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Our views on the Internet and society
Interact with Nobel Prize winners via Google+ and YouTube
Friday, December 7, 2012
Every year since 1901 the
Nobel Prize
has been awarded for world achievements in physics, chemistry, physiology or medicine, literature and for peace. This year, The
Nobel Foundation
has teamed up with Google to livestream some of the key events during the
Nobel week on YouTube
, including the Nobel Lectures by the prize winners in Stockholm, December 7-8 and the Nobel Prize Award Ceremonies in Oslo, December 10.
The
Nobel Week Dialogue
will also be covered live. This is a full day of panel discussions and seminars with Nobel laureates, members of Barack Obama’s administration and other prominent politicians and authors. You can participate by submitting questions through
Google Moderator
and these will be addressed by Nobel Laureates during live streamed lectures. Throughout the week, the Nobel Foundation will actively engage on
google.com/+NobelPrize
and organize a panel debate through
Hangouts On Air
, December 9.
Finally, if you’re one of the 500 million people that live in the EU, this year’s Peace Prize lecture and award ceremony may be of particular interest to you, as the
European Union won it
.
Tune in at 12:50 CET
on Monday 10th December to learn more!
Posted by Emma Stjernlöf, Communications Manager, Google Nordics
Remembering Ferranti Atlas: the UK’s first supercomputer
Friday, December 7, 2012
Last year
we celebrated the LEO computer
, the world’s first computer to be used for business. Today we’d like to pay tribute to another pioneer in the commercialisation of computing: the UK engineering firm,
Ferranti Ltd
. Among their achievements was the creation of
Atlas, the UK’s first supercomputer
, which was switched on 50 years ago today.
This film was produced by Google for this week’s 50th anniversary commemoration of the Ferranti Atlas.
In the 1940’s, Ferranti branched out from manufacturing power transformers to developing fuses, valves and other electronics to support the war effort. They were thus well-placed to win the contract to manufacture a commercial version of Manchester University’s groundbreaking “
Baby
”—the world’s first stored programme computer. The result was the
Ferranti Mark 1
, which became the first computer to be sold commercially in February 1951.
Next, Ferranti recruited an inhouse team who designed what became
Pegasus
, with backing from government-owned
NRDC
. Launched in 1956, with an upgrade in 1959, the Pegasus series was the most commercially successful of Ferranti’s computers. Overall, 40 Pegasus computers were built, and by the late 1950’s Ferranti’s
West Gorton facility
was the largest production plant for computers in Europe. A restored 1959 model Pegasus still exists today in the London Science Museum.
In parallel, Ferranti retained a close relationship with Manchester University. In 1957 they launched an upgraded version of the Mark 1 called
Mercury
, which was more reliable and better at
handling floating point arithmetic
. In 1959, they began to collaborate on something entirely new: Atlas, a
commercial version of the university’s Muse project
, which aimed to build a computer capable of 1 million instructions per second, an almost 100-fold increase compared to Ferranti’s previous models.
Atlas
represented a step change in UK computing design. Partly this related to hardware, as engineers shifted from using thermionic valves (aka vacuum tubes) to transistors, which were faster and used less power. Partly it related to software, as designers came up with new operating systems to squeeze out every last drop of performance. But also it related to ambition. By the late 1950’s and early 1960’s a new breed of high-performance computers were emerging from the US, heralding the start of the “supercomputing” era. Atlas was the UK’s attempt to catch up with these advances and, at least in technological terms, for a brief period it succeeded.
The first Atlas
became operational 50 years ago today
, on December 7th 1962, and was for a time
the most powerful computer in the world
.
It was claimed that when the first Atlas arrived in 1962, it roughly doubled the UK’s scientific computing capability.
Earlier this week, Google was delighted to lend our support to an anniversary gathering of computer historians and those who worked on Atlas to reminisce and celebrate their achievements.
While sadly Atlas did not find commercial success, and was soon overtaken in speed by other machines, its influence lives on. Many of the software concepts Atlas pioneered are still in use today—not least
virtual memory
and multi-tasking, enabling the computer to work on multiple programs at once. The program controlling this, called Atlas supervisor, has been described as the “
most significant breakthrough
in the history of operating systems”, with virtual memory the most widely used computer design development of the past 50 years.
Atlas was also the last hurrah for Ferranti’s computing business. In 1963 the division was sold off and merged into what became ICL, later bought by Fujitsu. The last Atlas was switched off in 1976 and with it came the end of an era for British computing.
