Europe Blog
Our views on the Internet and society
Remembering 70 years since Auschwitz's liberation
Tuesday, January 27, 2015
It was the end of one of the worst chapters in human history - the Soviet Army’s liberation 70 years ago of the notorious Nazi death camp Auschwitz on January 27, 1945. Today, starting at 15:30 CET, the Auschwitz Museum is live streaming on
YouTube
the ceremony marking the liberation, held in front of the Death Gate, together with survivors of the camp:
Throughout the world, various anniversary ceremonies, conferences, exhibitions and meetings are scheduled. The Auschwitz Museum and the United Nations have built a
Map of Remembrance
with the goal to bring together the various memorial activities taking place.
For the past three years, the
Google Cultural Institute
has been working with institutions and associations to preserve and share online thousands of archives, images and videos telling the
stories from the Holocaust
. The Auschwitz Museum participated in this project from the beginning, adding hundreds of
documents
and inviting you to discover individual stories like the love of
Edek Galinski
and
Mala Zimetbaum
or the unique collection of
family photographs
found in the ruins of the camp. Learn more on the “Evacuation and Liberation of the Auschwitz camp" and the “Sonderkommando" through these new online exhibitions.
For this anniversary, the
USC Shoah Foundation
, who shared with the world poignant testimonials of survivors through another exhibition, “70 Stories of Auschwitz”, inviting you to listen to the survivors as they recall their experiences in short and moving personal videos.
We encourage everyone to (re)discover these stories from the Holocaust - and remember, never again.
Posted by Agata Wacławik-Wejman, Head of Public Policy, Central and Eastern Europe
Bringing some of the best of Belgium to Street View
Thursday, January 22, 2015
hroughout the world, our Google Street View special collects allow users anywhere, on their mobile devices or computers, to see the world’s great sites. We’ve now just added some of the best of Belgium to the collection. Stroll through the Mardasson Memorial commemorating World War II’s decisive Battle of the Bulge or take a peek at the saxophone-filled homage to Albert Sax over the Meuse River in Dinant.
The images were taken with the
Street View Trekker
backpack on which is mounted a panoramic camera, and
Street View Trolley
, a cart with a camera system. Both tools make it possible photograph places inaccessible to Street View cars.
The project includes a shout out to three special Belgian towns: Wavre, Grobbendonk and Auderghem, the winners of Google eTown Awards in 2013. We award this prize to municipalities that benefit the most from the economic potential of the Internet.
In Wavre, we’ve captured images of the City Hall.
In Auderghem, we take a look inside the Val Duchesse castle.
In Grobbendonk, we feature the ruins of the OLV Ten Toon priory.
Posted by Caroline Coesmans, Policy Manager, Brussels
Launching voices of the Mediterranean
Wednesday, January 21, 2015
The Mediterranean Sea is the cradle of Western civilization - but all too often today is seen as an area of conflict. Together with the Voces Fondation, we are today launching a project designed to promote the development of a Mediterranean as a common place of respect, peace and solidarity.
Our focus is engage young people between the ages of 14 and 22 from Spain in the West to Palestine in the East that are interested in photography and audiovisual arts. Voces Foundation already has created a G+ page (
Voices of the Mediterranean
) where people can share pictures and videos about what the Mediterranean means, highlighting those aspects that bring us together instead of those aspects that separate the different cultures and countries.
Specific topics that will be discussed include access to water and other natural resources and to access to Internet and new technologie. Other subjects range from education and culture; gastronomy; entrepreneurship with social impact - and above all, peace. Actors and singers including actress Elisa Mouliaá or the musician and composer Rash already are contributing. Participate using the hashtag #Nostrum.
At the end of the project, we will hold a contest to choose the most interesting photos, painting and videos. Please contribute!
P Esperanza Ibáñez Lozano, Public Policy Manager
Entrepreneurial Spirit: Happy Socks and Angry Birds
Monday, January 19, 2015
At a Lisbon Council event in Brussels, David Drummond, Senior Vice President of Corporate Development and Chief Legal Officer, today argued that there is no limit to entrepreneurial spirit - and that Europe is generating more Internet success stories than most imagine.
