[G] Google Catalogs: More brands, more categories, more fun

Official Google Mobile Blog: Google Catalogs: More brands, more categories, more fun

(Cross posted on the Google Commerce Blog)

Since our launch in August, we’ve been hard at work to bring more great content to Google Catalogs. Today we're excited to announce that we’ve doubled our collection of catalogs to include more than 100 brands and 300 individual issues from the catalogs you love, like Williams-Sonoma, Sephora and Nordstrom.

Thanks to our ever-growing list of partners, we’ve expanded the app to include six new catalog categories for you to shop. Love gadgets or the great outdoors? Looking for that perfect holiday treat to send to a friend? Well, look no further than our newly launched catalogs and categories:

• Gourmet: Dean & Deluca, Mrs. Fields, Wolferman’s, Harry & David, The Swiss Colony, La Tienda, Lobster Gram, Cushman’s, GiftTree, King Arthur Flour and Fairytale Brownies


• Intimates & Loungewear: Bare Necessities, Fredericks of Hollywood, Spanx and Hanes


• Athletic & Sports: Nike, Athleta, Gaiam, Champion and Tennis Express


• Outdoor Adventure: REI, Moosejaw, Patagonia, Merrell, Eddie Bauer Outdoor, Sierra Trading Post and L.L. Bean Outdoor Gear


• Gadgets: Sharper Image, ThinkGeek and SkyMall


• Toys: One Step Ahead, Right Start, The Land of Nod, Sears and Kmart

Google Catalogs lets you create a collage of your favorite items from across many catalogs. You can even share your collages with friends and family - a visual way to show them what’s on your list this holiday season!

We’ve also added a number of great brands to our existing categories, including: Barneys, Tory Burch and Trina Turk (Fashion & Apparel); BeautyBar (Beauty); Blu Dot, FLOR, and Ballard Designs (Home); Hanna Andersson, CWDkids, and Serena & Lily (Kids); and Garnet Hill, Uncommon Goods, and Wine Enthusiast (Gifts).

In the mood to kick off your holiday shopping? Visit the App Store to download the free Google Catalogs app for iPad.

Posted by Abigail Holtz, Business Product Manager, Google Catalogs Team

URL: http://googlemobile.blogspot.com/2011/11/google-catalogs-more-brands-more.html

[G] Web Analytics TV #22 - The Automation episode

Google Analytics Blog: Web Analytics TV #22 - The Automation episode

Welcome to another delightful episode of Web Analytics TV! Web Analytics TV, as you well know by now, is powered by your amazing questions. In this wonderful episode we had questions from Australia, Denmark, India, Sweden, Germany andThe Netherlands.



If you’re new to this show, our process is simple.





Step 1: You ask, or vote on, your favorite web analytics questions. Vote on next week’s questions using this Web Analytics TV Google Moderator site.

Step 2: From a secret undisclosed location at the Googleplex Avinash Kaushik & Nick Mihailovski answer them. :-)

In this episode we award the “Ninja of the Episode” and award it to Niklas in Sweden, for a great question about the difference between events and custom variables. Niklas, just email us and we’ll send you a signed copy of Web analytics 2.0.

OK. Here is the list of last episodes questions.

In this action packed episode we discuss:

• (0:23) Best practices for rollup reporting across multiple sites (See answer below)


• (0:53) Reporting secure search in Google Analytics


• (3:27) Troubleshooting funnel navigation reports


• (4:31) Comparing using event tracking and session level custom variables.


• (6:28) Measuring how visitors who interact with a video influence conversions


• (7:35) When data in Google Analytics updated


• (9:55) Representing multiple date ranges by column


• (11:04) Best practices for tracking widgets


• (11:40) Exporting greater than 500 rows from Google Analytics


• (13:43) Comparing days to purchase by medium


• (15:20) Using multiple tracking codes on the same page (see answer below)


• (16:25) Best practices using custom variables to track multivariate test information


• (18:10) Reporting across multiple currencies in Google Analytics


• (19:10) Segmenting 'serious' visitors by loyalty and engagement metrics


• (21:32) Measuring click to call buttons in your mobile websites


• (22:45) The best and most time efficient way to put Google Analytics data into a powerPoint


