Europe Blog
Our views on the Internet and society
Hallo, hola, olá to a new powerful Google Translate app
Wednesday, January 14, 2015
Often the hardest part of traveling is navigating the local language. If you've ever asked for "pain" in Paris and gotten funny looks, confused "embarazada" with "embarrassed" in Mexico, or stumbled over pronunciation pretty much anywhere, you know the feeling. We’ve now updated the
Translate app
on
Android
and
iOS
to transform your mobile device into an even more powerful translation tool.
Instant translation with Word Lens
The Translate app already lets you use camera mode to snap a photo of text and get a translation for it in 36 languages. From today, you can instantly translate text. While using the Translate app, just point your camera at a sign or text and the translated text will overlaid on your screen—even if you don't have an Internet or data connection.
This instant translation currently works for translation from English to and from French, German, Italian, Portuguese, Russian and Spanish, and we’re working to expand to more languages.
Have an easier conversation using the Translate app
When talking with someone in an unfamiliar language, conversations can... get... sloowwww. While we’ve had real-time conversation mode on Android since 2013, our new update makes the conversation flow faster and more naturally.
Starting today, simply tap the mic to start speaking in a selected language, then tap the mic again, and the Google Translate app will recognize which of the two languages are being spoken, letting you have a more fluid conversation. For the rest of the conversation, you won’t need to tap the mic again—it'll be ready as you need it. Asking for directions to the Rive Gauche, ordering bacalhau in Lisbon, or chatting with your grandmother in her native Spanish just got a lot faster.
These updates will be coming to both Android and iOS, rolling out over the next few days. This is the first time some of these advanced features, like camera translations and conversation mode, will be available for iOS users.
More than 500 million people use Google Translate every month, making more than 1 billion translations a day to more easily communicate and access information across languages. Today’s updates take us one step closer to turning your phone into a universal translator and to a world where language is no longer a barrier to discovering information or connecting with each other.
Posted by Barak Turovsky, Product Lead, Google Translate
YouTube music hits the right note
Thursday, November 13, 2014
You watched the Belgian singer Stromae perform
Papaoutai
200+ million times on YouTube, helping propel the song about his father to the top of the charts in France and into a global success. And that’s all just for one song.
This week, we’re making it easier to find new music on YouTube and rock out to old favorites by launching a new paid subscription service called
Music Key
. It
lets you watch and listen to music without ads, in the background or offline and is available already in the United Kingdom, Finland, Ireland, Italy, Portugal and Spain, with more countries to come soon.
If you’re interested in getting more info on the beta, you can let us know at
youtube.com/musickey
.
Music Key represents a big step forward in our blossoming partnership with the music industry. We've struck new deals with the major producers, thousands of independent record labels, collecting societies and music publishers.
Thanks to your music videos, remixes, covers, and more, you’ve made YouTube the place to go for the music fan.
YouTube benefits both the established musicians as well as newcomers, sending them more
than
$1 billion
.
Of course, YouTube is much more than music. Other types of content creators - from educational to comedy shows - also are finding an audience earning money in our partnership programs. More
-one million channels today earn revenue through the YouTube Partner Program. Thousands of channels make six figures annually. We look forward to continuing to develop new online opportunities for Europe's creators.
Posted by the YouTube Music team, which recently watched
“Michael Jackson - Wanna Be Startin' Somethin' - YouTube Mix.”
Helping Europe's youth find work
Monday, June 23, 2014
All across Europe, far too many young people struggle to find a job and starting their careers. That is why we are joining a coalition of businesses and governments called the
Alliance for Youth
, which will support European youth to gain new skills and work experience.
At an event today in Lisbon attended by European Commission President Jose-Manuel Barroso and Portuguese Prime Minister Passos Coelho, we committed to a range of initiatives to increase access to digital skills training and education in science, technology, engineering and maths. We're also extending our support for entrepreneurs in Europe.
