Friday, December 18, 2009

Googland

Googland

[G] Carbon offsets at Google

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 07:11 PM PST

Official Google Blog: Carbon offsets at Google

As leaders from around the world meet in Copenhagen to address global climate change this month, we thought it was a good time to reflect on our own carbon footprint. In 2007, we committed to become a carbon neutral company. We know that it isn't possible to write a check and eliminate the environmental impact of our operations. So what does "carbon neutrality" mean to us?

First, we aggressively pursue reductions in our energy consumption through energy efficiency, innovative infrastructure design and operations and on-site renewable energy. Our Google designed data centers use half the energy of typical facilities. We're also working to accelerate the development of economic, clean renewable energy at scale through research and development, investment and policy outreach. At this time, however, such efforts don't cover our entire carbon footprint. Therefore, since 2007 we've gone a step further and made a voluntary commitment to buy carbon offsets to cover the portion of our footprint that we cannot yet eliminate — which is what we mean by "carbon neutrality."

So what exactly is a carbon offset? The idea behind an offset is that we pay someone to reduce their greenhouse gas emissions in a specific, measurable way, thus offseting an equal climate impact on our side. To determine our impact, we calculate our annual carbon footprint, which is then verified by an independent third party. We include direct energy consumption (like natural gas) and electricity use, employee commuting, company vehicle use, business travel and estimates of carbon emissions from building construction and from the manufacturing of servers used in our datacenters. We then buy an equivalent number of carbon offsets.

While carbon offsets seem simple in principle, in practice they are surprisingly complicated. In particular, it's often difficult to say whether or not the offset project results in emissions reductions that would have happened anyway. We find ourselves asking whether the project in fact goes beyond "business as usual." In the world of offsets, this concept is referred to as "additionality." Carbon offsets have a mixed reputation because some projects are not additional. Here at Google, we have set a very high bar to ensure that our investment makes an actual difference in reducing greenhouse gas emissions by purchasing offsets that are real, verifiable, permanent and additional.

To date, we have selected high quality carbon offsets from around the world that reduce greenhouse gas emissions — ranging from landfill gas projects in Caldwell County, NC, and Steuben County, NY, to animal-waste management systems in Mexico and Brazil. Our funding helps make it possible for equipment to be installed that captures and destroys the methane gas produced as the waste decomposes. Methane, the primary component in natural gas, is a significant contributor to global warming. We chose to focus on landfill and agricultural methane reduction projects because methane's impact on warming is very well understood, it's easy to measure how much methane is captured and the capture wouldn't happen without our financing (for the projects we're investing in, they couldn't make enough money selling the gas).

We need fundamental changes to global energy and transportation infrastructure to stabilize greenhouse gas emissions over the long term. In the meantime, the projects to which we contribute offer measurable emissions reductions and allow us to take responsibility for our carbon footprint. To that end, we're always looking for good emissions-reduction projects to support. If you have a landfill gas or agricultural methane carbon offset project you think we should consider, please visit this page for more information about how to participate in our latest carbon-offset procurement round.

Posted by Alice Ryan, Green Energy Project Manager
URL: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/12/carbon-offsets-at-google.html

[G] Finding your way in India with landmarks

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 06:02 PM PST

Google LatLong: Finding your way in India with landmarks


In the past few months, you may have noticed that Google Maps directions have been using some new phrases such as "Take the 2nd right" rather than just "Turn right". We're using phrases like this because they're natural concepts that relate to the way we think about navigation in real life. They're the way a friend might give you directions. This week we're taking this concept further for users in India, using landmarks to help drivers get their bearings.

During a trip to the Google engineering office in Bangalore, our driving directions engineers got a chance to learn firsthand how drivers navigate in India. We discovered that street signs or names tend to be less important than landmarks such as civic buildings and gas stations. A friend giving you directions might tell you to "Turn left at the school" or "Go past the convenience store". In India, we have a lot of great landmark data available through user-entered "Points of Interest" in Google Map Maker.

Our new algorithm determines which of these landmarks are most useful for navigation, based on visibility, importance, and closeness to the turns that you're making. We now combine landmark data, counted turns ("the 2nd right"), intersection names, and road names, and try to use whatever information is most relevant and useful. We're using landmarks in two ways: to identify where users need to turn, and to provide confirmation that they're on the right track. You can read more about the research that went into this feature on the Official Google Blog.

