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Google Maps is now available for iPhone
December 12, 2012
People around the world have been asking for Google Maps on iPhone. Starting today, we’re pleased to announce that Google Maps is here—rolling out across the world in the
Apple App Store
. It’s designed from the ground up to combine the comprehensiveness and accuracy of Google Maps with an interface that makes finding what you’re looking for faster and easier.
The app shows more map on screen and turns mobile mapping into one intuitive experience. It’s a sharper looking, vector-based map that loads quickly and provides smooth tilting and rotating of 2D and 3D views. The search box at the top is a good place to start—perhaps by entering the name of a new and interesting restaurant. An expandable info sheet at the bottom shows the address, opening hours, ratings and reviews, images, directions and other information.
At the heart of this app is our
constantly improving map of the world
that includes detailed information for more than 80 million businesses and points of interest. Preview where you want to go with Street View and see inside places with
Business Photos
to decide on a table or see if it’s better at the bar. To get you there, you’ve got voice-guided, turn-by-turn navigation, live traffic conditions to avoid the jams and if you want to use public transportation, find information for more than one million public transit stops.
The world around us is constantly changing and, thanks to feedback from you, we make tens of thousands of daily updates to keep Google Maps accurate and comprehensive. Here’s a helpful hint for the new app: if you see something off, simply shake your phone to send us feedback.
To complete the Google Maps ecosystem, we’re also releasing the
Google Maps SDK for iOS
, and a simple
URL scheme
to help developers use Google Maps when building their beautiful and innovative apps.
The new Google Maps app is available for the iPhone and iPod Touch (4th gen) iOS 5.1 and higher, in
more than 40 countries
and 29 languages, including Chinese, Dutch, English, French, German, Italian, Japanese and Spanish. Please note some of the features mentioned in this post aren’t available in all countries.
Visit the App Store today and download the new Google Maps app. We believe this delightful new experience is a great starting point—and we’ll continue to improve Google Maps for you, every day.
Posted by Daniel Graf, Director, Google Maps for Mobile
Unleashing creativity in Google’s CSI:Lab
December 12, 2012
This is the first in a series of posts profiling Googlers who facilitate classes as part of our “Googlers-to-Googlers” program (known internally as “g2g”). The g2g community consists of a group of Googlers who are passionate about teaching, sharing and learning from one another. 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. Our philosophy is: the best teacher you've ever had could be the one in the cube next to you. - Ed
For most people, the term “CSI” evokes images of crime scene investigators solving murder mysteries, like on the popular TV series. But I hadn’t heard of the TV show when I created the CSI:Lab at Google. This program on Creative Skills for Innovation is taught through our “Googlers-to-Googlers” (g2g) program—where Googlers teach other Googlers about topics that interest them. We don’t lift fingerprints or take down criminals, but like the show, CSI:Lab is all about reaching an end goal through brainstorming, getting your hands dirty and an “ensemble” performance.
Here I am welcoming a CSI:Lab
Over the course of my travels a few years ago, I had the opportunity to observe a variety of diverse places and cultures, from Shanghai to Capetown. Experiencing dissimilar cultures allowed me to see how people from different walks of life innovate to survive and thrive, and deepened my interest in the topic of innovation. One of the reasons I was drawn to Google was its unique innovation culture. Soon after arriving here in February 2010, I began to delineate what was tangible about that aspect of the Google culture and was determined to figure out how I could immerse both myself and others in it more. This led me to think about how I could use the knowledge I gathered on innovation from my travels to teach those with different occupations and mindsets—from a salesperson to a project manager to an engineer—to think more about how to be innovative and to ignite change in a company.
In my 20 percent time, I decided to develop a class with a “lab” component to show Googlers how to “experience innovation.” I wanted to get a diverse group of people together in one room to solve challenging problems by learning from each other’s experiences, and by developing their own inner strengths. The goal was to enable Googlers to experience an approach to innovation where one learns by
doing
, rather than by
listening
.
