Obama came sixth in the fastest-rising searched for terms on a global scale, and other celebrities joining the two politicians in the top 10 was the late Heath Ledger as the fifth fastest climber in the most searched-for rankings.

The UK has more of an interest in the new President Elect than the Alaskan Governor, however, as Obama came in at number seven as the fastest-rising search time in Britain, while Palin didn’t even place in the top 10.

And due to the high profile collapse of its parent bank Landsbanki and the subsequent freezing of UK customers’ savings accounts, Icesave became the fastest rising financial search term in the UK, followed by others such as HBOS and Lloyds TSB, quite possibly due to the controversial merger of the two banks, and moneysavingexpert was one of the only terms which is not a financial institution to appear in the fastest rising star list.

Google compiles its ‘Zeitgeist’ list each year to see what the surfers of the world are looking for when they go online, by analysing billions of searches typed into its search engine.

The UK’s top search terms revealed that Brits spend most of their time online using social network site Facebook, the most searched for term, followed by the BBC, video-sharing site YouTube, and auction website eBay.com.

‘Jobs’ came in at number 10 in the most searched for terms this year, reflecting the growing rise of unemployment in Britain as the credit crunch takes hold of the economy.

One of the fastest-growing terms in the UK was the ‘Large Hadron Collider’, a giant atom smasher which was unveiled earlier this year and in the UK managed to outrank Obama, despite the high profile of this year’s US election on November 4 and its dominance in the media.

Other prominent things in the global top 10 most searched for terms include Beijing 2008, Facebook login, and Euro 2008.

© Fair Investment Company Ltd