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Secretary of State John Kerry kicks off “Hangouts at State” series on Google+
April 15, 2013
Over the past year, Google+ has been used across the globe to connect people and enable free expression—from
Syria Deeply
, an independent news site which regularly uses Google+ and Hangouts to report about the crisis in Syria to
Tom Fletcher
, the British Ambassador to Lebanon, who issues dispatches from one country to another via Hangout.
Today, the U.S. Department of State is building on this trend by announcing a new series of discussions called “Hangouts at State.” Each month, these conversations will bring people together across global boundaries to discuss the most pressing U.S. foreign policy issues, like democracy promotion, human rights, counterterrorism efforts, economic development, climate change and drug interdiction.
The series kicks off on Friday, April 19 with a
Hangout
with U.S. Secretary of State John Kerry, entitled “The U.S. in the World: What’s In It for Us” and moderated by NBC’s Chief Foreign Affairs Correspondent Andrea Mitchell. The Secretary will be joined by a group of Americans to discuss the impact of U.S. foreign policy on people at home.
Tune in on Friday at 1 p.m. E.T. to watch the conversation unfold, and keep your eye on the
Google Politics and Elections page
for news about the next “Hangout at State.”
Posted by Ramya Raghavan, Google+ Politics and Causes
Taking a minute to enjoy some art on World Art Day
April 15, 2013
Today is
World Art Day
and it's around two years since we
launched
Google Art Project. In honour of this and all our partners, large and small, traditional and modern, let’s take a quick look at how people are interacting with art online.
The Internet brings paintings to life and it seems that
The Starry Night
by van Gogh is the one that visitors to Art Project admire the most. In the past six months, this was the most viewed painting in
gigapixel
—an extremely high resolution painting which allows viewers to zoom in to brushstroke level. While nothing beats seeing a painting in real life, the ability to examine a work of art in this level of detail seems to be encouraging viewers to linger. One minute is the average time spent looking at any given painting on the Art Project website, compared to under 20 seconds (according to several studies) in a museum.
The Starry Night is also the most frequently included painting in
user galleries
, where individuals create and share their own virtual art collections. We have 40,000 works of art on the platform but some remain perennial favourites. The other most popular inclusions in user galleries (in order) are :
Botticelli:
The Birth of Venus
Rembrandt:
Self Portrait Drawing at a Window
van Gogh:
The Bedroom
Manet:
In the Conservatory
Bruegel (the Elder):
The Harvesters
van Gogh:
Sunflowers
Holbein (the Younger):
The Ambassadors
van Gogh:
Field with Flowers near Arles
Böcklin:
The Isle of the Dead
The Starry Night on Art Project
Viewings of user galleries were in fact higher than any individual artist or painting. To date, 360,000 galleries have been created, 14,000 of which are public on the web. To mark World Art Day, we asked some of our
partners
to curate user galleries of their own. Take a look through the selections of eight museum directors
here
.
Given the list above, it’s clear the classics remain popular with viewers, but there is increasing interest in modern art as well, with
Dali
and
Klimt
featuring among the most searched for artists. The Internet has also allowed users to explore multiple genres in a single destination. More than 30 different mediums co-exist on Art Project with oil on canvas next to over 5,000 objects including
silk textiles
,
sculptures
and
furniture
. There can't be many places where you can find
Brazilian street art
alongside
Botticelli
.
Many partners who have contributed an art collection have also opted to put their museums on Street View. On average, visitors spend around two minutes exploring the interior of the buildings and viewing the paintings on display. The most-visited Street View destination on Art Project is
The White House
. As the majority of us will never get the opportunity to go inside, the Internet allows a rare glimpse into a global institution that also houses an extensive art
collection
.
With over 200 partners from 43 countries, we continue our quest to open up access to art to millions of professionals, students, beginners and amateur enthusiasts. At 1pm ET today, we’ll be holding the latest in our
Art Talks
series on our
G+ page
, which aims to put art lovers in touch with art experts online. Sign up
here
to hangout with the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York to chat about multimedia in the arts from the comfort of your armchair on World Art Day.