CSI:Lab is user-centered and prototype driven. In each class, small groups are formed to answer a broad challenge that entices folks to think big—such as, “How would you change the commuting to work experience?” Participants are asked to interview potential “users” of their solutions to generate insights. After the surveys, all the ideas are posted on a white board. For example, in this case individual hi-tech jet packs or “Marty McFly” skateboards might reduce commute time and aid the environment. Ultimately, one idea is chosen and the group then develops a physical prototype (think Play-Doh and pipe cleaners) of their solution, to learn and prove how and why it is the best. Each class is intentionally made up of groups of Googlers from varying parts of the company—for example, engineering, global business, or project management—to encourage the groups to collaborate and learn from each other’s experience.
CSI:Lab brainstorm session. The prompt: Re-imagine advertising.
Googlers developing their solution’s prototype to the challenge:
What is the learning space of the future?
Since April 2010, I’ve been humbled to run the Lab in 37 Google offices worldwide, and about 9,000 Googlers have participated. Today, we have more than 50 Googlers who act as ambassadors for the Lab, designing and facilitating more Labs as part of the g2g program. From New York to Tokyo to Sao Paulo, the different people and cultures of each lab offer a new perspective. And CSI:Lab inspires Googlers long after the sessions are over. One Googler told me that after the Lab, he used his experience to develop a prototype for a solution to one of his team’s issues. He described how good it felt to take a risk to reach a solution, and ultimately he convinced a team of other Googlers to work with him to refine and implement his idea. Ultimately, seeing these ideas absorbed by participants and put to use within the company is what CSI:Lab is all about.
Take a peek at five tips to help you embrace the CSI:Lab spirit and add more creativity and innovation to your everyday life—whether it be at home or at the office!
Know and own what inspires you.
Understand where your inspiration comes from and do it 10x more than you do now. For example, if your inspiration comes from museums, then go to museums 10x more often; if your inspiration comes from people, talk to 10 new people each week.
Think like a child.
Be open and question everything around you. Try not to pre-judge thoughts or ideas; develop them.
Dive into something new.
Involve yourself in areas at work where you’re unfamiliar with the content and want to learn more. People are generally happy to share their knowledge and you can often teach them something too just by bringing a fresh perspective to their work.
Play with fun and unusual materials when developing an idea.
We all constantly use our computers and paper and pen, so think outside the box to get your mind flowing. Want to “prototype” a solution you’ve thought of? Grab some pipe cleaners, construction paper, LEGO figures, feathers...you name it! See how the materials inspire you.
Invest in your physical space.
Having a supportive environment can make a big difference, so learn how what types of space inspire creativity. To create a more open, playful environment, try a flexible workplace with no offices. Or, help ideas flow more freely by making lots of whiteboard space easily accessible. For example, at Google’s Mountain View campus, we’ve created our own innovation space, called “The Garage” (a nod to the iconic Silicon Valley workspace). “The Garage” is big enough for 170 Googlers to use the area to create, collaborate and experiment.
A snapshot of the Garage
Posted by Frederik G. Pferdt, Global Program Manager for Innovation & Creativity
Zeitgeist 2012: What piqued your curiosity this year?
December 12, 2012
As 2012 comes to a close, it's time for our 12th annual Year-End Zeitgeist—an in-depth look at the "spirit of the times" as seen through the billions of searches on Google over the past year.
On our
2012 Zeitgeist website
, you can explore the most popular and hottest trending search terms from around the world. This year’s site is our most global to date, with a total of 838 lists from 55 countries. We’ve also added a number of new features, including an interactive map that shows where and when some of the hottest terms spiked around the world, and a
Google Zeitgeist Android app
coming out later today (with an iOS version coming soon too).
For a round-the-globe tour through 2012, take a look at our video:
So what kinds of things were top of mind this year? While there are perennial themes—“what is love?” topped the list in 10 countries—it’s the unusual and surprising that caught our attention in 2012.
Global superstar Whitney Houston topped many countries’ lists as well as
three of our overall trending lists
—her unexpected death surprising fans around the world. From Korea, YouTube sensation PSY’s “Gangnam Style” signature dance took the world by storm, landing him the #1 spot in many countries and making his song the second most trending query of 2012. (PSY’s video became the #1 most watched in YouTube history—stay tuned for YouTube’s Rewind for more.)
Then there was the superhuman. Austrian skydiver Felix Baumgartner’s epic free fall jump made him the
#6 globally trending person
of the year, while the
2012 Olympics
and its various athletes made it into almost every country’s top trends. And NBA player Jeremy Lin also rose on the charts this year, making him the
#1 trending athlete globally
.