I want to thank the Lisbon Council for all the work they’ve done on entrepreneurship and continuing to push the conversation forward. I feel privileged to speak here today on a vital topic that is near and dear to our hearts at Google.
Just this month, Niklas Zennstrom, the Swedish founder of Skype was interviewed in
Foreign Affairs
magazine, where he was asked for his thoughts on the global spread of tech entrepreneurship.
In the article, Niklas spoke about the usual concerns you hear about being an entrepreneur in Europe. Red-tape. Scarce venture capital. A risk-averse culture. Unforgiving bankruptcy laws.
That’s become a commonplace critique in Europe. As far back as 2003, the European Commission asked a similar question in a Green Paper on entrepreneurship: “Why are so few Europeans setting up their own companies?”
But, overall, the tone of Zennstrom’s interview was surprisingly upbeat.
“Ten or 15 years ago,” he said, “if you wanted to be an Internet innovator or entrepreneur, you packed your bag and bought a one-way ticket to Silicon Valley and made it over there.”
But “today,” he said, “you don’t need to do that.”
So while there’s no shortage of doom and gloom when discussing the startup climate in Europe, I’m here today to side with Niklas, and to talk about trends that suggest Europe’s entrepreneurial spirit is very much alive.
The same continent that gave birth to several of the world’s most important companies of the last century—BMW, Maersk, L’Oreal, —is producing a new generation of startups that have the potential to shake up markets, grow economies and boost jobs. It’s a trend we’re witnessing firsthand at Google, both in terms of the numbers and through the success of our many partners. And it’s one we’re heavily invested in promoting.
Data
Let’s start, as we often do at Google, with the numbers.
In capital after capital, European startups are having banner years. In London, tech firms set a new investment record in the last year, bringing in nearly 1.2 billion euros in investment, double what they raised in 2013.
In Madrid, startups raised 187% more capital last fall than they had just a year earlier.
In Berlin, tech start-ups saw their investments grow by 140 percent year-over-year, with two of Europe’s largest tech IPOs. Both the e-commerce site Zalando and the incubator Rocket Internet earned multibillion euro valuations.
And in Stockholm, we’re witnessing the birth of one of the most prolific tech hubs in the world, with 6.3 companies valued at a billion dollars for every million Swedes. In Silicon Valley, that number is only a little higher at 6.9.
The emerging picture shows that across Europe, 2014 was a great year for tech startups. In fact there were as many start-up exits in the first half of 2014 in Europe as there were in all of 2011 and 2012 combined.
Stories
Ok, so let’s look beyond the numbers for a minute and look instead at cultural influence. The most downloaded gaming app in Google Play last year was Candy Crush, created by British gaming company King. A few years after the Finnish firm Rovio defined app-based gaming with Angry Birds, other Helsinki-based firms like Supercell are following in their footsteps, with massive hits like Clash of Clans — 2014’s top-grossing game for iPhones and iPads.
And the future of the music industry is increasingly being charted by ambitious European companies. SoundCloud is a Berlin based platform for musicians and music fans to promote, share and stream music. Since its launch in 2007, it has built up a base of over 175 million monthly users who contribute over 12 hours of new content every minute. Experts expect its valuation to soon top €1 billion. Another example is the popular Swedish music streaming service Spotify. Since Spotify was launched, Sweden’s record industry revenues grew by more than a third, while piracy plummeted. Today, Spotify has more than 60 million users worldwide and is providing global exposure for chart-dominating European acts like Clean Bandit and Hozier.
All of these developments have left us at Google with an optimistic view of European entrepreneurship. That’s why Google Ventures, our Venture Capital investment arm, broke ground in Europe in a big way. Last year we established a European venture fund of $100 million to support the next generation of European companies, helping fuel their passion and bring their ideas to life. And after a few months we announced that we would be increasing that fund to $125 million - a clear sign that we believe investing in European entrepreneurs is good business. While I know it has often been fashionable to bemoan the lack of European venture capital funds, we’ve been impressed by their number and quality, and we are actively seeking to co-invest with them.
We want Google to be an engine of entrepreneurship in Europe, helping match the enormous talent and ambition of European entrepreneurs with the opportunity the world’s largest market provides. We’re excited to join a vibrant investment scene in Europe and work with other European investors to give our support directly to European businesses.