Posted by Amit Sood, Google Cultural Institute
Introducing the Glass Collective
April 10, 2013
Glass
is a potentially transformative technology. It’s a window into the world’s information, and a new way to share experiences with those you care about.
Here at
Google Ventures
, my partners and I thought the potential for Glass was significant enough to invite our friends at
Andreessen Horowitz
and
Kleiner Perkins Caufield & Byers
to join us in exploring this big opportunity. We’ve formed the Glass Collective, an investment syndicate among our three firms, to provide seed funding to entrepreneurs in the Glass ecosystem to help jumpstart their ideas.
Smart entrepreneurs and engineers are going to develop amazing experiences through Glass. If you’ve been mulling over a brilliant idea for Glass,
let us know
.
Posted by Bill Maris, Managing Partner, Google Ventures
For Malaysia: Bringing Google Apps and Chromebooks to the classroom
April 10, 2013
As a parent of three kids, I have the same aspirations as many other parents and educators—to provide them with the best opportunities to learn and discover their passions. For many students, the web has become an incredible resource for the classroom, offering tools to work collaboratively, share and research. School systems of all sizes—from a single primary school to an entire country such as the
Philippines
—have “Gone Google” in their schools and embraced the web to transform education.
Today the country of Malaysia is going a step further by adopting
Google Apps
for 10 million students, teachers and parents. As part of this initiative they are also deploying Chromebooks to primary and secondary schools nationwide. These efforts to integrate the web are a central part of a
national plan
(PDF) to reform its educational system.
To deploy technology across a nationwide school system, computers need to be simple, manageable and secure. Chromebooks are ideal for learning and sharing in the classroom—there’s nothing complicated to learn, they boot up in seconds and have virus protection built in. They also offer
easy setup and deployment
, which means they’re ready to go the moment a student opens the lid and logs in. And with reduced overhead costs, Chromebooks are a cost-efficient option* to deploy technology at scale.
To date, more than 3,000 schools worldwide, from Edina, Minnesota to Point England, New Zealand, have deployed Chromebooks to
improve attendance and graduation rates
,
make learning more fun
and
enable students to take more ownership for their learning
.
The web gives our children and students new opportunities to access the world’s information and work collaboratively. We look forward to working with
national and regional leaders
to make the most of the web with Google Apps and Chromebooks and help them provide the best opportunities to every student.
Posted by Felix Lin, Director of Product Management
*In research sponsored by Google, research firm IDC found that Chromebooks yield three-year cost of ownership savings of $1,135 per device compared to traditional PCs or tablets, require 69% fewer hours to deploy and 92% fewer hours to manage.
Learn more
.
Fighting human trafficking
April 9, 2013
Human trafficking, the narcotics trade and weapons smuggling all have one major thing in common: Their ill-gotten proceeds feed conflict, instability and repression worldwide. Out of all of these, human trafficking is perhaps the most devastating, enslaving nearly 21 million people and
generating
at least $32 billion of illicit profits every year. At last summer's
Google Ideas
summit on mapping, disrupting and exposing illicit networks
, it became clear that connecting anti-trafficking helplines in a global data sharing collaboration could help identify illicit patterns and provide victims anywhere in the world with more effective support. Today,
Polaris Project
,
Liberty Asia
, and
La Strada International
are receiving a $3 million
Global Impact Award
from Google to do just that. Building on our
2011 grants
, this brings our total commitment to anti-trafficking efforts to $14.5 million.
Global Impact Awards support nonprofits that use technology to launch disruptive solutions in their sector. We
launched
the Global Impact Awards program last December to fund new ideas with a potential for huge scale. And at the
Google Ideas INFO summit
over the summer, we brought together technologists, leaders, and those with unique personal experiences — including former weapons brokers and survivors of domestic and international human trafficking — to look at illicit networks and their defining obstacles. By connecting technologists and experts with those who understand and have lived through trafficking situations, our discussion centered around a fundamental question: What if local, national, and regional anti-trafficking helplines across the globe were all connected in a data-driven network that helped disrupt the web of human trafficking?