Landmarks now appear in both desktop and mobile directions. As a result, we hope that our users in India will have an easier time getting to their destinations using directions in Google Maps -- and you can improve our directions by adding more POIs in Google Map Maker!


Posted by Dave Walker and John Leen, Software Engineers
URL: http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2009/12/finding-your-way-in-india-with.html

[G] Go thataway: Google Maps India learns to navigate like a local

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 06:02 PM PST

Official Google Blog: Go thataway: Google Maps India learns to navigate like a local

Have you ever been lost? Perhaps you missed a turn because a street sign was poorly labeled, hard to see in the dark, or just not where it should have been? These are problems we've all faced, but they're especially complicated in India, where street names are not commonly known and the typical wayfinding strategy is to ask someone on the street. Without road names, it's difficult to produce a set of directions that makes sense. Just take a look at this screenshot of Google Maps directions in India in 2008 and you'll get the picture:


To solve this problem, this week we launched an improvement to Google Maps India that describes routes in terms of easy-to-follow landmarks and businesses that are visible along the way. We gathered feedback from users around the world to spark this improvement to our technology, and we thought we'd give you a glimpse at our thinking behind this launch.

We knew from previous studies in several countries that most people rely on landmarks — visual cues along the way — for successful navigation. But we needed to understand how people use those visual cues, and what makes a good landmark, in order to make our instructions more human and improve route descriptions. To get answers to these questions, we ran a user research study that focused specifically on how people give and get directions. We called businesses and asked how to get to their store; we recruited people to keep track of directions they gave or received and later interviewed them about their experiences; we asked people to draw us diagrams of routes to places unfamiliar to us; we even followed people around as they tried to find their way.

We found that using landmarks in directions helps for two simple reasons: they are easier to see than street signs and they are easier to remember than street names. Spotting a pink building on a corner or remembering to turn after a gas station is much easier than trying to recall an unfamiliar street name. Sometimes there are simply too many signs to look at, and the street sign drowns in the visual noise. A good landmark always stands out.

We also discovered that there are three situations in which people resort to landmarks.

The first is when people need to orient themselves — for instance, they just exited a subway station and are not sure which way to go. Google Maps would say: "Head southeast for 0.2 miles." A person would say: "Start walking away from the McDonald's."

The second situation is when people use a landmark to describe a turn: "Turn right after the Starbucks."

The third use, however, is the most interesting. We discovered that often people simply want to confirm that they are still on the right track and haven't missed their turn.

Giving people this sense of confidence while they explore an unfamiliar territory became one of the goals of our redesign. Over the course of several months, the team brainstormed various ways of presenting the information contained in Google Maps in a way that would be useful for people. We then settled on a design that added some landmarks to describe the turns and confirm the route.


The next step was to put this design to a test with drivers in Bangalore, India. The results were eye-opening. While we were on the right track with introducing landmarks, we still relied on street names too heavily. Drivers wanted more confirmation. They wanted to compare what they saw on Google Maps with what they saw from the driver's seat, every step of the way.

We added more landmarks along routes and reduced the visual prominence of street names, and the result was our final design:


Now Google Maps India gives you directions like a local would. Happy wayfinding!

Posted by Olga Khroustaleva, User Experience Researcher, Google Maps
URL: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/12/go-thataway-google-maps-india-learns-to.html

[G] New resource for display advertisers on the Content Network

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 06:02 PM PST

Inside AdWords: New resource for display advertisers on the Content Network

Over the last year and a half, we've made significant changes to the Google Content Network to deliver better performance for your campaigns and to simplify the process of serving ads across a range of websites. As we roll out more features, we want to make it easy for you to discover what best fits your needs. To this effect, we've just launched a new Content Network brand channel on YouTube.

The site is stockpiled with videos, links and downloads about the full suite of features and solutions on the Content Network. Structured into four key sections, you can learn about a number of different products we offer and how they can help you achieve your various advertising goals. You can also find case studies and research papers from various industries so that you can see what some of the most successful advertisers on the Content Network are doing.

Last but not the least, we've also introduced a new creative direction for our videos, adding a bit more color and fun. Enjoy the first 5 videos below, and let us know what you think by sharing your comments on YouTube.