AdWords
Now we’re also seeing firsthand how small business entrepreneurs are using the Internet to create innovative business models and grow what many will see as traditional businesses. And we’re proud that our products are helping entrepreneurs in all fields to hire talent and expand their reach into new markets that were previously closed to them.
Study after study has shown that small businesses can do better when they establish a strong web presence, growing sales up to four times faster than their competitors when they embrace the web and digital tools.
The clearest reason for that growth is the internet’s ability to help entrepreneurs tap a vibrant export market. It’s important to remember that 30 years ago, small businesses couldn’t afford to advertise, certainly not on a global scale. They could afford listings in the yellow pages or their local paper, but expanding beyond that market was simply out of reach. Today, with technologies like Google’s AdWords advertising, they can market their wares globally, exposing their craft to a much larger audience.
We’re not really known in Silicon Valley for our sense of fashion. But today, I’m proud to be wearing these very loud and very vibrant socks. Six years ago, on a bleak day in Stockholm, a man named Viktor Tell noticed his friends had all worn colorful socks to lift the mood. He realized how hard it was to find colorful socks and took to his shed to begin a new trend from the ankles-up.
For years,
Happy Socks
, the company he founded, has been using our AdWords advertising product to take his local experiment in optimism worldwide. By advertising and selling his socks online, he dramatically increased his traffic and revenue, doubling his turnover in 2013. Today he has customers throughout Europe, Japan, Australia and the US, making Happy Socks a global player with a presence in over 6,000 retail stores.
And even if you prefer to go sockless on the beaches of the Aegean, we can help. The Greek travel Agency
Pamediakopes.gr
has grown tremendously since it began to advertise with Google AdWords in 2010. In four years, both its traffic and sales have quadrupled, leading a small company of 35 to grow to 150 employees. By targeting Russian, Romanian and Bulgarian web traffic through AdWords, Pamediakopes is now a leading travel agency in each of these countries.
Google has helped hundreds of thousands of European small businesses like Happy Socks and Pamediakopes succeed online, giving them new ways to grow and promote their businesses. A study by the German Institute for Economic Research credited Google products with helping create 28,000 companies and 100,000 jobs in Germany during the worst years of Europe’s downturn.
But we still need to help educate people and businesses to get online; for example, in the UK only 45% of small businesses have a website.
In Germany, we kicked off the “
Weltweit Wachsen
” initiative to do just this, helping German small businesses to use the internet to tap new markets. By the end of the year, we expect to engage more than 250,000 people through educational workshops to bring their businesses online.
And we also launched a digital platform called
Made in Italy
, to support traditional Italian industries like food, fashion and handcrafts by improving their digital skills. Through free online training for business owners as well as personalized support from over 100 tutors, we plan to reach over 80 percent of Italy’s traditional small businesses.
YouTube
Some of those jobs may not be the type you’d expect. YouTube, our online video site, is helping create an entire new type of field: the online video entrepreneur.
Rather than explain what I mean, let’s embrace the spirit of YouTube and have you see it for yourself in this video.
With a simple camera, a YouTube account and the savvy to realize that the music he loved wasn’t being covered anywhere else, Jamal Edwards built his passion into the leading youth media music force in the UK, SB.TV. In fact, when we ran that ad for the first time in the UK, the SB.TV web site crashed because nearly a million people searched for Jamal Edwards.
Now, Jamal is spending his time expanding SB.TV, landing himself on the cover of the Economist and breaking new artists worldwide. In fact, Spotify’s top male artist of the year, Ed Sheeran, actually broke through on SB.TV.
And speaking of breakout stars, I’m curious, how many of you could guess one of the five most popular celebrities among US teenagers, according to Variety magazine?
Not Katy Perry. Not Leonardo Dicaprio. Not Taylor Swift.
According to Variety, the top five most popular celebrities are all YouTube stars, coming out ahead of traditional stars like Jennifer Lawrence and Johnny Depp. In fact, the third most popular celebrity is a 25-year-old Swede named Felix Kjellberg who lives in Brighton, England. Felix is better known to his fans as
PewDiePie
and he currently has the most popular YouTube channel in the world, with over 33 million subscribers. By the end of this month, that number will probably be 34 million.