• (23:47) Tracking cross-sells or up-sells on a product page


• (26:05) Tracking multiple ids or paths per page


• (26:45) Why single page website show time on site metrics


• (28:27) Using the reverse page path report for analysis


• (30:21) Do profile filters impact site search reports


• (32:39) How to get fast traffic in your reports

Here are the links to the topics we discuss:

• A custom report users using secure site search


• Use nextAnalytcs to extract custom views of data out of Google Analytics


• Tracking users without JavaScript using Mobile tracking snippets


• Reporting tools to simplify data access using the Google Analytics API


• A custom report comparing days to purchase by medium


• Using Analytics Canvas to report in a common currency across Google Analytics profiles


• Applying advanced segments to custom reports by Avinash (includes downloadable report)


• Google Analytics PowerPoint integration provided by Shufflepoint


• Using the new flow visualization (to replace reverse goal path analysis)

There was one question asked which we needed to get more information. 

“What is your recommendation to simultaneously track data for a local site & having a roll-up profile to track aggregate data across all sites of a company.”

What we learned was that there are 25+ sites on different domains split across 2 business units. A simple solution is to pull out data using the API to create any rollup reports you need. Another option is to have multiple tracking codes on the same page, and have one code be the same across all the sites. That way all the data is sent into a single report which you can view.

One thing to keep in mind, is that each site will track visitors separately. So visitor numbers will not be accurate across all the sites.

So hopefully this helps you out. As always, if you need help setting up Google Analytics or leveraging the advanced configuration options, we recommend hiring a Google Analytics Certified Partner.

If you found this post or video helpful, we'd love to hear your comments. Please share them via the comment form below.

This series would not be possible without your awesome questions. Please submit them on our public Google Moderator site, and while you’re there don’t forget to vote for your favorite questions.  Avinash and I will answer them in a couple of weeks with yet another entertaining video.

Posted by Nick Mihailovski, Google Analytics team

URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blogspot/tRaA/~3/waXSKvEVL50/web-analytics-tv-22-automation-episode.html

[G] Scilab reaches for the sky

Google Open Source Blog: Scilab reaches for the sky

In France we say “Jamais deux sans trois” (everything comes in threes, if it's happened twice, it'll happen a third time). Scilab (free and open source software for numerical computation) was happy to keep this saying alive this year as we participated in our third year as a Google Summer of Code mentoring organization. Each year we have been impressed by the growing quality and diversity of projects submitted to us, the involvement of the selected students and the pleasure they have in working in the open source community. Our experience as a mentoring organization in Google Summer of Code shows us that even professional software raises interest amongst students yearning to contribute to its development both on a technical and professional level. For us, this is an acknowledgment of success in our daily work.

We consider our experience this year to be a very positive one as of the 9 selected Scilab projects, 7 have been successfully completed. We chose to focus here on the experience and work of two of our students that seem to be very representative of our Google Summer of Code experience.

CGLAB Module (a CGAL-based extension) by Edyta Przymus

Edyta’s work consisted in providing a binding of CGAL available from Scilab to offer to users of advanced computational geometry functions. Edyta got involved in the Google Summer of Code following the advice of a friend of hers who was one of our students in the 2010 edition of the program. She chose to work on Scilab because she considers it to be essential software in her domain of study: control theory and robotics. Edyta told us that participating in Google Summer of Code was a unique and wonderful experience that gave her a lot of satisfaction. She considers herself a more confident programmer (she wrote her first lines of code only 2 years ago) and has learned to organize her work process and correct her own bugs. She is continuing to work on her project in response to users’ demand and improving her code along the way.

A release of Edyta’s project (tagged as 2.0) has been published in ATOMS (the Scilab module packaging system).

Introduce a Scilab backend to Cantor by Filipe Saraiva

The goal of Filipe’s project was to provide the power of Scilab to Cantor software, a Qt/KDE front end for numerical computing software. Filipe Saraiva worked on the introduction of Scilab and its capabilities as a backend computing engine. Filipe was fond of Scilab since he began using it as an undergraduate. He considers it to be the best free tool available for numerical programming and is proud to have been able to help further its development. He summarizes his experience in the program by saying he learned how important communication is in development work, and that Google Summer of Code was an unique program to learn programming and management in free software communities that he could not find at university.