Since the summit, we’ve worked with Polaris Project, Liberty Asia and La Strada International to make this concept a reality. These organizations exist to provide vital help to victims in need across the United States, the Mekong Delta region and Europe. Now, working across borders, this new Global Human Trafficking Hotline Network will collect data from local hotline efforts, share promising practices and create anti-trafficking strategies that build on common patterns and focus on eradication, prevention and victim protection. To enhance the participating organizations' ability to better share, analyze and act upon their data in real time,
Palantir Technologies
will expand on its existing relationship with Polaris Project by donating its data integration and analytics platform for this project. In addition,
Salesforce.com
supports Polaris Project's hotline center and is helping scale their call tracking infrastructure internationally.
Together, these partners will not only be able to help more trafficking survivors, but will also move the global conversation forward by dramatically increasing the amount of useful data being shared. Appropriate data can tell the anti-trafficking community which campaigns are most effective at reducing slavery, what sectors are undergoing global spikes in slavery, or if the reduction of slavery in one country coincides with an increase right across the border.
In the U.S., Polaris Project has collected data from over 72,000 hotline calls, helping local and national anti-trafficking communities better understand the dynamics of the crime. No such actionable hotline database has existed globally — but it doesn’t need to be that way. Clear international strategies, increased cooperation, and appropriate data sharing amongst anti-trafficking organizations will help victims, prevention efforts, and sound policymaking. Slavery can be stopped. Let's get to it.
Posted by Jared Cohen, Director of Google Ideas and Jacquelline Fuller, Director of Google Giving
Google Fiber’s Next Stop: Austin, Texas
April 9, 2013
We know that your time is valuable and so we’ve always focused on speed — from search to Gmail, Chrome to Android. Two years ago, we announced that we’d be bringing Google Fiber to Kansas City to show what’s possible with super fast Internet access, and since November we’ve been connecting homes there to gigabit Internet that’s 100 times faster than today’s average broadband performance.
Today, we’re pleased to announce with Mayor Lee Leffingwell that Austin, Texas is becoming a Google Fiber city. It’s a mecca for creativity and entrepreneurialism, with thriving artistic and tech communities, as well as the University of Texas and its new medical research hospital. We’re sure these folks will do amazing things with gigabit access, and we feel very privileged to have been welcomed to their community.
Our goal is to start connecting homes in Austin by mid-2014. Customers there will have a similar
choice of products
as our customers in Kansas City: Gigabit Internet or Gigabit Internet plus our Google Fiber TV service with nearly 200 HD TV channels. We’re still working out pricing details, but we expect them to be roughly similar to Kansas City. Also, as in Kansas City, we’re going to offer customers a free Internet connection at 5 mbps for 7 years, provided they pay a one-time construction fee. We’re also planning to connect many public institutions as we build in Austin— schools, hospitals, community centers, etc. — at a gigabit for no charge. If you live in Austin and want to sign up for more information, please visit our website.
The Internet is still in its early days and has so much more potential to improve our lives. The web helps students and families access essential resources, from information about jobs and healthcare to banking and educational services. Communities that are connected to the Internet grow stronger because there’s greater potential to create jobs, drive economic growth, and help businesses succeed. We believe the Internet’s next chapter will be built on gigabit speeds, and we hope this new Google Fiber city will inspire communities across America to think about what ultrafast connectivity could mean for them. If you’re a city leader and you’re looking for some help making your city gigabit-friendly, have a look at
this video
from the FCC’s March 2013 Workshop on Gigabit Community Broadband Networks for steps you can take towards your own gigabit-powered future.
Posted by Posted by Milo Medin, Vice President, Access Services
Become a public speaking pro: learning how to present the next great idea
April 4, 2013
This is the third post in a
series
profiling Googlers who facilitate classes as part of our g2g program, in which Googlers teach, share and learn from each other. Regardless of role, level or location, g2g's community-based approach makes it possible for all Googlers to take advantage of a variety of learning opportunities. - Ed.