If you'd like to see more, you can always bookmark the playlist. Hope you find the new channel informative and fun!

[Note: this post is reprinted from the Google Agency Ad Solutions Blog]

Posted by Miles Johnson, Inside AdWords crew
URL: http://adwords.blogspot.com/2009/12/new-resource-for-display-advertisers-on.html

[G] The Davos Debates 2010: Your Pitch To The World

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 04:11 PM PST

YouTube Blog: The Davos Debates 2010: Your Pitch To The World

This year's iteration of The Davos Debates is up and running, offering one YouTube user the opportunity to attend this year's World Economic Forum meeting in Davos to put forward the cause they are most passionate about at a specially convened panel.

Our candidate will get the opportunity to engage and debate with the world's leaders and take the opportunity that Davos offers to elevate the cause that is closest to their heart. As you can imagine: we're looking for someone a bit special. Someone like you? See below for more details:




What sort of person are we looking for?

The winner of the Davos Debates will be someone with knowledge and passion for a public cause, who can demonstrate they're able to interact with the world's leaders. We want to hear real stories from people working on local issues, with a view to offering the opportunity to make these concerns global. Maybe it's fighting for human rights, or the environment, or against poverty? Maybe it's world fishing, education, or political freedoms? Whatever it is, we're looking someone who isn't afraid to get their voice heard, and give them the chance to be at Davos.

How does it work?

From today until the January 4, we're asking YouTube users to submit their video entries. Five finalists will be selected by a judging panel comprised of Paolo Coelho, Arianna Huffington and Muhammad Yunus. These finalist videos will then go to public vote on January 8, with a winner announced on the January 19.

Beyond that, and the information at the World Economic Forum channel, it's up to you. So get filming, rally some support and Make Your Pitch To The World.


Steve Grove, News & Politics, recently watched "CNN/YouTube Climate Debate"


URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/youtube/PKJx/~3/bD-iVzEVS3o/davos-debates-2010-your-pitch-to-world.html

[G] Google Honored as a Finalist in the 2010 SC Awards

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 04:11 PM PST

Official Google Enterprise Blog: Google Honored as a Finalist in the 2010 SC Awards

Google is honored to have been selected as a finalist in the 2010 SC Awards for outstanding achievement in IT security. Google Message Security, powered by Postini, was nominated for the Reader Trust award in the Best Managed Security Service category from more than 600 entries across 31 technology categories.

Widely respected in the industry for more than a decade, the annual SC Awards recognize the professionals, products, and companies providing security solutions that not only protect organizations today, but are also able to identify emerging threats as the landscape of online security evolves.

At Google, we're especially proud to be up for a Reader Trust award, since our focus is always on our users first. Voters from small, medium and large enterprises spanning all industries gave Google Message Security high marks on functionality, manageability, ease-of-use and scalability, as well as the customer service and support provided for it.

"Finalists in this year's SC Awards including Google, represent a cross-section of the security industry's best-in-class," said SC Magazine Editor-in-Chief Illena Armstrong. "Our readers recognize that these companies are making today's businesses more secure."

Winners of this year's SC Awards will be announced at at the annual SC Magazine award dinner in San Francisco on Tuesday, March 2, 2010. To attend the SC Awards, please register here.

Google's Postini team would like to thank SC Magazine and the many readers who voted for Google Message Security. We'd also like to congratulate our fellow nominees and acknowledge their contributions to the field of online security.

Posted by Gopal Shah, Google Postini team



URL: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2009/12/google-honored-as-finalist-in-2010-sc.html

[G] Automatic site translation and more in Google Sites

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 03:44 PM PST

Official Google Docs Blog: Automatic site translation and more in Google Sites

Just in time for the holidays, we've added three new additions to Google Sites. First, we've integrated Google Sites with the Google Translate element. Now, visitors to your Google Site with a different language setting than your site can hit the translate button on the bottom right of the page to translate the whole site to the language of their choice. Try it out for yourself.

Before:


After:


Second, PDFs attached to pages and file cabinets can now be previewed in the Google Docs viewer. As we've mentioned before here and here, the Google Docs viewer is a good alternative to downloading a file.

