Author Archives: bechikson

Calling women coders – apply for the Ada Awards

Fewer than one in ten computer science graduates in Europe are female. In order to improve on this dismal rate, we are sponsoring the 2014 European Ada Awards.



The Awards, affectionately known as the “Adas,” are named in honor of Ada Lovelace, a 19th-century English mathematician, considered by many to be the world’s first computer programmer and the first to envisage computing’s true potential.

It’s the second edition of the awards. The European Commission launched the Ada Awards in June, 2013 as part of its pledge to improve Digital Skills and Jobs in Europe. Three awards are given out - the Digital Girl of the Year, the Digital Woman of the Year , and the Digital Impact Organisation of the Year. Nominations are valid from across the European Union and reflect a broad spectrum of digital fields – academia, research, industry, enterprise and creative.

“Tomorrow's world will be driven by digital technology, and having digital skills will
open a goldmine of opportunities. I want women to be in the goldmine,” Neelie Kroes European Commission Vice President responsible for the Digital Agenda, said at last year’s award ceremonies.

Please note the award agenda:

Deadline for Nominations: September 16, 2014
Finalist Announcement: October 6, 2014
Rome Award Ceremony: October 30, 2014

Additional information and nomination forms are available at AdaAwards.com.

Posted by Alison Daniel-Cutler, Pre-University CS Education Outreach Manager

Fighting against hate speech

At a time when racism and hate speech is rising, it is urgent to unite and act to preserve it as a space of tolerance.

This week, we joined with leading French anti-racism organizations SOS Racisme, UEJF, LICRA and MRAP to launch “Pousse Ton Cri”, an online platform allowing people to voice their opposition to discriminations by recording a short “shout” via video.



The campaign aims to raise awareness amongst young internet users by mobilising them around a symbolic and collective act against the voices of intolerance on the web. Users will also learn more about how to report hate speech online.

Over the next six weeks, we will help organize three Hangouts on Air to debate racism in various fields. On September 17, we will look at racism in sports. The following week, on September 24, will investigate racism in music and the final one, on October 3, will focus on hate speech on the Net.

Each Hangouts will give young people the opportunity to ask their questions to famous figures in these different fields. Among others, French YouTuber “Jigmé”, who now has more than half a million subscribers, will share his story of how he uses humor to highlight prejudices.

You can register to participate to one of these debates via this link.

Posted by Florian Maganza, Senior Policy Analyst, Google France

Connecting schools around the globe

As a bishop in his native Buenos Aires, Pope Francis founded "Escuela de Vecinos" (Neighbor Schools) and "Escuelas Hermanas" (Sister Schools) to allow students in richer and poorer neighborhoods to share their concerns. Today, at the Vatican, a new project was announced, using the Internet and Google tools, allowing students from around the world to communicate. The Pope himself tomorrow will publicly present the new platform.

The initiative, Scholas, seeks to connect schools all over the globe, so that they may learn from one another, share projects and find volunteers to make these projects a reality. Scholas Occurrentes integrates Google Apps for Education.

“Technology and Education are key in tackling the roots of violence”, said Jose María del Corral, Scholas's CoFounder at the press conference held this morning. We are helping "take down the physical barriers and prejudices that stand in the way of peace." Google's Managing Director for Spanish-speaking Latin America Adriana Noreña and representatives of Globant and Line64, responsible for the site´s design and programming, joined him at the Vatican launch.



The initiative comes after a Vatican-sponsored education congress and a soccer match for World Peace held earlier this week, for which Pope Francis I personally invited some of the best soccer players.

Posted by Ana Paula Blanco, Head of Communications for Google Latin America

Celebrating the 25th Anniversary of the Baltic Way

Twenty-five years ago, on this week, two million people in Estonia, Latvia and Lithuania joined hands to form a human chain for freedom. We’re celebrate the 25th anniversary of the Baltic Way with a customized logo our 'doodles made specially for the three countries.



The Baltic Way was a remarkable non-violent protest. It brought together almost a third of the three Baltic nations population seeking independence. ’The demonstrators created a 600km long human chain, starting from Tallinn in Estonia, going through Riga in Latvia and finishing in Vilnius in Lithuania.



Baltic Googlers themselves came up with the idea for the Baltic Way doodle. Many have very vivid and strong memories about the Baltic Way. Although Vytautas was only eight years old, he remembers his grandparents bringing him to the human chain near Vilnius Cathedral. "I joined hands with my grandma and a stranger. The real magic moment for me was when the light airplanes flew over the heads and dispersed a huge cloud of flowers - way better than any firework I've seen before! I'm proud I can say "I was also part of it!”

In Latvia, Laura remembers people singing songs, and "many of them, including me and my parents, were crying - all for the freedom of Baltics. Regimantas was six years old and still remembers how "we had to wait for instructions through an old radio on when we should all stand together, holding each other hand.” Gabriele says her parents were in Germany. During the event, they stopped on a freeway near Berlin -and joined their hands and sang the national anthem of Lithuania. "Germans stopped their cars to find out what was happening and joined hands together once they got to know about the Baltic Way. It was a unique sense of brotherhood of nations.”

Many of our Baltic team work from our European headquarters in Dublin. They met up this week to share and enjoy songs, dance performances, sport games and just have a good time together. Together with the Lord Mayor of Dublin and diplomatic and community representatives, they joined hands with participants to form a human chain through the heart of Dublin.

Posted by Google Baltics team

Hacking for EU democracy

It’s hackathon time in Brussels. Applications are open now here for the fourth annual EUhackathon. Apply before October 2. This year’s event, scheduled for December 2 and 3, 2014, focuses on increasing democratic participation and how to increase European citizens’ involvement in the European Union policy-making process.



