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Our views on the Internet and society
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Wednesday, March 19, 2014
The Internet has generated a series of new opportunities and issues for policymakers, impacting everything from copyright to competition. As a company that started out in academia, we’ve long supported some of the world’s best computer science researchers in universities. Our
Google Research Awards
grant program only recently branched out into policy areas and we’re eager now to attract top notch researchers to submit applications on Internet policy matters.
Researchers can apply for up to $150,000. However most first time awards are funded at the amount needed to support basic expenses for one graduate student for one year, or around $50,000. Please see our
FAQs
for more details on eligibility and budgets.
Applications for the next funding round are due by April 15th.
Each funded project will be assigned a Googler as sponsor. The role of the sponsor is to support the project by discussing research directions, engaging with professors and students, and overseeing collaboration between the project team and Google. For more details, look at the FAQ for the question, What are Google contacts and potential Google sponsors, and what roles do they play?
A separate, but related program, for students is the
Google Policy Fellowship program
, which provides an exciting opportunity for paid internships. Inspired by Google’s Summer of Code with a public policy twist, the Google Policy Fellowship program offers undergraduate, graduate, and law students the opportunity to work at public interest organizations at the forefront of debates on broadband and access policy, content regulation, copyright and creativity, consumer privacy, open government, government surveillance, data security, data innovation, free expression and more. More information about the host organizations and the areas of focus for the fellows is outlined
here
.
The deadline is April 14th.
Both the Policy Fellowship Program and the Research Awards program aim to stimulate public debate around the exciting challenges born in the Internet age. Please do apply and participate in this adventure.
Posted by Max Senges, Internet Policy & Innovation Manager, Berlin
First time for everything at Cultural Institute
Tuesday, March 18, 2014
Today we’re celebrating a series of "firsts" at our Cultural Institute - our first Nigerian partner, our first Pakistani partner, and our first Native American partner.
Nigeria's
Pan-Atlantic University
is presenting its collection of rare historical documents and photographs that tell the story of
Nigeria’s formation as a colony
. A second exhibition documents through rare photographs
Lagos
's transformation
from a cosmopolitan colonial trading center to West Africa’s largest metropolis.
Colonial Lagos
Modern Lagos
Our first partner from Pakistan is the Citizen’s Archive. Its
exhibit
documents the emergence of new media after the country’s independence in 1948. During this period, traditional art forms were revived on radio and television, with series that addressed issues such as the role of women.
Pakistani TV medical drama from the 1980s
Mashantucket Pequot Museum's collection encompasses 20,000 years of Native American history. Its eye-opening exhibition on
Neetôpáwees
(pronounced nee-top-a-wees) means “Little Friends” in the Mohegan-Pequot language.
In the exhibition, we discover dolls from the past 125 years, and their myriad uses: as medicine dolls, possessing healing and protective powers, important tokens of exchange and respect between Northeastern Native American tribes, and interactive, educational toys. The dolls’ stories and meanings are as varied as their origins, design, and materials.
Two Indian dolls on exhibit
Posted by Lauren Nemroff, Program Manager, Google Cultural Institute
Driving data-driven innovation at CeBIT
Friday, March 14, 2014
CeBIT
is the worlds biggest IT-fair, attracting world leaders to make an annual pilgrimage to the Hannover Fair Grounds. This year, UK Prime Minister David Cameron joined German Chancellor Angela Merkel for the opening event. We came to advance the agenda of Data-Driven innovation.
In Germany, data all too often often is seen in a negative light. We believe it can be, properly used, a powerful motor for economic and social progress. We Accenture and Acatech that produced a
report on Data-Driven Innovation
, which was
handed over
during the fair to Chancellor Merkel. German corporate heavyweights including Deutsche Bahn, Deutsche Post, Siemens, Miele, Deutsche Telekom, SAP, and Thyssen-Krupp participated as well. The report’s conclusion was clear: Germany needs to embrace the value of data to remain competitive.
Data is not just a dry well of numbers. It can be used in exciting, dramatic and artistic ways as well. We partnered with
CODE_n
to run a DatenDialog in a hall surrounded by 50 start-ups under the topic of “driving the data revolution”.
Artists Kram/Weisshaar
visualized data from the
Ngram
viewer on a wall of 80mx20m, showcasing our partnership with the Bavarian State Library to digitise its priceless book collection.
Another priority for us at CeBIT was digital safety and literacy - closing the gap between the comfortable-with-Internet and the left-out less-comfortable-with-Internet. Federal Minister of the Interior Thomas de Maizière visited the booth of our NGO partner
Deutschland sicher im Netz
and learned about our joint initiative
"Digital Neighborhood."
It consists of a set of ready-to-use lesson plans for volunteer IT trainers who want to teach computer and Internet basics.
Germany needs to embrace the digital revolution in order to keep its position as one of the world’s economic and exporting powerhouses. In her keynote remarks, Chancellor Merkel acknowledged tremendous “respect” for the IT industry as a source of growth and praised is the emergence of a strong German Start-Up culture. Let’s hope these words soon will extend to praising the merits of data driven innovation.
Posted by Sandro Gianella and Sabine Frank, Public Policy, Berlin
Participating in the EU’s Innovation Summit
Monday, March 10, 2014
I’m excited to be traveling to Brussels this week to attend the
European Union’s flagship innovation summit
.