Posted by Lynette Webb, Senior Manager, External Relations
Supporting a free press in North Africa
Friday, December 7, 2012
These are tumultuous, exciting times in North Africa, for all citizens, but particularly for journalists. Once subject to strict controls, the press in much of the region suddenly is free to report and write. We want to encourage the free press, so we recently teamed up with the
United Nations Alliance of Civilizations
and the
World Bank Institute
to present comprehensive training on how our tools can benefit the media at
IPSI
(Institut de Presse & des Sciences de L'Information).
Some 26 journalists attended, selected from more than 300 applicants across Morocco, Tunisia and Algeria. Our Tunis-based Googler, Khaled Koubaa, spoke about the importance of a free and open internet and how it has evolved in the region. Workshop sessions featured hands-on training (via translation) with search, trends, Google Maps & Google Earth, Google Fusion Tables and Google+, and YouTube. The World Bank focused on finding data, showing the journalists how to use census data, GDP, health statistics and many more useful sources of information. Each participant received a certificate signed by the the UN and Google.
During the workshop’s second day, some 22 local Tunisian journalism received a glimpse into the next-generation of storytellers. Some of these students (and working journalists) have already been witness to
historic events
across North Africa. While some of the practices of data journalism are relatively new for many of them, their enthusiasm to learn and share ideas and integrate Google into their efforts was both humbling and inspiring.
Posted by Maha Abouelenein, Head of Communications, Middle East and North Africa
Boosting the Egyptian economy
Thursday, December 6, 2012
Egypt long has been a leader in the Arab region and it now has the opportunity to become an Internet leader. According to a new Google-supported Boston Consulting Group study entitled
“Egypt at a Crossroads: How the Internet is Transforming Egypt’s Economy,”
the country has the largest population of Internet users in the Middle East - 31 million as of July 2012.
The Internet contributed an estimated 15.6 billion Egyptian pounds to the Egyptian economy which constitutes 1.1 % of GDP and is comparable to the GDP share of other sectors in Egypt including health services (1.3%), education (1.1%) and oil refining (1.1%).
While the report shows that Egypt is making progress in terms of infrastructure and usage, vast unlocked opportunities and much potential remain to capture the Internet’s full potential. Egypt’s Internet economy could grow substantially over the next five years at an estimated 22% per year in nominal terms to reach more than 52 billion Egyptian pounds by 2017.
“Egypt’s Internet economy is now at a crossroads. The choice is whether to continue with business as usual or to take bold steps now to unlock the potential of e-commerce and energize online business-to-business transactions, thereby driving substantial growth in the Internet’s contribution to Egypt’s GDP” says David Dean, Senior Partner and Managing Director at the Boston Consulting Group.
By commissioning this report, Google aims to providing a better understanding of the economic impact of the Internet. One opportunity Google has embraced is investing in enhancing the quality and quantity of Arabic content on the Internet. The Arabization of the Internet represents a crucial component of Google’s strategy in the Middle East and North African region and is part of Google’s commitment to educate users in their own language.
Posted by Samir ElBahaie, Head of Public Policy & Governmental Relations in Middle East and North Africa
Saluting African digital journalism pioneers
Wednesday, December 5, 2012
Digital tools are an increasing impetus for innovation across African newsrooms. From crowdsourcing content to using infographics to tell stories, journalists are finding new ways to report the news. We're excited to be supporting these innovators through the $1 million Africa News Innovation Challenge,
announced in May this year
—the latest in a series of projects to spur innovation in African journalism.
Run by the t
he
African Media Initiative
, other partners include
Omidyar Network
, the
Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation
, the
John S. and James L. Knight Foundation
, the
U.S. State Department
, the
Konrad Adenauer Stiftung (KAS)
and the
World Association of Newspapers and News Publishers (WAN-IFRA)
. The response to the challenge was really enthusiastic, with more than 500 proposals submitted.
The 20 winners are all exciting digital journalism projects that will contribute to solving some of the biggest challenges facing the African media industry. They range from mobile apps to mobilise citizens against corruption and improved infographics to communicate complex issues, to developing new platforms for sharing content on buses and taxis. Key themes among the projects include a growing concern about manipulated online content, the security of communications with whistleblowers and sources, and the need to improve engagement with audiences.
The projects have the potential to be replicated by media elsewhere in Africa, or to be scaled up across the continent, to create wide and sustained impact. Some projects will also develop new tools to support newsrooms and boost media revenues to support sustainable journalism. Winners will receive cash grants ranging from $10,000 to $100,000; technology support from a team of four developers at AMI’s
jAccelerator lab
in Kenya, and business development support from top media strategists affiliated with the
World Association of Newspapers & News Publishers
. Ten of the winners will also be flown to the Knight Foundation’s annual
M.I.T. Civic Media Conference in the U.S., while the rest will be showcased at other important industry events.