Every week, Felix reviews and comments on video games to a global fanbase that extends throughout Europe, North America and Asia.
In fact, YouTube stardom has become so mainstream that in Germany, we’ve seen something remarkable happen. When our German YouTube stars apply for a loan, they list their occupation as YouTuber.
Today, thousands of YouTube channels are making six figures annually and total revenue amongst our YouTubers has grown by 50 percent in each of the last two years.
Android
I spoke earlier about companies like Rovio and SuperCell, both companies that have found success through the emergence of the mobile economy. Mobile marketplaces are serious business, with a recent study finding that the mobile economy generated about 90 billion euros in revenue in Europe in 2013. It’s estimated that there are more than 2.9 million developers in the world and more than 2 million apps.
We’re proud to be a part of that ecosystem. Indeed, one of Google’s largest efforts over the last several years was developing our open-source mobile operating system Android, with our own app store called Google Play. We announced at our global developers conference last year that we had paid out more than $5 billion to developers since the previous year’s event.
Developers like
6Wunderkinder
, a Berlin startup who built a task management app called Wunderlist that was a top app on both Google Play and the App Store last year. Wunderlist’s largest market is the US, but its also thriving in China and Europe as well. They recently attracted 16 million euros from Sequoia Capital. Sequoia’s name is legendary in the US, having backed companies like Apple, Oracle, even Google. But it wasn’t until 6Wunderkinder that they made their first investment in Europe.
Elsewhere in Berlin,
EyeEm
has built a global community for photographers in record time. In 2013, the app had 1 million users. Today, 10 million users from around the world have a destination to sell photos, share tips and connect with other aspiring photographers.
Supporting Entrepreneurs
If we’re honest, entrepreneurial growth in Europe isn’t just a question of capital, or helpful products or global platforms like YouTube and Android. It’s also a question of skills. Entrepreneurship feeds off of collaboration and partnership, with people coming together to learn from each other and generate new ideas.
Our own effort to seed Europe’s playing field led us to create Campuses that attract ambitious and aspiring entrepreneurs in a place to connect and create. We’ve also been proud to partner with a number of leading start-up organizations - such as
NUMA
in France - to support start-up working spaces and programs for entrepreneurs across the EU. Globally our programs have reached some 280,000 entrepreneurs who have launched 8000 startups, created 6600 jobs and raised 160 million euros.
Google’s London Campus
has already grown to 32,000 members, leading to startups that have created nearly 600 jobs and attracted 44 million euros in funding. Across this year, we’ll be launching
new campuses
in Warsaw and Madrid, based on the inspiring demand we’re seeing on the ground in those cities. At each of these centers, we're supporting founders and developers to improve their technical and business skills so they can take their ideas to market. We offer thousands of hours of free mentoring, networking with venture capital and other events to support these entrepreneurs.
We also launched
Actívate
in Spain, where youth unemployment has reached a massive 54% in 2014. Actívate is an initiative to provide free online training in e-commerce, analytics and cloud computing to Spanish youth. These are real courses designed in partnership with Spanish government and academic institutions, awarding official certificates that can breathe new life into CVs throughout the country. Our goal is to offer these courses to 160,000 young people in Spain by year’s end.
And we’re already seeing these efforts pay off. Last year, María Victoria Ruiz joined an Actívate digital marketing course in Spain. This inspired her to set up her own business with co-founder Eduardo Fernández, and in 2013, Maredas was born – an online shop selling urban-style espadrille shoes. Working with Google AdWords, Maredas has built their visibility and attracted new customers, exporting to other parts of Spain and even to France and Italy. In fact most of their sales increase has come from abroad.
We are also helping to fuel the creative economy and grow the next generation of creators and media companies online. Both Google Play and YouTube have provided a paid distribution platform to creators to reach a global audience. YouTube alone has paid over €1 billion to the music industry, propelling the success of countless European creators. The
YouTube Space London
is YouTube’s state of the art production facility open to European YouTube creators to learn from industry experts. Creators learn everything from camera basics, to being a business on YouTube, share best practices, collaborate and network with other creators and create the dream video through the latest technology in video production. Hundreds of talented creators have got the chance to create brilliant content and showcase it to the world.