Lastly, you can set a default location for a page template. This makes it simpler for you to keep the pages of your site organized. For example, if you have a recipe template in your family site, set /recipes/ as default location for pages created from that template so all your recipes show up together within your site.

We hope you enjoy these new additions to Google Sites.

Posted by: Russ Vrolyk, Software Engineer, Google Sites
URL: http://googledocs.blogspot.com/2009/12/just-in-time-for-holidays-weve-added.html

[G] Translate Google Sites with one click

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 03:44 PM PST

Official Google Blog: Translate Google Sites with one click

Google brought translation features to many of our products in 2009, including Google Docs and Gmail and we're happy to add one more before the New Year. To make it easier for people around the globe to read the site you created with Google Sites, we've integrated with the Google Translate Element. Now, whenever someone visits a Google Site in another language, they will be given the option to translate the content into the language of their choice. All they have to do is click on the translate link at the bottom right-hand side of the page. Now, the content on your site can be translated into 51 languages, allowing you to reach a whole new audience. Check out this before and after for a Korean school's website below (or try it out for yourself).

Before

After

We hope this feature helps expand your Google site's reach to more people.

Posted by Michael Cheng, Software Engineer, Google Sites
URL: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/12/translate-google-sites-with-one-click.html

[G] API Python Client Library Updated

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 03:44 PM PST

Google Analytics Blog: API Python Client Library Updated

It's easier for developers to program in the languages they know, so we updated the Google Analytics API Python Client library with the just-launched API version 2 features. We also added reference examples for both the Account Feed and Data Feed. Now it's easier than ever to automate your analysis workflow using our API.

Taking The Library For a Spin

With the updated library, we thought it would be a great time to highlight the power of the new features. So we created a sample application to do just that. The application uses the new Python library to retrieve metrics for a series of segments. It then performs some calculations on the data and creates bar charts using the GChartWrapper package, an open source Python wrapper for the Google Charts API. Finally, it uses the Python Imaging Library to add a title and legend, and stitches all the charts together into a single image. We decided to release this application as open source so you can create visualizations with your own data.

Solving Business Problems

Since social media is all the rage, let's use this new application to help Avinash Kaushik, our Analytics Evangelist, measure "engagement" on his popular Occam's Razor blog. We also wanted to determine if the time he spends participating in social media sites is valuable and sends new readers to his blog.

First we created segments to pull all the referrals from Facebook and Twitter. Second, we chose five calculations and corresponding metrics to compare the performance of these two segments. We then compared the segments to each other and, for context, for all the visits to the site as a control.

They say a picture is worth a thousand words, here are the results:
Let's Analyze

Some interesting observations become apparent.
  • Far more visits originate from Twitter (3.6x) when compared to Facebook, perhaps not surprising given Avinash's Twitter followers (~16,120)

  • Visitors from Twitter tend to be new visitors, a good thing, but they view fewer pages and spend significantly less time on the blog.

  • On the other hand Facebook delivers an audience that is loyal. These visitors come back to the site more often and spend a significant time on the blog (compared to Twitter and all other visitors).
The bottom line? Even though social networking sites are all the rage, they actually contribute very little to Avinash's blog. If this blog were a company, it would be wise to ensure the time and effort put into driving traffic from social media is proportionate to the actual volume of traffic and goal conversions from those sites.

Hopefully this example shows how powerful our new features can be.

If you're interested in running this report against your own data, the application is free and open sourced. Additionally, we made it really easy to change the metrics, segments, calculations and all the other visual properties to power your own visualizations. Download it here and give it a whirl, we would love to hear your feedback.


Posted by Nick Mihailovski, The Google Analytics API Team
URL: http://analytics.blogspot.com/2009/12/api-python-client-library-updated.html

[G] Setting some ambitious goals in a National Broadband Plan

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 01:10 PM PST

Google Public Policy Blog: Setting some ambitious goals in a National Broadband Plan

Posted by Richard Whitt, Washington Telecom and Media Counsel

One of Google's top policy priorities is spurring the availability and uptake of affordable, open broadband Internet service. The Internet may have been invented in the United States, but unfortunately in too many places we continue to lag behind Asia and Europe when it comes to broadband speed, penetration, and adoption.

We've been working closely with FCC staff over the past several months as they prepare to deliver a National Broadband Plan to Congress in February, and to date they've shown a strong commitment to providing the best possible blueprint for action.