To achieve his project with success, Filipe worked very progressively. He began by studying the other back ends implemented in Cantor to see how they worked and how he could do the same for Scilab in enabling communication between the two software environments. In the midst of developing all the new needed features, he encountered some difficulties, which pushed him to consider and learn the specifics of the whole ecosystem of his application like kcfg and the processing of XML files in Q.

Since Filipe needed to modify some piece of code in Scilab itself, the Cantor/Scilab connector will not be released until Scilab 5.4.0.

The complete descriptions of all Scilab projects including the five other projects, Binary patching by Stefan Mihaila, Dakota module by Yann Chapalain, Mexlib from Scilab by Luri de Silvio, Accurate and Portable Elementary Functions by Shashank Sahni and .net called from Scilab by Igor Gridchyn are available on the Scilab website.

One of our students told us that working with technology and software used by thousands of people was rewarding. On the same note, having the opportunity to work with such passionate students each year thanks to the Google Summer of Code program is rewarding for us too, and we are thankful to Google for this opportunity.

By Julie Paul & Sylvestre Ledru, Scilab Mentors

URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/GoogleOpenSourceBlog/~3/ywAELOmXWtg/scilab-reaches-for-sky.html

[G] Grow your audience with Google+

Inside AdSense: Grow your audience with Google+

At Google, we help grow your audience by connecting you with new users. We introduced the +1 button so your site would stand out on search and your users could easily share your content on Google+. But, sometimes you want to join the conversation and post content directly to where people are sharing.

Today we’re introducing Google+ for Business, a collection of tools and products that help you grow your audience. At the core of this is Google+ Pages, your site’s identity on Google+.

Google+ Pages: Have real conversations with the right people
To get your site on Google+, you first need to create a Google+ Page. On your page, you can engage in conversations with your visitors, direct readers back to your site for the latest updates, send tailored messages to specific groups of people, and see how many +1’s you have across the web. Google+ Pages will help you build relationships with your users, encouraging them to spend more time engaging with your content.

Google+ Pages are at the heart of Google+ for Business

Hangouts

Sometimes you might want to chat with your users face-to-face.  For example, if you run a food blog, you may want to invite a chef to talk about her favorite recipe, or if you manage a fashion review site, beauty specialists might want to hold how-to sessions with makeup tips. Hangouts make this easy, by letting you have high-quality video chats with nine people with a single click. You can use Hangouts to hold live forums, break news or simply get to know people better, all in real time.

Hangouts let you meet your customers, face-to-face

Circles

Circles allow you to group followers of your Page into smaller audiences. You can then share specific messages with specific groups. For example, you could create a Circle containing your most loyal readers and offer them exclusive content.





The Google+ badge: Grow your audience on Google+

To help your users find your page and start sharing, there are two buttons you can add to your site by visiting our Google+ badge configuration tool:

The Google+ icon, a small icon that directly links to your Page.

The Google+ badge, which we’re introducing in the coming days. This badge lets people add your page to their circles without leaving your site, and allows them to get updates from your site via Google+.

 

Extend the power of +1, stand out in Google search
You can also link your site to your Google+ page so that all your +1s -- from your Page, your website, and search results -- will get tallied together and appear as a single total. Potential visitors will be more likely to see the recommendations your site has received, whether they’re looking at a search result, your website, or your Page, meaning your +1’s will reach not only the 40 million users of Google+, but all the people who come to Google every day. You can link your site to your Page either using the Google+ badge or with a  piece of code. To set this up, visit our Google+ badge configuration tool.

Bringing Google+ to the rest of Google

Our ultimate vision for Google+ is to transform the overall Google experience -- weaving identity and sharing into all of our products. Beginning today, we’re rolling out a new experimental feature to a small group of eligible publishers, Google+ Direct Connect -- an easy way for your audience to find your Google+ Page on Google search.  If you’ve linked your Page to your site and you qualify, when someone searches for your website’s name with the ‘+’ sign before it Direct Connect will send them directly to your Page. For example, try searching for ‘+YouTube’ on Google. Users will also be prompted to automatically add Pages they find through Direct Connect to their circles. 