At Google, we’ve taken on nearly 3500 new employees in Europe over the last three years - net growth of 60% since 2011. Of those 3500, nearly 650 are newly-minted graduates of European universities. They work in a wide range of technical and non-technical roles based in our offices across Europe. More jobs are available. We still have entry level positions open in engineering, advertising support, and product management.
Another priority is helping university students develop professional skills via
internships
. This summer alone, we’ll play host to more than 600 technical and non-technical interns in Europe. We have strong partnerships with universities and organizations.
Across Europe, we are working with partners to help meet some of the specific challenges facing young people. In Spain, where youth unemployment has reached an alarming 57%, we launched
Activate
, a platform to train the young generation in digital skills. Through a suite of offline and massive open online courses (MOOCs) on digital marketing, data analytics, cloud computing, e-commerce, we hope to reach more than 100,000 Europeans by early next year.
Our
RISE
(Roots in Science & Engineering) and
CS4HS
(Computer Science for High School) programs target younger high students. These programs nurture coding skills, use robotics to teach engineering and maths and help teachers with STEM (science, technology, engineering and maths) education tools. Through our partnerships with education organizations, we’ll reach 500,000 students and teachers in 20 European countries, up from 100,000 in 2013.
Finally, Google continues to supports entrepreneurship in Europe. We plan to reach thousands of entrepreneurs through
Google for Entrepreneurs
, including
Startup Weekend
,
Startup Grind
or publicly available online learning resources tailored to early-stage entrepreneurs. We also support a growing number of startup hubs and co-working spaces: in London (
Campus London
), Berlin (
The Factory
) and Paris (
Numa
), and a recently announced Campus in Warsaw.
We're delighted to contribute to the new Alliance for Youth. All of us need to support young Europeans to develop the skills and experience allowing them to find meaningful careers in the 21st century economy.
Posted by Matt Brittin, President, Business and Operations, Northern and Central Europe
Get an All Access music pass on Google Play
Thursday, August 8, 2013
With millions upon millions of songs out there, it can be a daunting task to figure out what to choose. Sometimes you just want to sit back, press play and hear something new. Starting today, you can do just that.
All Access
, our new monthly music subscription service in Google Play, is now available in Austria, Belgium, France, Ireland, Italy, Luxembourg, Portugal, Spain and the UK.
All Access provides an unlimited pass to a huge library of music on all your devices — from all the major record companies, as well as top local and independent labels.
The new service lets you create an ad-free, interactive radio station from any song or artist. You can add, remove or re-order your station and see what’s coming next. Or browse recommendations from our expert music team and explore songs by genre. The “Listen Now” tab puts artists and radio stations we think you’ll like front and center allowing you to start listening the minute you open your library.
When millions of songs just aren’t enough, Google Play Music lets you combine our collection with your own collection. You can store 20,000 songs for free online, and listen to them alongside the All Access catalogue on any Android device, or via the web at
play.google.com
. You can even ‘pin’ specific albums and playlists songs so they’re available offline.
Try it today for free for the first month and -- as a special introductory offer -- pay only EUR7.99 each month after that. Regular pricing for those who sign up after September 15 will be EUR9.99 a month, with a 30-day free trial.
With today’s launch, Google Play moves one step closer to your ultimate digital entertainment destination, where you can find, enjoy and share your favourite apps, games, books, movies, magazines, TV shows and music on your Android phone or tablet. Go ahead and start discovering a whole new world of music.
Posted by Paul Joyce, product manager for Google Play Music
Music to your ears! Five more countries get Google Play Music
Wednesday, April 10, 2013
Today music lovers in Austria, Belgium, Ireland, Luxembourg and Portugal can join their European neighbours in the UK, Germany, France, Spain and Italy, and buy their favourite songs and albums on
Google Play
, our digital entertainment destination for Android devices and the web.