As we explained in our initial comments, we think it's essential that in addition to instituting some constructive near-term solutions, the plan also should include some explicit, ambitious – and ultimately achievable – longer term goals for bringing ultra-high broadband speeds to all Americans. Those goals should be supported by our country's best thinking about various potential pathways to achieving them.

Today, in a letter to FCC Chairman Julius Genachowski, House Communications Subcommittee Chairman Rick Boucher called on the Commission to commit to specific "stretch" goals as part of its overall plan – and we agree. Without including in the plan some future-focused benchmarks for speed and service, our nation risks losing the opportunity to make robust, nationwide broadband access a reality for American consumers.

Affordable, high-speed Internet access can drive economic growth, job creation, and education. We should not be satisfied with shorter-term fixes alone that likely will still leave us lagging behind the rest of the industrialized world.
URL: http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2009/12/setting-some-ambitious-goals-in.html

[G] “The Beautiful Life” Makes its YouTube Premiere

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 01:10 PM PST

YouTube Blog: "The Beautiful Life" Makes its YouTube Premiere

Today we are teaming up with Katalyst, a studio for social media co-founded by Ashton Kutcher, and HP to bring previously unaired episodes of Katalyst's television drama The Beautiful Life to YouTube at www.youtube.com/TBL.







The TBL series is being presented without commercial interruption by HP in connection with its Create Change program. As part of The Beautiful Life experience on YouTube, Katalyst and HP have asked the show's stars and viewers to participate by recording, tagging and posting video commentary about how they will create positive change in 2010.



We are excited to bring first-run original programming like this to the YouTube community. The first two episodes of the series, originally aired on the CW, will debut today, followed by the remaining three episodes beginning on December 21. We're sure devout TBL fans will enjoy this holiday treat, and we think the show is likely to find many new fans through YouTube.



George Strompolos, Strategic Partnerships, recently watched The Beautiful Life - Episode 2


URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/youtube/PKJx/~3/fb0JV-CHYls/beautiful-life-makes-its-youtube.html

[G] Our final imagery update of 2009

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 12:20 PM PST

Google LatLong: Our final imagery update of 2009


We just launched our final imagery update of the year for Google Earth and Google Maps. Check to see if any of your favorite places have gotten an update! You can view the updated areas highlighted in red below. Alternatively, you can download this KML for viewing in Google Earth or you view the updates in Google Maps.


Updates are noted with a red frame.

We're excited to provide you with the freshest, most current imagery in Google Earth again next year, in 2010.

Posted by Matt Manolides, GIS Specialist
URL: http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2009/12/our-final-imagery-update-of-2009.html

[G] Template spotlight: Holiday newsletter

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 11:07 AM PST

Official Google Docs Blog: Template spotlight: Holiday newsletter

Holiday newsletters are a great way to keep friends and family up to date on what's happened over the past year, and this holiday newsletter template is an easy way to jump right in. Add your family photo, share it with everyone in the family, and you'll be done in record time.


If you're looking for other themes, check out the holiday newsletter (candy cane theme) or the holiday newsletter (string of lights theme).

Posted by: Peter Harbison, Product Marketing Manager
URL: http://googledocs.blogspot.com/2009/12/template-spotlight-holiday-newsletter.html

[G] Transliteration goes global

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 11:07 AM PST

Official Google Blog: Transliteration goes global

Most of us use a keyboard to enter text; it's one of the most basic activities we perform on a computer. However even this simple activity can be cumbersome in many parts of the world. If you've ever tried to type in a non-Roman script using a Roman keyboard, you know that it can be difficult to do. Many of us at Google's Bangalore office experienced this problem firsthand. Roman keyboards are the norm in India, making it difficult to type in Indian languages. We decided to tackle this problem by making it very easy to type phonetically using Roman characters and we launched this service as Google Transliteration.

Using Google Transliteration you can convert Roman characters to their phonetic equivalent in your language. Note that this is not the same as translation — it's the sound of the words that are converted from one alphabet to the other. For example, typing "hamesha" transliterates into Hindi as: Hindi transliteration example, typing "salaam" transliterates into Persian as: Farsi transliteration exampleand typing "spasibo" transliterates into Russian as . Since our initial launch for a single Indian language, we've been hard at work on improving quality, adding more languages and new features.