Direct Connect suggestions start populating as you type on Google.com

Just the beginning
We want to help you get your site on Google+ as soon as possible, so we’re opening the field trial for Google+ Pages to everyone today. Creating a Google+ Page only takes a few minutes. To get started, you’ll need a personal Google+ profile. If you don’t have a Google account, it’s very quick and easy to join. And if you’re looking for inspiration, check out some of the sites that are already starting to set up their Pages:

To learn more about how Google+ works for your site, check out the Google+ Your Business site. We’re just getting started, and have many more features planned for the coming weeks and months. To keep up to date on the latest news and tips, add the Google+ Your Business page to your circles. If you have ideas on how we can improve Google+ for your site, we’d love to hear them.



Posted by Dennis Troper, Product Management Director, Google+ Pages

URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/blogspot/tuAm/~3/dkhh642YTas/grow-your-audience-with-google.html

[G] A new way to connect with Gmail and friends

Official Gmail Blog: A new way to connect with Gmail and friends

Posted by Sarah Price, Community Manager

Today, the Google+ team launched Pages, a new way for you to build relationships with the things you love. We’re looking forward to connecting with you on our new Gmail page on Google+.


When you add the Gmail page to your Google+ Circles, you'll see updates from our team, including launches, tips and tricks, and more. You'll be able to discuss those updates with other Gmail users in the comments on the posts. Mention +Gmail when you share your own tips -- if we see a really stellar tip, we might reshare it. We’re also planning to hold regular Hangouts, so you can shoot the breeze with Google community managers, engineers, product managers and designers.

In addition to Gmail news, we’ll feature some of your other favorite Google products, including Google Calendar, Google Voice, Google Chat and Google Tasks. Be sure to add the Gmail page to your Circles and let us know what you think.

URL: http://gmailblog.blogspot.com/2011/11/new-way-to-connect-with-gmail-and.html

[G] Welcoming you to +YouTube

YouTube Blog: Welcoming you to +YouTube

This morning the Google+ team launched Google+ Pages, making it easier for you to connect with things you care about like businesses, brands and products. To help you find more of what you’re into at YouTube, we’re kicking off +YouTube to share news and start conversations from all areas of YouTube. We’re bringing you the latest from news to music and live streamed events, as well as partners and everyday people doing amazing things with video.

Expect to discuss and experience the many ways you’re changing the world through video, and we hope you’ll join us by adding us to your circles. Tell us what you think is awesome, what you want featured and, like YouTube, you can help make this page your own.



You can read more about Google+ Pages and see other brands involved at the Official Google Blog here, and if you don’t have a Google+ account yet you can sign up here.



Danielle Paquette, Social Media Manager, recently watched “YouTube Challenge - I Told My Kids I Ate All Their Halloween Candy.”

URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/youtube/PKJx/~3/iHm3aiW-6wc/welcoming-you-to-youtube.html

[G] Google+ Pages: connect with all the things you care about

Official Google Blog: Google+ Pages: connect with all the things you care about

In life we connect with all kinds of people, places and things. There’s friends and family, of course, but there’s also the sports teams we root for, the coffee shops we’re loyal to, and the TV shows we can’t stop watching (to name a few).

So far Google+ has focused on connecting people with other people. But we want to make sure you can build relationships with all the things you care about—from local businesses to global brands—so today we’re rolling out Google+ Pages worldwide.



People + pages, better together
Google+ has always been a place for real-life sharing, and Google+ Pages is no exception. After all: behind every page (or storefront, or four-door sedan) is a passionate group of individuals, and we think you should able to connect with them too.

For you and me, this means we can now hang out live with the local bike shop, or discuss our wardrobe with a favorite clothing line, or follow a band on tour. Google+ pages give life to everything we find in the real world. And by adding them to circles, we can create lasting bonds with the pages (and people) that matter most.

For businesses and brands, Google+ pages help you connect with the customers and fans who love you. Not only can they recommend you with a +1, or add you to a circle to listen long-term. They can actually spend time with your team, face-to-face-to-face. All you need to do is start sharing, and you'll soon find the super fans and loyal customers that want to say hello.

