Google Homepage - New UI standard?

The other day I was listing to podcast of discussion between Tony Conard, Toni Schneider and Mike. Tony Conard is the CEO of Sphere, which a new blog search engine and Toni Schneider is its advisor. Mike was the anchorperson. At one time, the discussion went into the UI design of Sphere homepage and this is what Tony Conard and Toni Schneider had to say;

Tony Conard and Toni Schneider-
early on we had a number and that was 28 and that was the no of words happen to be on Google Homepage(on that day) and our goal was to make sure we are 27 or less(on homepage of Sphere)

if you go to google it is very clear you have to put something in the white box and if you don't put something in the white box that site doesn't do a lot for you and we want to create a environment in which people came and it was very simple wordings indicating to them what it is we need them to do and we need them to put in a word there and then we can help them to find really great stuff along there interest

Mike -
how many words do you have on your home page

Tony Conard and Toni Schneider-
you know I counted the other day I think we are up to 35
hey I have good news..Google was up to 41

Good lord..I am all aware that Google interface is extremely elegant, but was not aware that Google homepage design is elevated to such a cult status that people have started to compare the number of words on there home page to that of Google's to decide if its good enough. Well Andy Rutledge does not seem to share the same enthusiasm about the Google homepage and he for sure has a comment or two to make.