Support from policymakers
We know there’s more Google can do to spur the blooming trend of entrepreneurship in Europe. And we plan to keep investing—in both ideas and people. But the question I get asked most is what can policymakers do to help.
Now, I’m always very nervous as an American going to other countries and offering advice to people on how to manage their policies. But here’s what I’ve observed from ten years of repeated trips to Europe and conversations with policymakers and entrepreneurs alike.
I speak to many entrepreneurs who struggle with 28 different rule books. The Internet is in many ways borderless and yet there are many borders still within Europe, even within the single market. With over two dozen frameworks, many of which are inconsistent, entrepreneurs stumble when they seek to grow or hire across borders or trade goods and services. The biggest step the EU can make is to complete the formation of the digital single market, a goal the European Commission rightly recognizes as critical to the Continent’s growth.
We hope the Transatlantic Trade and Investment Partnership can also provide a generational opportunity to support the growth of the transatlantic economy and open up new avenues for growth to European and American companies alike.
I also hear from policymakers and business leaders about the crucial role intellectual property plays and need to protect their innovations. The Internet creates opportunities for creators to reach new audiences and develop new sources of revenue. Copyright rules should take full advantage of a new single market to promote research and innovation while protecting the rights of creators.
Of course, the other ask from entrepreneurs is to make it easier for them to access capital to grow and scale-up their business. Nicklas Zennstrom called on governments to encourage private investors to put their money in start-ups by reducing capital gains taxes for investing in start-up companies.
And anyone who’s in need of talent talks about the importance of encouraging our youth to acquire the digital and scientific skills of the future, both in Europe and the US. By 2020, nearly 90 percent of all jobs will require some technical information and communications skills. At current rates, the EU predicts a shortfall of 900,000 jobs that will go unfilled because students—especially young women—are lacking these skills. In the US, 57% of bachelor's degrees are earned by women, but only 12% of computer science degrees.
At Google, we’ve invested in initiatives like the
RISE Awards
and
Made with Code
to encourage children to adopt technical skills. And we’re also working with more than a dozen Science, Technology, Engineering and Math—or STEM—education organizations across the EU to give over 90,000 students exposure to computer science. Our goal is to ensure that children have the technical tools to solve real world problems, whatever their passion.
Conclusion
We at Google see clear reasons for confidence in Europe’s entrepreneurial potential and we’re proud to play our part. But in all this talk about Happy Socks and Angry Birds, IPOs and investment rounds, it’s easy to lose sight of what entrepreneurship really means.
Despite the revolutions we’ve seen in technology or the transformations that have shaken both our economies, when it comes to work, one thing has never changed. As people, we still largely define ourselves by our calling—by our profession. Whether you choose to be a barrister or a baker, a politician or a police officer, you derive a sense of pride from your work. That is something that is fundamental to the human condition—we all seek meaning through work or service.
The human costs of unemployment in both America and Europe have been massive. When people cannot find work—when they cannot better their own lives or the lives of their families or their communities—they lose more than a paycheck. They lose a sense of themselves. They ache for meaning.
What we’re beginning to see in Madrid and Milan and Athens, as well as in American cities like Detroit and Baltimore, is a response to that ache. We’re witnessing a belief in entrepreneurship that suggests people can climb out of their circumstances, if only their talent and ambition can be met with opportunity.
That opportunity doesn’t just exist on one shore or in one country. On both sides of the Atlantic, we’re seeing a drumbeat of innovation grow steadier, taking advantage of the scale and support that only our combined markets can provide.
Silicon Valley has been a tech hub for nearly fifty years. And I hear the question all the time: How do we replicate Silicon Valley? And my answer is not that you can’t, but that you shouldn’t.
Silicon Valley is the product of a number of forces that came together to create something unique. Whether it’s proximity to a world-class university in Stanford, or even nice weather--there’s no one thing that makes Silicon Valley what it is, nothing that can be exported on a barge and sent across the Atlantic. And there’s definitely nothing in the water...