A number of pages are already available (see below), but any organization will soon be able to join the community at plus.google.com/pages/create.

All American Rejects Anderson Cooper 360 Angry Birds Barcelona Football Club Burberry Dallas Cowboys Fox News Good Morning America H&M Macy's

Modelland The Muppets* Pepsi Phoenix Suns Save the Children Toyota Train WWE X Games Zen Bikes

* You can join Kermit and Ms. Piggy for a live Hangout on the Muppets’ Google+ page today at 4:30pm PT!

Direct Connect from Google search
People search on Google billions of times a day, and very often, they're looking for businesses and brands. Today's launch of Google+ Pages can help people transform their queries into meaningful connections, so we're rolling out two ways to add pages to circles from Google search. The first is by including Google+ pages in search results, and the second is a new feature called Direct Connect.

Maybe you're watching a movie trailer, or you just heard that your favorite band is coming to town. In both cases you want to connect with them right now, and Direct Connect makes it easy—even automatic. Just go to Google and search for [+], followed by the page you're interested in (like +Angry Birds). We'll take you to their Google+ page, and if you want, we’ll add them to your circles.

Direct Connect works for a limited number of pages today (like +Google, +Pepsi, and +Toyota), but many more are coming. In the meantime, organizations can learn more about Direct Connect in our Help Center.



With Google+, we strive to bring the nuance and richness of real-life sharing to software. Today’s initial launch of Google+ Pages brings us a little bit closer, but we’ve still got lots of improvements planned, and miles to go before we sleep. So stay tuned.

Posted by Vic Gundotra, Senior Vice President of Engineering

URL: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/11/google-pages-connect-with-all-things.html

[G] Powering a new job search engine for military veterans

Official Google Blog: Powering a new job search engine for military veterans

(Cross-posted on the Inside Search blog and the Public Policy blog)

Earlier today, President Obama spoke about the importance of helping returning military veterans find work. Thousands of businesses have committed to hiring military veterans and families and as part of this nationwide effort, starting today, job seekers can visit the National Resource Directory (NRD) to search more than 500,000 job openings from employers around the country.

We have been working with the U.S. Department of Veterans Affairs to provide a customized job search engine for the NRD, using Google Custom Search technology. This custom search engine uses the power and scale of Google search to constantly crawl the web, looking for JobPosting markup from Schema.org on sites like simplyhired.com to identify veteran-committed job openings. An employer can easily add a job posting to NRD simply by adding that markup to their own web page. As pages are updated or removed from the web, they’re automatically updated and removed from the system, keeping the available job postings on NRD fresh and up to date.

If you’re an employer, you can find more information on how to participate on nationalresourcedirectory.gov. In addition, organizations such as local veterans' groups can help people find jobs by adding a veteran-committed jobs search box to their websites.

We’re happy to contribute to this important initiative and hope businesses use this opportunity to connect with veterans seeking employment.

Posted by Christina Chen, Product Manager, Custom Search Team

URL: http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2011/11/powering-new-job-search-engine-for.html

[G] A visit from Pulitzer Prize-winner Jennifer Egan

Inside Google Books: A visit from Pulitzer Prize-winner Jennifer Egan

Greg Sanders, Technical Writer, DoubleClick and display products

We were pleased to host Pulitzer Prize-winner Jennifer Egan, author of A Visit from the Goon Squad, for an Authors@Google event in our New York office this August. I had the pleasure of moderating the talk with Egan in front of a group of Googlers.

Although the cast of characters spanning Goon Squad is vast and raucous, Egan is most interested in the sometimes self-destructive, sometimes tender-hearted protagonists, a music producer and former punk-rocker, Bennie Salazar, and his klepto assistant, Sasha.

The book has received much press focused on the nonlinear nature of its narrative. Rather than flowing predictably from past to present to future, the chapters are ordered either to trace the threads of the characters' lives – to lend credence and nuance to their current state of mind – and sometimes as needed to maintain the plot’s tension. For example, we're led back in time to the formative days of West Coast punk, then thrust a decade or two into the future of lower Manhattan, all with interesting effect, especially as regards Egan's take on technology. Yet I found other aspects of her novel even more intriguing.