Previous EUhackathons also addressed pressing policy issues and built bridges between policymakers and the world of coders. The 2011 edition aimed to enhance transparency around broadband Internet access; the 2012 edition created child safety solutions; and the 2013 edition promoted transparency around government surveillance of online communications.



This year’s Hackathon entrants will be asked to produce apps that increase democratic participation. They might allow citizens to participate in public consultations or in policy-making debates held at EU (and possibly national) level. They might promote transparency, enable the mining and analysis of responses and positions published in the public consultation process or legislative debate.

Selected applicants will be invited to Brussels for the two day event. Sponsors will cover their travel and accommodation costs. The winner will receive EUR 5,000. European Parliamentarians Eva Paunova (EPP, Bulgaria), Julia Reda (Greens/EFA, Germany) and Marietje Schaake (ALDE, Netherlands) will host the award ceremony.

Posted by Marco Pancini, Senior Counsel, Brussels

Honoring Finland’s Famed Architect Alvar Aalto

Alvar Aalto changed the way we see the world. Finland’s famed architect and designer not only built path-breaking buildings - during his long, fruitful life, he also designed some of the 20th century’s most innovative furniture, textiles and glassware. Today, we’re proud to announce a partnership with the Alvar Aalto Foundation to bring much of this genius’s important work online - allowing anyone, anywhere to virtually visit many of his his most important buildings and learn about his design breakthroughs.

This project means something special to many of us at Google. We have built one of our two largest data centers in Finland - and the architect of our data center building was none other than Aalto. The Finnish master originally designed our data center in Hamina as a paper mill. The mill closed in 2007. We took over the empty building, transformed and expanded it, investing so far almost a billion euros and creating hundreds of jobs in the region, while attempting to keep intact as much as possible of the Aalto heritage. Take a look. We’re publishing new Street View images of the renovated exterior and interior today on our main data center page.

Aalto designed many other buildings in the area around our data center - including the world-famed Sunila worker housing in Kotka. We long have shown the outsides of these buildings on StreetView. We’re now adding the interiors.

Many of Aalto’s most famous buildings are located hundreds of kilometers apart, making them difficult to visit. We toured the entire country to photograph his most important masterpieces. We went to his hometown Jyvaskyla in central Finland and photographed the Alvar Aalto Museum and Säynätsalo Town Hall.


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We went to Imatra and are presenting the famed Church of the Three Crosses.


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In the Finnish capital Helsinki, we captured not only Aalto’s own studio but also two important cultural buildings, Finlandia Hall and the House of Culture. At the Restaurant Savoy, Aalto brought Finnish nature into the center of Helsinki, designing still-in-production door knobs, clean-lined lighting fixtures, club chairs, and the famed Savoy vase, mirroring the outlines of a Finnish lake.


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The cooperation with Finland’s Aalto Foundation includes two new online exhibitions on our Google Cultural Institute platform. The first focuses on Aalto’s famed three legged stool 60. This much imitated model relied on one of Aalto’s most important innovations - a new process for bending wood that he applied to create organic shapes. The stool was designed in 1933 and was first used in two major early works of Aalto: Paimio Sanatorium and Vyborg Library before becoming an iconic piece of modernist furniture for people to furnish their homes with.

A second exhibition describes the renovation of the Vyborg Library. The building was immediately considered a modernist chef d’oeuvre, softening and humanizing the hard edges of German Bauhaus strictures into a new original, organic style, replacing steel with wood, and creating a warm, cosy atmosphere for the reader. When the Library was constructed, the city of Viipuri was in Finland. After World War II, Finland was forced to hand it over to the Soviet Union and it became Vyborg. The library survived the war but remained unused for twenty years and fell into disrepair. Finally in 2013 the renovation was completed.

Together, these initiatives demonstrate our commitment and confidence in Finland. This is a hard time for the country, with growth slowing and unemployment rising. At the same time, our Hamina data centre keeps expanding and Internet infrastructure represent an important ray of economic hope. As this project demonstrates, we are committed to the country and are delighted to use the Internet to promote Finnish culture.

Posted by William Echikson, Head of Community Relations, Europe

Launching Code for Germany

At Google, we like to experiment. Today we are experimenting with a guest blogpost from the Germany’s Open Knowledge Foundation.

Many in Europe believe that computer science and the Internet is an American invention. This summer, we decided to prove this idea wrong, launching our program, launching our program Code for Germany.
The feedback so far has been amazing. In the past few months, fourteen labs have sprouted up all across the country, bringing together more than 150 people on a regular basis to work on civic tech, use open data, and make the most of their skills to better their cities.

All told, more than 4000 hours of civic hacking has produced multiple apps and projects. The OK Lab in Hamburg has a strong focus on urban development, and have created a map which shows the distribution of playgrounds in the city. An app from the OK Lab Heilbronn depicts the quality of tap water according to the region, and another from the OK Lab Cologne helps users find the closest defibrillator in their area. One of my favourite developments is called “Kleiner Spatz”, which translates to “Little Sparrow” and helps parents find available child care spaces in their city. Check out the list for yourself to see what amazing things can be built with technology.

This is just the beginning. In the coming months we want to strengthen the various communities and establish ties with officials, governments and administrations. We want to foster innovation in the field of Open Data, Civic Innovation and Public Services and create fertile collaborations between citizens and governments. Our OK Labs offer this possibility.

So far, Code for Germany has been a blast! Let me express my most heartfelt gratitude towards the community of developers and designers who have contributed so much already. Let’s rock and stay awesome!

Posted by Fiona Krakenbürger, Code for Germany