Under the patronage of European Commission President
Jose Manuel Barroso
, the Convention will gather more than 2000 innovators, thought leaders, policy makers, business and top researchers. We’re delighted that the goal is to create an innovation-friendly environment, allowing great ideas to be turned into products and services that will bring our economy growth and jobs.
)
My role representing Google at such a big event is a bit daunting - two years ago, our executive chairman Eric Schmidt gave the keynote address.
At this year's edition, I will present Google's initiatives to foster entrepreneurship and startups. Our
Google for Entrepreneurs
program includes four European tech hubs in
London
,
Krakow
,
Berlin
, or
Paris
. These initiatives are Google’s pledge to the
EU Grand Coalition for Digital Jobs
.
We’re not just coming to the summit to talk, either. We’ll be there to offer participants Google will an exclusive demonstration of the exciting
Google GLASS
demonstration. GLASS is one of the first examples of the development in wearable technology that is meant to make exploring and sharing the world around you faster and easier. It just the type of idea and product that we would like to see emerge here in Europe.
Posted by Eze Vidra, Head of Google for Entrepreneurs - Europe, and Campus London
Competing for the values of net sportsmanship
Friday, March 7, 2014
Real Madrid
is one of the world’s great athletic clubs. In addition to winning football and basketball championships, it is keen to promote sportsmanship, on and off the field. We worked with the club’s foundation to run a competition called
"First Prize for the Promotion of Internet Values
.”
More than 4,000 children from the Real Madrid Sport School competed, producing essays and videos promoting the values of sportsmanship for the Internet.
Contest winners meet Real Madrid basketball star Tremmel Darden
Like Real Madrid, we believe technology and sport offer powerful tools for personal development. When you play sport or surf the Internet, you aim to have fun and learn. As in sports, 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 .
Fair play is important, off and online. If you insult an opponent on the field, the referee would expel you. When you play a team you wear a uniform with a number and name. On the Internet you have to act the same without impersonating others or lying about your identity.
Real Madrid basketball star
Tremmel Darden
and Enrique Sánchez, Vice President of Real Madrid Foundation, chaired the award ceremony. Six children from eight to 13 years old received prizes for their presentations, which included videos, powerpoints and drawings, all promoting Internet sportsmanship. For prizes, they received Android Nexus tablets and Real Madrid’s shirts signed by players, including football superstars
Cristiano Ronaldo
and
Iker Casillas
.
Posted by Francisco Ruiz Anton, Public Policy Manager, Madrid
Awarding innovative work in data journalism
Thursday, March 6, 2014
For the past two years, we have supported the
Global Editors Network
(GEN) Data Journalism Awards. The third edition is now open to submissions on the
GEN website
until April 4. Work may be submitted for any media platform, but must be published or broadcast between April 10, 2013 and April 4, 2014. A total of eight prizes, worth a total of EUR16,000, will be awarded.
As journalism makes the exciting, if sometimes difficult, transition from off to online, technology is opening up new avenues for journalism. The emerging field of data journalism analyses numerical data and databases to make inferences and discoveries which enable journalists to produce news in ways that were difficult or impossible before the invention of the Internet and powerful data-processing.
Bertrand Pecquerie
, the GEN CEO, believes the use of data will, in particular, revolutionize investigative reporting.
Entries will be judged by an all-star jury of journalists, including
Wolfgang Blau
of The Guardian,
Simon Rogers
of Twitter, and
Giannina Segnini
from La Nación.
Paul Steiger
, the former editor-in-chief of the Wall Street Journal and founder of the Pulitzer Prize-winning
ProPublica
, will serve as president.
Winning teams will be invited to present their work at the
Global Editors Network Summit
in Barcelona on June 12, 2014. Steiger and Jaume Giro, CEO of the bank
la Caixa
, will preside at the ceremony, which will be held at the
Centre de Cultura Contemporània
de Barcelona.
Posted by Simon Morrison, Public Policy manager, London
Curbing patent trolling in Europe
Tuesday, February 25, 2014
Last September, we joined a
coalition
of European and U.S. companies and associations in an
open letter
applauding Europe’s move toward a Unitary Patent System. Today, we’re releasing
another letter
with an expanded coalition.
We are participants in and supporters of the European patent system and look forward to its harmonized future. The coalition has proposed some changes to the Unitary Patent System draft rules to help ensure its smooth operation and to curb abuses by the kinds of patent trolls that have plagued the U.S. economy.
Patent trolls
—entities that don’t make anything, instead using
dubious patents
to extort money from companies that do—are placing a huge drag on innovation. In the United States, trolls use the threat of expensive and lengthy litigation to extract settlements, even if their patents wouldn’t hold up in court.
A Unitary Patent System could promote efficiency and long-term competitiveness. But the current draft rules contain certain provisions that trolls could exploit, taking a potentially serious toll on economic growth and innovation in Europe.
For instance, the rules as currently written could allow a troll to block a product from the European market using a patent that later turns out to be invalid. We think that the validity of a patent should be tested before it impacts 500 million European consumers.
The proposals outlined in our coalition letters would build confidence that Europe’s new Unitary Patent System will address the problem of patent trolls, allowing companies to invest in innovation and growth—not frivolous patent litigation.
Posted by Catherine Lacavera, Director of Patent Litigation
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