First, as a fiction writer myself, I was impressed with the control and narrative prowess Egan exhibits in Goon Squad, including the numerous voices and styles she employs to tell her story. I was particularly interested in one "future" chapter, told by the sister of an Aspergian child, called "Great Rock 'n' Roll Pauses," that presents its narrative in the form of a series of graphs and charts. (Makes us wonder how data narratives will fit with straight-up storytelling in the future.) In addition, she clearly grants her imagination broad license. I wanted to understand how she manages her creative process, and wondered if she had a model that was generalizable for writers and engineers (remember, this is Google) alike.

To prepare for the role as moderator, I made a mental map of the narrative arcs that intersect across the chapters; I read the book a second time and took notes on character names, places, plot points, settings, etc. I then began generating potential points of discussion. When I felt I had a critical mass of questions, I typed them up on index cards (see a sampling) using a manual typewriter. Egan, I discovered in my research, writes all of her early drafts in longhand. This would prompt at least one question I'd ask her: does the mode we write in influence the content we write?

The discussion with Egan was fast-paced and improvisational. She clearly enjoys expanding on the themes of her work – technology, music, the perception of time, the nature of memory – and is refreshingly open about the process she goes through while writing a book like Goon Squad. Take a look for yourself.

Egan speaks at Authors@Google in our New York office

Egan's A Visit from the Goon Squad is available as a Google eBookstore, as well as other novels by her (available in certain countries):

• The Keep
• The Invisible Circus
• Look at Me

URL: http://booksearch.blogspot.com/2011/11/visit-from-pulitzer-prize-winner.html

[G] The Horns are hooked: UT Austin has gone Google

Official Google Enterprise Blog: The Horns are hooked: UT Austin has gone Google

Posted by Rich Rao, Director, Global Sales and Operations, Google Enterprise

Apparently it’s not enough for The University of Texas at Austin to give its alumni degrees anymore; now, the University’s 450,000 graduates (and 50,000+ current students) are also getting free email addresses for life. As a Longhorn alum and member of the Texas Exes, I’m thrilled to have the privilege of announcing that my alma mater is now offering Google Apps for Education.



Driven by the desire for better communication and collaboration capabilities, the student body petitioned for an upgraded email system. The university used the state-mandated procurement process to make its selection as it assembled a task force consisting of representatives from across campus to evaluate possible vendor solutions. After thorough review by two subcommittees, we’re proud that Google emerged as the top choice.

The University of Texas at Austin joins more than 15 million other students, faculty and staff who are part of the Google Apps for Education family. We’re thrilled to work with the Longhorns to make their launch a big success.

And I personally can’t wait to start using my alumni account.

URL: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2011/11/horns-are-hooked-ut-austin-has-gone.html

[G] YouTube Town Hall: Congress Answers Your Questions

YouTube Blog: YouTube Town Hall: Congress Answers Your Questions

Over the past month people around the world watched members of Congress answer YouTube Town Hall questions about trade with China, the path to a balanced budget, and U.S. manufacturing. October’s five highest voted videos include a diverse array of answers from Senators and Representatives on both sides of the aisle:



With campaign season heating up, political energy is in the air and this month proved to be amongst the busiest yet on the YouTube Town Hall - you all asked Conress over 1,000 questions in October, twice as many as in any other month. Today we’re launching a new round of Congressional videos answering two of this month’s top-voted questions:

1. GOVERNANCE: Why has partisan bickering taken hold in Congress? Compromise is necessary for the benefit of the American people. Do you have to always vote along party lines? Can we learn to compromise again?
2. ECONOMY: What do you think about the Wall Street protests?

Visit the YouTube Town Hall now to watch members of Congress answer these questions and then vote on the answers you most agree with!

Will Houghteling, YouTube News and Politics, recently watched “Ed Lee is...2 Legit 2 Quit.”

URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/youtube/PKJx/~3/gRqS7A6XW5I/youtube-town-hall-congress-answers-your.html

[G] Advancing the free flow of information

Google Public Policy Blog: Advancing the free flow of information

Posted by Winter Casey, Senior Policy Analyst, Google

The global economy relies on the free flow of information more than ever before. Companies large and small can use the Internet to reach new markets, which contributes to economic growth, job creation, and increased trade around the world.