“[Public speaking] is quite simple, say what you have to say and
when you come to a sentence with a grammatical ending, sit down.” —Winston Churchill
If only public speaking were actually that easy. We’re often asked to present in front of a group, so good presentation skills are really important. Fear of public speaking is often
ranked
higher than fear of spiders, flying and heights. While spiders can make me jumpy, I not only
enjoy
public speaking, I also teach it.
In addition to my core role as Google Toronto’s agency team lead (helping to nurture relationships with some of the largest ad agencies in Canada), I help my colleagues amp up their public speaking skills as a g2g (Googler-to-Googler) facilitator for two classes, “Presenting with Confidence” and “Presenting with Charisma.” These two classes help my fellow Googlers erase anxiety and self-doubt and focus on the goal—communicating your message. I am actually a mechanical engineer by trade who, at one point, entered graduate school to study robotics. Not exactly the type that comes to mind when you think of great orators. But I’ve learned along the way, as an engineer turned “sales guy,” that a confident demeanor and a little charm can turn a snooze-fest into an engaging, lively meeting.
Here I am teaching one of our Presenting with Confidence classes in our New York City office.
Photo by Jane Hu.
“Presenting with Confidence” goes beyond the “picture the audience in their underwear” adage. First, students are tasked with making brief presentations about themselves, whether it be about their most recent vacation or how they play in a jazz band. We videotape the students giving their presentations on their phones to review later as a part of the exercise and to keep for their own reference. This, as it turns out, is one of the most effective, eye-opening exercises in the class. Before we roll the tape, the participant comments on an area he/she believes will be pointed out by others, such as, “I always fidget with my hands” or, “I blush as red as a tomato.” The reality is often completely different, and provides an immediate boost of confidence, allowing the student to focus on the content of their presentation. Part of the confidence boost also stems from being surrounded by peers who are in the same boat, so there’s no judgment.
Sharing honest feedback with your peers is an important part of the learning process.
Photo by Jane Hu.
“Presenting with Charisma” focuses on adding charm and magnetism to your speech. The more the audience wants to hear from a speaker, the more information they’ll absorb. In this class, Googlers nail down the right mix of tone, body language and delivery to better captivate their audience. We role play to learn how to conquer inevitable yet potentially disastrous moments, like when your technology demo crashes.
I experienced one such moment myself when I covered a presentation for a fellow Googler at the last minute. When I started getting asked questions that were beyond my ability to handle, I followed the advice I give my own students, which is to remain calm, upbeat and easy-going—no matter what. I decided to play off the audience’s own knowledge so that the Q&A became more of a dialogue rather than the spotlight shining solely on me.
Solid communication skills anchor any job function. Whether you are an engineer presenting new findings to your manager or a salesperson pitching a new business strategy to a client, a few tips and a lot of practice can make a significant impact on your presentations. If you’re one of the many,
many
professionals who feels uneasy about getting up in front of a room full of people, try the following tried-and-true techniques to start mastering the art of public speaking.
Tips and tricks to boost your public speaking confidence and charisma:
1) Pace yourself.
To slow down and build momentum, try reciting a sentence then walking to the other side of the room. Pause, then walk back to the other side and deliver your next sentence.
2) Unfreeze.
What to do if you totally freeze during your presentation? Look at your slide or notes and just describe what you see on the slide or page in front of you. The words will start flowing and come back to you.
3) Fidget and fiddle no more.
Displacement tactic: if you find yourself always fiddling with your hands or keeping your hands in your pockets, try standing behind a chair or a podium and planting your hands on the podium so you appear confident. (Even
political leaders
use this trick.)
4) Get physical.
Use the room to your advantage and keep your audience alert. Walk across the room or even among the audience to get people involved in your presentation.
5) Stop saying “Um.”
To rid yourself of “umm”-ing your way through a presentation, use this physical displacement tactic: Every time you are transitioning from one point to another, do something small but physical, like moving your pen. Making a conscious effort to move the pen will turn your brain off from using a verbal filler instead.
Posted by Adam Green, Agency Lead and G2G Instructor
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