There’s no reason that the forces that were harnessed in Silicon Valley-- talent, creativity, ambition, and as we like to say at Google, a healthy disregard for the impossible-- cannot be brought to bear to create an equally valuable, and uniquely European technology sector. In fact, major European cities already have much more than Silicon Valley ever did at the beginning, when it was just a lightly populated region south of San Francisco known mostly for producing apricots, plums and strawberries. London, Paris, Berlin, Warsaw, Stockholm--you have vibrant, diverse cities, with a deep-seated sense of culture and a shared history, full of creative people with brilliant ideas just looking for an opportunity.
More than anything else, Silicon Valley was built on an entrepreneurial spirit—on a prevailing idea that entrepreneurs could build something from scratch and see it thrive and expand.
But there’s no natural limit to that spirit. It doesn’t need a work visa; it doesn’t need translation. It travels easily. Google began 1998 in a garage in Menlo Park. But today, it’s just as likely the next great company will begin in a warehouse in Berlin or a Swedish cafe or a British tech incubator.
Good ideas are everyone’s domain; they just need to be nurtured to reach their potential. And that’s a commitment we can all make together.
Thank you.
Posted by David Drummond, Senior Vice President of Corporate Development and Chief Legal Officer
Driving into the future with European partners
Monday, January 19, 2015
Since we revealed our plans last May to build
fully self-driving vehicles
for testing and learning, we’ve been working on different prototypes. We’ve now put all those systems together into a
fully functional vehicle
which we discussed recently at the
Automotive News World Congress
in Detroit.
These vehicles, designed from the ground up to drive themselves, could only be possible by working with strong European partners and suppliers, including ZF Lenksysteme, Continental, Bosch, FRIMO and many others. ZF Lenksysteme, for example, brought its expertise in steering system development, driver assistance systems and safety concepts. Bosch provided expertise in powertrain development and driver assistance systems and Continental provided expertise in braking systems and other electronics.
In addition to our existing suppliers, we’re looking for automotive industry partners to help bring the vision of self-driving cars to market. We see that our best path forward to this goal is combining our technology with car maker know-how.
The self-driving car project is designed to improve road safety and help people who are
blind
,
disabled
or otherwise can’t drive, Much work remains ahead. Our hope is to test prototypes on public roads in later this year. We're excited by the progress we've made so far - and our suppliers are playing a crucial role.
Posted by Chris Urmson, Director, Self-Driving Car Project
Lighting up Google Maps with the aurora borealis
Thursday, January 15, 2015
Nature’s greatest light show has come to Google Maps for the first time. Starting today, armchair arctic explorers, science lovers and curious observers will be able to explore the Northern Lights in Finland right from Google Maps.
Northern Lights, Finland
Also known as the aurora borealis (after Aurora, the Roman goddess of the dawn, and Boreas, the Greek name for north wind), these dazzling lights are the effect of charged particles interacting with one another in earth’s atmosphere. These light displays have long been a source of wonder for poets and travelers gazing up at the otherworldly colors in stark contrast with the austere, arctic terrain. However, they can only be seen in person at certain latitudes and times of year, making this breathtaking sight a rare experience for most of us.
To see more views of the Northern Lights, explore the
Google Maps gallery
. Click across the frozen lake in Finland where these shots were captured, and take in the awe-inspiring views above.
Posted by Magdalena Filak, Google Maps Street View Associate Program Manager
Hallo, hola, olá to a new powerful Google Translate app
Wednesday, January 14, 2015
Often the hardest part of traveling is navigating the local language. If you've ever asked for "pain" in Paris and gotten funny looks, confused "embarazada" with "embarrassed" in Mexico, or stumbled over pronunciation pretty much anywhere, you know the feeling. We’ve now updated the
Translate app
on
Android
and
iOS
to transform your mobile device into an even more powerful translation tool.
Instant translation with Word Lens
The Translate app already lets you use camera mode to snap a photo of text and get a translation for it in 36 languages. From today, you can instantly translate text. While using the Translate app, just point your camera at a sign or text and the translated text will overlaid on your screen—even if you don't have an Internet or data connection.
This instant translation currently works for translation from English to and from French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish, and we’re working to expand to more languages.
Have an easier conversation using the Translate app
When talking with someone in an unfamiliar language, conversations can... get... sloowwww. While we’ve had real-time conversation mode on Android since 2013, our new update makes the conversation flow faster and more naturally.