Today we are pleased to introduce a new and improved version of Google Transliteration, available in Google Labs or at http://www.google.com/transliterate.

In this new version, you can select from one of seventeen supported languages: Arabic, Bengali, Greek, Gujarati, Hindi, Kannada, Malayalam, Marathi, Nepali, Persian, Punjabi, Russian, Sanskrit, Serbian, Tamil, Telugu and Urdu. You can also compose richly formatted text and look up word definitions with our dictionary integration. If the default transliteration is not the word you wanted, you can highlight it to see a list of alternatives. For even finer-grained control, we provide a unicode character picker to allow character-by-character composition.

Google Transliteration is integrated into several Google properties and we have an API and bookmarklets to extend this capability to other websites. A solution we initially built to solve a problem we saw here in India is now being used in many other parts of the world as well - one small example of the scale and leverage that technology can bring in today's increasingly globalized environment. As with all labs products, we will continue to improve the technology and try out new features. We would love to hear from you, so do let us know what you think.

Posted by Nilesh Tathawadekar and Mohammed Aslam, Software Engineers
URL: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2009/12/transliteration-goes-global.html

[G] The Iterative Web App: Feature-Rich and Fast

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 11:07 AM PST

Official Google Mobile Blog: The Iterative Web App: Feature-Rich and Fast

Every mobile engineering team -- including Google's -- struggles to make its applications available to all users on all devices. Even if you scope your work to today's smartphones, you're left with no less than five major operating systems. But we pay this cost because native code is often the only way to build an app that's rich enough and fast enough to meet users' needs. Enter the mobile web.

A growing number of mobile devices ship with an all-important feature: a modern web browser. And this is significant for two reasons:
  1. As an engineering team, we can build a single app with HTML and JavaScript, and have it "just work" across many mobile operating systems. The cost savings are substantial, not to mention the time you can re-invest in user-requested features.
  2. Having a web application also means we can launch products and features as soon as they're ready. And for users, the latest version of the app is always just a URL and a refresh away.
Of course: what sounds good in theory doesn't always materialize in practice. So back in April 2009 our team began re-building Gmail for mobile for today's modern browsers. We wanted to know: Could the mobile web support Gmail's basic and advanced features? Could we stuff the app with functionality while still keeping it fast and responsive? Today, and for the first time, we have answers to both questions.

Over the past 8 months we've pushed the limits of HTML5 to launch a steady string of Gmail features, including:
So yes, HTML5 and the mobile web are clearly up to the task of building rich and powerful apps. But speed is arguably the most important feature of any application. And we've remained unsatisfied with Gmail's performance on the mobile web. Until now.

As of today, and thanks to numerous optimizations, I'm happy to report that Gmail for mobile loads 2-3x faster than it did in April (see Figure 1). In fact on newer iPhone and Android devices, the app now loads in under 3 seconds. So yes, the mobile web can deliver really responsive applications.


Figure 1: Best and Worst Case Gmail for mobile start-up times, April 2009 vs. December 2009. All figures recorded on an iPhone 3G with EDGE data access.

The Gmail for mobile team isn't done, of course. We've focused primarily on performance over the past few months, but many other features and optimizations are on the way. So keep visiting gmail.com for the latest and greatest version of the app.

Looking ahead, it's also worth noting that as a worldwide mobile team, we'll continue to build native apps where it makes sense. But we're incredibly optimistic about the future of the mobile web -- both for developers and for the users we serve.

Posted by Alex Nicolaou, Engineering Manager
URL: http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2009/12/iterative-web-app-feature-rich-and-fast.html

[G] MWV has gone Google

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 09:55 AM PST

Official Google Enterprise Blog: MWV has gone Google

MWV (formerly MeadWestvaco), a global packaging company based in Glen Allen, Virginia, has migrated its 12,000 technology-enabled employees to Google Apps. A 165-year-old company with a diverse set of commercial and consumer solutions, MWV products are ubiquitous in everyday life – Mead Five-Star notebooks, coffee cups from your local barista, canned beverage FridgePak cases you see in your grocery store, collectors edition DVD cases, and fluid dispensers for luxury perfumes and lotions – among many others.

