Short answers, pulled from the story.
The Spice Girls have sold more than 100 million records worldwide, making them the best-selling girl group of all time. Their debut album Spice alone sold more than 23 million copies, becoming the best-selling album by a female group in history.
The Spice Girls were formed in 1994 following auditions held by Heart Management at London's Danceworks studios on the 4th of March 1994. The five members are Mel B (Scary Spice), Melanie C (Sporty Spice), Emma Bunton (Baby Spice), Geri Halliwell (Ginger Spice), and Victoria Beckham (Posh Spice).
The phrase "girl power" was originally coined by US punk band Bikini Kill in 1991 and appeared as the title of a 1996 single by British pop duo Shampoo. The Spice Girls adopted the slogan after Halliwell encountered the Shampoo single, and it was their emergence in 1996 that brought the phrase into mainstream global consciousness. It was later added to the Oxford English Dictionary.
The Spice Girls fired Simon Fuller on the morning of the 7th of November 1997, the day of their MTV Europe Music Awards performance where they won Best Group. The group had grown frustrated with the pace of commercial commitments and chose to begin managing themselves. The firing made front-page news worldwide.
"Wannabe" reached number one in 37 countries, spent seven weeks at number one in the UK, and held the top spot on the US Billboard Hot 100 for four consecutive weeks. It is the best-selling single by an all-female group of all time and the best-selling debut single by an all-female group. Its US debut at number eleven on the Hot 100 was the highest-ever debut by a non-American act at the time, surpassing the record previously held by the Beatles.
The nicknames were devised by Peter Loraine, then-editor of Top of the Pops magazine, and his staff after a lunch with the group following the release of "Wannabe". Staff writer Jennifer Cawthron explained the reasoning: Victoria was Posh Spice for her reserved manner and Gucci-style dress, Emma was Baby Spice for wearing pigtails and sucking a lollipop, Mel C was Sporty Spice for leaping around in a tracksuit, Mel B was Scary Spice for being "shouty", and Geri was Ginger Spice simply because of her hair. The nicknames were never intended for global adoption.