People researched a breadth of other topics, too. Web users took a serious interest in threats to the open Internet, with proposals like SOPA and ACTA both finding their way to the top of many countries’ lists. The U.S. elections brought attention to the candidates and issues, not least the presidential campaigns’ most notorious
political gaffes
. And while it might not be surprising to see that tragic natural disasters like Hurricane Sandy ranked highly (#3 on the global trending list), it is reassuring to find searches like [donate to Sandy]
spiking
as well.
We hope you enjoy exploring what people around the world were searching for in 2012. It’s quite a snapshot of what makes us human: a blend of guilty pleasures and higher pursuits.
Posted by
Amit Singhal
, SVP & Google Fellow
The evolution of
This Exquisite Forest
December 11, 2012
A
few months ago
we released
This Exquisite Forest
,
a Chrome Experiment that lets you create collaborative animations using an online drawing tool. Since then, thousands of people from all over the world have contributed to the project, creating unique animations like
Looking Up / Looking Down
,
Wine after Coffee
and
Animated Typography
. For any of these animations, you can click the button in the lower right to add to the story and branch it in a new direction.
Today, we’d like to share
The Endless Theater
, a new way to wander the forest by viewing a continuous stream of different animations. In addition, now you can embed animations directly into your site or blog, so it’s even easier to share your work with the world. Just go into the
lightbox view
and click “Embed.”
A project of this scale and diversity is really only possible on the web, where people can view and contribute from all over the world using only a browser. Thank you all for making the forest so full of life. Please continue to
explore
, find your favorite animations, and add to the story.
Posted by Aaron Koblin, Creative Lab
(Cross-posted from the
Chrome blog
)
Steel + silicon = business success in Detroit
December 11, 2012
From time to time we invite guests to post about items of interest and are pleased to have Linzie Venegas join us today. Linzie is head of sales and marketing for
Ideal Shield
, a manufacturing company in Detroit, Mich. that specializes in bumper post sleeves. Based in a city forged in tradition and steel, Ideal Shield has seen great success on the web—a story Linzie tells us in this post.
-Ed.
When my great-grandparents moved from Mexico to Detroit in 1917, they were looking for a better life. They had no idea that one day their grandson, my father Frank Venegas, would invent a product and start a business that would help transform their adopted hometown. Thanks to my dad’s hard work and a little help from the web, that’s exactly what Ideal Shield has done.
Ideal Shield
specializes in manufacturing bumper post sleeves. You may have seen these around—they’re colorful covers that slide over the steel pipes that keep cars from running into buildings. As a young child, my first job at Ideal was to assemble mailers for potential customers. Our mailers were unique—I would place a pack of jelly beans into each envelope. Talk about a great way to get a high “clickthrough rate!” Today, I head sales and marketing for the company, and we’ve taken our family business online with phenomenal results.
Ideal Shield’s father-daughter team Frank and Linzie Venegas in the factory surrounded by bumper post sleeves and guard rails.
We began using Google AdWords in 2004 to help potential customers find our product because many people didn’t know what it was. We were drawn to AdWords because everyone could see our ads—but we only had to pay for the customers who clicked through to our website. We also found that the leads were very qualified and had a higher close rate than leads from other sources. So far this year, for every $1 we've spent on AdWords we’ve gotten back $22. We’ve been able to have great success—without jelly beans!—using Google AdWords.
The energy we’ve put into our online presence has produced tremendous growth for our business; we’ve been able to grow our workforce by 20 percent. We’ve also focused on building our local community of Southwest Detroit. Each year we hire many interns from the local high school, Detroit Cristo Rey, and teach them skills that will last a lifetime. We’ve outfitted the junior and senior classes at Detroit Cristo Rey with Chromebooks so that they’ll have access to the power of the web anywhere, and many teachers there use the free Google Apps for Education suite with their students. This year, we were proud to hear that Detroit Cristo Rey achieved a 100% graduation rate and a 100% college acceptance rate. We also work with the Michigan Minority Business Development Council to teach other small businesses in the community the importance of an online strategy and how the web can help small businesses thrive.