MWV has grown extensively through acquisitions, which left it with twelve siloed email systems, including multiple instances of Microsoft Exchange and Lotus Notes across the globe.



MWV embarked on a journey to unite its global workforce on a single email platform. Critical to their "One MWV" initiative was to enable users in 34 countries and speaking a wide variety of languages to collaborate and easily communicate as one global team.

Mark Gulling, MWV's CIO, explains that "The shift to Google has enhanced our ability to effectively collaborate by simplifying our email infrastructure, and delivered a richer set of communication tools. Google provides not only a rich collaboration suite, but a constant stream of innovative, market-defining products that enhance and constantly evolve our user's working experience." Gulling reports a number of benefits since switching to Google:
  • Increased productivity. Users, from executives to individual contributors, have reported increases of over 30 minutes per day, thanks to powerful search capability and the organization features of Labels, Filters, and more.
  • Online information sharing. Users have rapidly adopted Google Sites to share information and media. Approximately 200 group, product, and project collaboration sites have been created since MWV switched to Google Apps.
  • Real-time communications. MWV has used Google Docs and video chat to help people stay in touch and collaborate in real time, avoiding unnecessary travel or videoconferencing costs.
  • Innovation. MWV's product sales team was able to quickly roll out a new quote management framework based on Google Forms and Google Docs with the help of Google Apps Script.
MWV's users are excited about the switch to Google and the new features available to them. As Mel Shaffer, VP of Global Service Delivery, says, "Moving to Google has givenMWV the ability to ride a wave of collaboration and technology features that would be difficult to duplicate in any other product."

Continuing, Shaffer adds, "Google's innovative product design and commitment to user experience translate into a feature-rich user experience that is unparalleled in the IT marketplace today. Additionally, Google's price point enables IT to reduce costs and minimize or eliminate capital investment – a true win for our enterprise and our users."

Join us in welcoming MWV to the growing ranks of businesses who have gone Google.

Posted by Colleen Horan, Google Enterprise team
URL: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2009/12/mwv-has-gone-google.html

[G] Keeping your account secure

Posted: 17 Dec 2009 08:44 AM PST

Inside AdSense: Keeping your account secure

We understand how important your AdSense account is to you. You need to sign into your account to generate ad code, manage the appearance of your ads, view your reports and check the status of your payments. However, keep in mind that your AdSense account is actually part of your Google Account. This means that you may have several Google products, such as AdSense, Gmail, AdWords, Blogger, etc, all tied to a single sign-in.

We take account access issues very seriously and would like to take some time to provide a few simple tips to help you protect your Google Account.

If you're having trouble signing in to your Google Account, usually resetting your password will do the trick. To add additional security to your account, you should update your alternate address, choose a strong security question (if you have Gmail), and add a mobile number to your account so Google can text you a recovery code if you ever forget your password. Also, if you have a Gmail address, we recommend providing a current secondary email address where you can receive our password-assistance email. If you don't have any of these set up, it will be difficult for us to verify your identify and reset your password, so please take some time to update your security options.

If resetting your password doesn't work, you can try filling out our account recovery form. We can usually restore access in a few hours if you're able to provide the necessary information to prove ownership.

Here are some additional tips to ensure that only you have access to your account:
  • Create a strong password and security question. Your password shouldn't be something that someone else can easily guess. The same goes for your security question. If someone that knows you can answer your security question, then it's probably not a good question. Review these tips for suggestions.
  • Don't share your account password with anyone. It may be tempting to share your password with your friends or family, but don't do it, especially if it's your personal account. If you need to create an account that is accessed my several people, make sure that the account is not tied to any products that contain personal information.
  • Don't respond to messages asking for your username or password. Google will never send you an email, IM, or any other communication asking for your sign-in information, so don't respond to any messages asking for it.
  • Be cautious of fake sign-in pages. Always look for www.google.com/adsense in the URL. If the URL is different, don't sign in on the page. If you think you may have signed in using a fake sign-in page for AdSense or any other Google product, please reset your password as soon as possible to prevent abuse of your Google services by a third party.
You can find more tips in the Google Accounts Help Center.

Posted by Diane Velasco - AdSense Policy Team
URL: http://adsense.blogspot.com/2009/12/keeping-your-account-secure.html
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