Music first launched on Google Play in Europe in November 2012, and the fast rollout to more countries today is due to the multi-territorial licensing process, as
recommended by the European Commission
last year. We have 14 multi-territorial licenses for composition rights covering Europe and representing the vast majority of the world’s music, and have recently welcomed the members of AKM/AUME in Austria, SABAM in Belgium, SPA in Portugal, and IMRO in Ireland into our growing list of author’s society partners.
Google Play makes it easy for you to buy your favourite songs and albums, and instantly add them to your music library. You can add up to 20,000 songs from your existing music collection to Google Play instantly, and listen to your music from any computer or Android phone or tablet, even when you’re offline.
To coincide with Google Play Music’s launch in these five new countries, we’re also launching artist hub – a platform for independent artists to sell their music directly to fans. In the artist hub, self-published artists can create a profile, upload their music files, suggest a retail price, and sell their music on Google Play.
According to a Nielsen/Billboard’s recent
Music Industry Report
, overall music purchases are at a record high, driven by digital sales. Sales of digital albums were up 14 per cent in 2012, while sales of digital tracks grew by five per cent last year, meaning overall music sales were up more than three per cent compared to 2011.
As people’s love affair with great music continues, so too will our commitment to bringing Google Play to more countries around the world.
Posted by Sami Valkonen, head of international music partnerships, Google Play
Supporting safety online
Tuesday, February 7, 2012
Telefono Azzurro
, one of Italy’s main child protection NGOs, does amazing work on behalf of missing and sexually exploited children and their families. Last year, we donated a
Google Search Appliance
- essentially the Google ‘search engine in a box’ - to improve information retrieval on their internal network and make it easier to search on their public website.
Today, on
Safer Internet Day 2012
, we’re happy to announce that this collaboration is expanding. Telefono Azzuro will share its Search Appliance with all of the members of
Missing Children Europe
(MCE), the federation of national NGOs responsible for the
European 116.000 phone hotline
, who will use Google's search technology on their public websites. Eventually, the Search Appliance will also be linked to MCE’s interconnected
European database
of missing children (currently under construction), enabling
each member NGO
to better organise its own case files and conduct secure searches on its internal network.
This is just one example of how seriously we take the challenge of increasing safety on the web, but on Safer Internet Day, we’re also involved in a whole host of initiatives all over Europe, including:
Digital literacy education / workshops
Italy
: we’re running online safety workshops with Telefono Azzurro /
Sicuri in Rete
and with the Italian
Postal and Communications Police
(at more than 100 schools); and we’re distributing online safety information to parents together with the Italian
Association of Paediatricians
.
Portugal
: we’re launching the
Google Family Safety Center
at an event chaired by the President of National Commission for Support for Children.
Russia
: We’re partnering with
Net Literacy
to engage over 200 Russian journalism students in digital literacy campaigning in schools and communities
Events
UK
: we’re hosting online safety events with
CEOP
, the Child Exploitation and Online Protection Centre, and
Raceonline
; we’re also participating in workshops organised by the UK
Safer Internet Centre
.
Russia
: we’re working with the
Russia Safe Internet Centre
and
Russian Association of Electronic Communications
to run a series of international expert panels at the Safer Internet Forum.
Germany
: Wieland Holfelder, Google Engineering Director, is keynoting a session on the platform for safe internet use at the Safer Internet Event in Germany, organized by
Bitkom
and the Ministry of Consumer Protection (
BMELV
).
Research
UK
: we're launching, together with
YAW-CRC
, new research funded by Google into how parents can
keep their families safe online
, and
become more digitally literate themselves
.
Technology
France
: we’re supporting the work of
e-Enfance.org
on a new Google Chrome browser extension called
NetEcoute
, which will make it easy for youngsters to start an online discussion with a helpline counselor.
These initiatives are part of our global outreach on Safer Internet Day - but we hope that each of them will - in their own way - be a step forward for online safety education.
Posted by Laura Bononcini, Senior Policy Analyst, Google
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