodle right on top followed by the usual list of sites one would expect for this kind of search. There doesn't seem to be any historic unexplained phenomenon at this date nor has there been any significant one lately so what exactly does it mean?

Well, Google is giving us a hint by the way of an equally mysterious tweet on the company's main Twitter account. The message in its entirety says: “1.12.12 25.15.21.18 15 1.18.5 2.5.12.15.14.7 20.15 21.19” so it's not that helpful at first glance. But the “code” isn't really much of a cryptographer's conundrum, replacing the numbers with the corresponding letter from the Latin alphabet (A=1, B=2 etc.), the message is revealed to say “All your o are belong to us” a play on the very popular meme from the web's distant past (early 2000's), when the term “meme” wasn't even coined up yet, which said “All your base are belong to us.”

The humorous saying made its rounds through the forums and blogs of the day originating from a very poor translation of a Japanese video game. While the reference is sure to get a giggle from anyone who remembers the simpler times at the start of this century, it doesn't help explaining Google's message one bit but maybe that's the whole point.