The ANIC winners are:
actNOW (Ghana)
AdBooker (
South Africa)
Africa Check
(
South Africa / Nigeria)
skyCAM
(
Kenya / Nigeria)
Africa’s Wealth
(
renamed NewsStack
) (
Nigeria / Namibia)
Citizen Desk
(
Mozambique)
Code4Ghana (
Ghana)
ConvergeCMS
(
Kenya / Tanzania / Uganda)
CorruptionNET
(
South Africa)
DataWrapper
(
Nigeria / Senegal / Tanzania)
End-to-End
(
renamed LastMile Crowdmapping
) (
Liberia / Ghana / Kenya)
FlashCast
(
Kenya)
Green Hornet
(
South Africa)
ListeningPost
(
South Africa)
MoJo: Keeping media honest by monitoring online journalism
(
South Africa)
openAFRICA
(
Kenya / Nigeria / Rwanda / South Africa)
ODADI
(
renamed Code4SouthAfrica
) (
South Africa)
Oxpeckers
(
South Africa)
Wikipedia Zero
(
Cameroon / Ivory Coast / Tunisia / Uganda)
ZeroNews (
pan-African)
You can learn more about the winners’ projects on the
ANIC website
.
We can’t wait to see how these innovations unfold and we look forward to working with more African journalists to help them use technologies to tell important stories.
Posted by Julie Taylor, Communications Manager, Sub Saharan Africa
Libération wins Google-supported digital press prize
Tuesday, December 4, 2012
They were ingenious ideas. At the first ever Google-supported
GEN
Editor’s
Lab
Paris
, a team from the French daily
Libération
developed an online application called Qui+. The application tags faces in photos that are published on the the newspaper’s website, linking to additional information about image. According to Libération’s Florent Latrive, Qui+ will be implemented in the newsroom during the first half of 2013.
Ask Media
was the runner up, with an application called InstaLive that organizes streaming social media photos by hashtags, facilitating the process of photo selection for editorial use.
Held last week in
Le
Nouvel
Observateur’s
headquarters near the Paris Stock Exchange, the day long workshop demonstrated how Google and newspapers can find common ground on bringing high-quality journalism to the net.
Seven different media organizations across a wide range of the French media spectrum participated. They included
Le Nouvel Observateur
,
Libération
,
France 24
,
Play Bac Presse
,
Ask Media
,
Citizenside
, and
OWNI
. Several Google speakers took part.
Daniel Sieberg
, author of the book Digital Diet, gave a keynote speech about the value of innovation in journalism and Christian Witt, Google TV’s development manager, held a masterclass on digital Internet-enabled TV.
During the event, each participating media represented an Editors' Lab teams. At the end of the workshop portion each presented a five minute pitch of their projects. Both winning teams are invited to the next level of the Editors’ Lab: The International News Hackathon, which will take place at the GEN News Summit from 19 - 21 June 2013.
Posted by Alexandra Laferriere, Public Policy & Government Affairs Manager, France
Keep the Internet free and open
Monday, December 3, 2012
Cross-posted with the
Official Google Blog
Update December 17, 2012:
At the conclusion of the ITU meeting in Dubai last Friday, 89 countries signed the treaty, while 55 countries said they would not sign or that additional review was needed. We stand with the countries who refused to sign, and with the
millions of you
who have voiced your support for a free and open web.
Starting in 1973, when my colleagues and I proposed the technology behind the Internet, we advocated for an open standard to connect computer networks together. This wasn’t merely philosophical; it was also practical.
Our protocols were designed to make the networks of the Internet non-proprietary and interoperable. They avoided “lock-in,” and allowed for contributions from many sources. This openness is why the Internet creates so much value today. Because it is borderless and belongs to everyone, it has brought unprecedented freedoms to billions of people worldwide: the freedom to create and innovate, to organize and influence, to speak and be heard.
But starting in a few hours, a closed-door
meeting
of the world’s governments is taking place in Dubai, and regulation of the Internet is on the agenda. The International Telecommunication Union (ITU) is convening a conference from December 3-14 to revise a decades-old
treaty
, in which only governments have a vote. Some proposals could allow governments to justify the censorship of legitimate speech, or even cut off Internet access in their countries.
You can read more about my concerns on
CNN.com
, but I am not alone. So far, more than 1,000 organizations from more than 160 countries have
spoken up too
, and they’re joined by hundreds of thousands of Internet users who are standing up for a free and open Internet. On an interactive map at
freeandopenweb.com
, you can see that people from all corners of the world have signed our petition, used the #freeandopen hashtag on social media, or created and uploaded videos to say how important these issues are.
If you agree and want to support a free and open Internet too, I invite you to join us by signing the petition at
google.com/takeaction
. Please make your voice heard and spread the word.
Posted by Vint Cerf, VP and Chief Internet Evangelist
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