My dad started Ideal with himself, my mother and a couple of laborers; today this family business has more than 35 employees and annual sales of $14 million. With help from the web, his hard work, determination and “out of the box” thinking have made Ideal a symbol of strength and renewal in Southwest Detroit. My father has always told me that if you take care of the community, the community will take care of you. Detroit is our community—it’s our heart, it’s our home. We’ve been surprised and delighted at how much the web has contributed to Ideal Shield, and we’re happy to share that success with Detroit. We can’t wait to do more!
Posted by Linzie Venegas, Head of Sales and Marketing, Ideal Shield Detroit
Chromebooks for classrooms: $99 for the holidays
December 10, 2012
For many students and teachers, the hassles of traditional computing often prevent them from making the most of technology in the classroom. Schools that have adopted Chromebooks, however, have been able to bring the web’s vast educational resources—whether it’s conducting real-time research or collaborating on group projects—right into the classroom. Chromebooks are fast, easily sharable, and require almost no maintenance. Today more than 1,000 schools have adopted Chromebooks in classrooms, including some school districts like Richland School District Two (S.C.), Leyden High School District (Ill.), and Council Bluffs Community School District (Iowa) who have deployed Chromebooks to tens of thousands of students.
To help budget-strapped classrooms across the country, we’re working with
DonorsChoose.org
, an online charity that connects donors directly to public school classroom needs. For the holiday season, teachers can request the
Samsung Series 5 Chromebook
—the most widely deployed Chromebook in schools—at a special, discounted price of $99 including hardware, management and support.
If you’re a full-time public school teacher in the U.S., visit DonorsChoose.org and
follow the instructions
to take advantage of this opportunity by December 21, 2012. Your request will be posted on DonorsChoose.org where anyone can make a donation to support your classroom. When you reach your funding goal, you’ll receive your Chromebooks from Lakeshore Learning, DonorsChoose.org’s exclusive fulfillment partner for this program.
If you’re not a teacher, please share this opportunity with the teachers who have made a difference in your life! Or if you’re interested in supporting a classroom directly, read through the
list of Chromebook projects
and donate what you can. Be sure to check back often for new projects.
Thank you for your support in giving the gift of hassle-free technology to teachers and students. Working together, we can ensure “The virus ate my homework” is never uttered in a classroom again, and we can help classrooms get off to a strong start in the New Year!
Happy holidays.
Update
Dec 11
: We’ve seen a tremendous response—thanks to all the teachers who have applied so far! Please check
DonorsChoose.org
for the latest status of the program.
Posted by Rajen Sheth, Group Product Manager
Supporting Israel’s “start-up nation”
December 10, 2012
In March, we launched
Campus London
to help support the vibrant start-up community there and help energize the U.K. Internet economy. Today, we’re launching Campus Tel Aviv—a one-floor event & community space in downtown Tel Aviv, made available to early stage start-ups and developers.
With the Internet economy contributing
6.4 percent
of Israel’s GDP and with the world’s second largest center of tech start-ups after Silicon Valley, it’s no wonder that Israel is commonly referred to as “
start-up nation
.” For some time now, we’ve been supporting Internet and mobile entrepreneurs in Israel with tech talks, events and hackathons. We hope that Campus Tel Aviv will enable us to do more to support local innovation.
The Campus space will be used by start-ups and partners for events, a “device lab” will give developers the chance to try out projects on a range of devices, and entrepreneurs will get access to Google’s teams and other experts. We’re also working with tech incubators, accelerator programs and other
partners
to bring their start-ups to Campus for an initiative called “Launch Pad.” It’s a two-week “bootcamp” for more than 100 start-ups each year, aimed at enhancing existing accelerator programs by providing expertise in user experience and design, product strategy, global marketing, business development and more.
At the launch of Campus Tel Aviv—from left to right, Mr. Benjamin Netanyahu (Israeli Prime Minister), Meir Brand (Managing Director, Google Israel, Greece, South & Sub-Saharan Africa), Yossi Matias (Head of Israel R&D Center).
In 1998, when Larry and Sergey founded Google, we were a start-up in a garage. In many ways, we remain a start-up at heart, and we’re committed to helping new
entrepreneurs
and developers around the world succeed. We hope that Campus Tel Aviv will contribute to future Israeli tech innovation and, in doing so, make the web and the mobile space better. You can find out more about Campus Tel Aviv on our
website
.
Posted by Amir Shevat, Developer Relations Manager & Eyal Miller, New Business Development - Co-leads, Campus Tel Aviv
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