Europe Blog
Our views on the Internet and society
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
Hello from Tunisia
Tuesday, May 8, 2012
It was a perfect way to celebrate the Arab Spring.
UNESCO
last week marked its World Press Day in Tunisia, the country that led the rush for freedom in the Arab world. We sponsored the event, hosting Tunisian President
Moncef Marzouki
who met with
Daniel Calingaert
, Freedom House’s Vice President in Washington DC via an On Air Hangout on
UNESCO’s Google+ page
.
World Press Day marks an appropriate moment to review our progress in the Middle East and North Africa. We’re investing and digging deep roots. Over the past year, we have doubled our regional workforce. We have hosted g|daysreaching an estimated 12,000 entrepreneurs and developers in Egypt, Saudi Arabia, Morocco, the United Arab Emirates and Jordan. Our
Google Media Academy
has trained nearly 2,000 journalists.
Google products are going Arabic. Only about three percent of the web now is in Arabic, while more than 10 percent of the world’s web population speaks it as a mother tongue. In order to encourage more local content, we have launched eight local YouTube domains and 11 local maps domains. An Egyptian who searches YouTube is no longer directed to Western videos but instead is able to access local content. We have introduced Arabic versions of Voice Search, Driving directions for Maps, and Google+.
Many magic moments have occurred in the past year. We hosted celebrity high profile hangouts with entertainer
Myriam Fares
and the Arab world’s biggest pop star, Amr Diab. We also launched the Official Google Arabia Google+
page
.
Earlier this month, two Qatar museums,
Museum of Islamic Art
and
Mathaf
, joined the Google Art Project. Egypt, the first episode of "Inside Google" aired on
Al Hayat Al Youm
, Egypt's number one Prime Time TV show. Egypt’s very own Amr Mohamed became a global finalist in the
YouTube Space Lab
. And next week we will crown a national winner for the
Ebda2
with Google competition to provide local entrepreneurs seed capital to start their own business kickstarting the internet ecosystem in Egypt to flourish.
This Arabization drive is producing impressive results. Google searches are up by 25 percent year on year in the region. Some 167 million YouTube videos are viewed each day in the Middle East and Africa - the second highest number in the world, behind the U.S. and ahead of Brazil. These daily views represent 112 percent increase since last October - more than double the views in just one year. An hour of YouTube video is uploaded each minute in the Middle East and North Africa. Since the launch of our local map domains, we have seen 50 percent growth in maps usage throughout the region.
Our goal is clear – to become part of the local landscape, giving people around the Middle East and North Africa access to information, preferably in their own language. For us, our contribution to UNESCO’s World Press Day represents yet another strong step towards this goal.
Posted by Maha Abouelenein, Head of Communications, Middle East and North Africa
Celebrating World Press Freedom Day
Wednesday, May 2, 2012
Update from Tunis
: UNESCO kicked off its World Press Freedom celebrations here at a ceremony at the presidential palace conducted via Google Hangout. Tunisian President Moncef Marzouki spoke with Freedom House Vice President Daniel Calingaert in Washington DC. The President said that his country's revolution last year "was done in the defense of freedom of expression," vowing that "Tunisia will never give up the freedom of expression is has won." A full two day program on press freedom continues Friday and Saturday under the theme “Media Freedom Helping to Transform Societies: New Voices, Youth and Social Media.”
The United Nations designates every May 3 as
World Press Freedom Day
. The day is designed to raise awareness about of the importance of freedom of the press and remind governments of their commitment to respect and uphold the right to freedom of expression enshrined in the
Universal Declaration of Human Rights
.
This year,
UNESCO
is marking the day in Tunisia. The choice of setting honours the North African country’s recent uprising in favor freedom of expression, one in which the Internet played an important role. On Thursday afternoon,
Tunisian President Moncef Marzouki
will host the ceremony conferring the
Guillermo Cano World Press Freedom Prize
on a deserving individual, organisation or institution that has made an outstanding contribution to the defence of press freedom.
We’re proud to be sponsoring the celebrations. President Marzouki announced the event through his official
Google
page and we’re organising a Google Hangout from the presidential palace, allowing guests from Amsterdam, Tripoli and Washington, D.C. to speak with the Tunisian President.
Thursday’s ceremony will be followed by a two-day conference bringing journalists, NGOs and officials from all over the world to Tunisia. They will discuss how to improve the safety of journalists, deal with defamation, develop opublic service broadcasting, and the issue of media ownership in a changing media landscape. Throughout, the impact of the Internet and social media will be on the agenda.
We’re involved here as well. Maha Abouelenein, our head of communications in MENA, will participate in a session about new media in the afternoon of May 4. Khaled Koubaa, our policy manager for North Africa, will appear on the same day on a panel titled “Innovation in Gathering and Sharing News. Finally, I will speak on May 5 about freedom of expression.
Please stay with us to follow UNESCO’s Tunis World Press Freedom celebrations.
Posted by William Echikson, Head of Free Expression, Europe, Middle East and Africa
Working with Le Monde to aid Tunisian journalism
Friday, February 10, 2012
Update,
February 16
. Google France welcomed five of the six Tunisian journalists at its offices for a lunch to hear about their experiences in Paris and to discuss progress of freedom of expression in their homeland.
In a single, magnificent moment, journalists in Tunisia liberated themselves from the shackles of censorship. They no longer were forced to regurgitate government propaganda and finally could write what they wanted. Instead, they were confronted with the challenges of freedom.
We are teaming up with the prestigious French newspaper
Le Monde
to help tackle this crucial challenge. Six Tunisian journalists are coming to Paris to work for three months in the Le Monde newsroom. As the
paper explained
, the journalists will help cover daily news and the upcoming French Presidential election. Our hope is that they then will return home with new skills that will serve to construct a new, free but responsible professional press in Tunisia.
The six winners of the Google internship are:
Radhouane Somai, a political reporter for the Business News website.
Hajer Ben Arjroudi, an an investigative reporter for the Express FM radio station.
Thameur Mekki contributes to three online webzines, specializing in digital culture.
Zbiss Hanene, the editor of the culture section for Realities magazine.
Hajer Jeridi, the editor-in-chief of the www.gnet.tn news site.
Nacer Talel, a freelance photographer
At Google, we are aware of the need to work with publishers to smooth the transition not only from oppression to freedom, but from analogue to digital distribution. We are sponsoring a series of digital journalism prizes with
Institut de Sciences Politiques
, the
International Press Institute
in Vienna and the
Global Editors Network
in Paris. We also are the proud backer of Reporters Without Borders’ annual
Netizen of the Year
award. In addition, we have come up with a series of products such as
Adsense
to split online ad revenues with publishers.
The collaboration with Le Monde marks a significant step forward in our engagement. We are working hard to support free elections in the countries of North Africa and the Middle East, building a series of new Internet tools that allow politicians to reach voters and voters to have their voice heard by politicians.
A special thanks goes out to Le Monde’s
Sylvie Kauffmann
for this project. Sylvie covered Central Europe for Le Monde when it the communist imposed countries of the Soviet empire freed themselves. Sylvie continued to become the Le Monde’s first female editor-in-chief. She travelled to Tunis and personally interviewed and chose all the candidates. For her, and for Le Monde, strong journalism represents a key building block for free societies.
Posted by William Echikson, External Relations, Head of Free Expression, Europe, Middle East and Africa
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