Starting today, simply tap the mic to start speaking in a selected language, then tap the mic again, and the Google Translate app will recognize which of the two languages are being spoken, letting you have a more fluid conversation. For the rest of the conversation, you won’t need to tap the mic again—it'll be ready as you need it. Asking for directions to the Rive Gauche, ordering bacalhau in Lisbon, or chatting with your grandmother in her native Spanish just got a lot faster.
These updates will be coming to both Android and iOS, rolling out over the next few days. This is the first time some of these advanced features, like camera translations and conversation mode, will be available for iOS users.
More than 500 million people use Google Translate every month, making more than 1 billion translations a day to more easily communicate and access information across languages. Today’s updates take us one step closer to turning your phone into a universal translator and to a world where language is no longer a barrier to discovering information or connecting with each other.
Posted by Barak Turovsky, Product Lead, Google Translate
Hacking against Ebola
Tuesday, January 13, 2015
Like other epidemics, Ebola creates panic, dangerous rumors and unverified facts. Journalists must be prepared, yet unfortunately they often lack the necessary resources and tools that match the responsibility to inform local communities.
To help fill the gap, we’re supporting the
Global Editors Networks's
#HackAgainstEbola on January 14 and 15. Other supporters include
Open Society Initiative for West Africa
(OSIWA),
Union for Francophone Press (UPF)
, and
Code for Africa
. Follow the two-day event through GEN's
live blog
and the hashtag #HackAgainstEbola.
Our goal is to help develop the best tools needed to explain the Ebola epidemic. In Dakar, a dozen teams, composed of one journalist, one designer, and one developer, who will work to build a prototype online product in 48 hours.
This is only the final of a
three part series
. Nigeria's
Pan-Atlantic University
, Ghana's
PenPlusBytes
and
South Africa's 24.com
hosted previous Ebola hack days.
The Editors' Lab has been running
Google-supported hack events
in newsrooms around the world for the past few years, bringing journalists and coders closer together to explore new ways of creating and presenting the news. World-renowned media organizations including The New York Times, The Guardian, El Pais and Le Parisien have hosted hack days on different themes.
The winning team in Dakar will compete against the other winning Editors Lab teams at the GEN Summit 2015 in Barcelona next June.
Posted by Simon Morrison, Public Policy and Government Affairs Manager, London
Promoting sportsmanship on the field - and on the net
Sunday, January 11, 2015
In football, a red card means expulsion from the game. On the Internet, what would a red card resemble? This week, we launched a contest here in Belgium with the Mons Football Club youth clubs to help find out.
Why Belgium and why Mons? One of our two largest European data centers is located just outside the city. We’ve invested hundreds of millions in it and that means we are going to be involved in the local community for a long time to come. Belgium’s football reputation has been growing recently with an excellent showing at the recent Brazil World Cup - its top players are found sprinkled on many of the world’s top team - and the Mons youth academy is known as one of the country’s best.
Launching the contest in Belgium
The idea came from our strong partnership with the local
Mundaneum
institution and a
partnership
forged last year with one of the world’s biggest football clubs - Real Madrid. It held a contest called
"First Prize for the Promotion of Internet Values.”
As in football, the Net bans violence towards others. When you play sports, you are obliged to help all who are injured or have a disability. On the Internet, too, you need to help others.
The Belgian contest will be open to 11-17 olds, the teenagers who are growing up on the net. From this month through April, the club’s teenage players will attend workshops and create projects - drawings, videos, or essays - that marry their passion for football, fair play and the Internet.
More than 120 young players from RAEC Mons attended the
contest launch
. Dressed in their team uniforms, most said they spent as much or more time surfing on the Net as on the playing field. They will now compete for prizes ranging from a Chromebook to a tablet. Winners will be announced on April 19 at the club’s final home match this season.
Posted by William Echikson, Head of Community Relations, Europe
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Remembering 70 years since Auschwitz's liberation
Bringing some of the best of Belgium to Street View
Launching voices of the Mediterranean
Entrepreneurial Spirit: Happy Socks and Angry Birds
Driving into the future with European partners
Lighting up Google Maps with the aurora borealis
Hallo, hola, olá to a new powerful Google Translat...
Hacking against Ebola
Promoting sportsmanship on the field - and on the net
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