But as companies and individuals are transmitting more information online, some governments are seeking to impose limits on the free flow of information. More than 40 governments now block or restrict information and data available on the Internet.

Last year, we released a white paper demonstrating that governments which block the free flow of information on the Internet are also blocking trade and economic growth. For example, when companies can’t confidentially and confidently transmit the files and information that are necessary to keep their business running, their ability to export goods and services is hurt. The thesis is simple: when countries support the free flow of information, they will see more economic growth.

That’s why we joined companies like Citi, Microsoft, IBM, GE and others to endorse a new set of principles endorsing the free flow of information across borders. The principles, written under the leadership of the National Foreign Trade Council, outline several priorities for the U.S. business community which will promote transparent, fair, and secure cross-border data flows.

Individuals and businesses will benefit from a more consistent and transparent framework for the treatment of cross-border flows of goods, services and information. We look forward to continued work with governments and industry to advance the free flow of information online.

URL: http://googlepublicpolicy.blogspot.com/2011/11/advancing-free-flow-of-information.html

[G] This week's Trends: billions, spots, jelly beans

YouTube Blog: This week's Trends: billions, spots, jelly beans

Each weekday, we at YouTube Trends take a look at the most interesting videos and cultural phenomena on YouTube as they develop. We want take a moment to highlight some of what we've come across this week:

• We noted that Justin Bieber's single "Mistletoe" helped push the star over 2 billion views.
  
  
  
  
• We saw more intense confrontations at "Occupy" protests.
  
  
  
  
• We collected 10 of the most-viewed performances of "Thriller" on Halloween.
  
  
  
  
• We tracked the most popular song parody in Wisconsin.
  
  
  
  
• We asked Yukigassen the New Botaoshi?
  
  
  
  
• We viewed spreading "lockout" spots from Nike.
  
  
  
  
• We highlighted the search bump around the new GTA.
  
  
  
  


• And this was certainly the most elaborately crafted music video to captured our attention this week:

Check back every day for the latest about what's trending on YouTube at: www.YouTube.com/Trends



Kevin Allocca, YouTube Trends Manager, recently watched "Jian Sword Dancing."

URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/youtube/PKJx/~3/y7O5NGjzqRI/this-weeks-trends-billions-spots-jelly.html

[G] Missed the Think Mobile webinar on Nov. 2nd? The recording is

Official Google CPG Blog: Missed the Think Mobile webinar on Nov. 2nd? The recording is

Missed the Think Mobile webinar on Nov. 2nd? The recording is now available on the Google Business Channel on YouTube:

In this video, Avinash Kaushik (http://www.kaushik.net/avinash) shares some best practices mobile marketing strategies, and points out some strategies that you should beware of. He also shares a framework for bringing fast, innovative measurement to your mobile data (including a special downloadable report).

URL: http://google-cpg.blogspot.com/2011/11/missed-think-mobile-webinar-on-nov.html

[G] Simian Update Released

Google Open Source Blog: Simian Update Released

Simian, the enterprise-class Mac OS X package management solution, released an updated version this week at MacTech. Originally open sourced at Macworld in January by Google, the latest version adds some significant new features. The new version of Simian is available through Google Code with source also available here.

Since the initial release a little over 10 months ago, we've added:

• Apple software update catalog management
• Apple software update iCal feed/integration
• Dynamic targeting of clients
• Dynamic Manifest Mod API: no more manual tech personnel fulfillment
• Better troubleshooting of broken clients
• Many reporting enhancements

For more details, please join the discussion list. The Simian team will also be hosting Google Hangout office hours on a regular basis; for details please check the Simian Google Code page.

By Jeff Bates, Open Source IT Program Manager with John Randolph and Justin McWilliams, Google Corporate Platforms Engineering Team

URL: http://feedproxy.google.com/~r/GoogleOpenSourceBlog/~3/t6jRFRMV3_A/simian-update-released.html

[G] US Holocaust Memorial Museum completes transition to Google Apps in 90 days

Official Google Enterprise Blog: US Holocaust Memorial Museum completes transition to Google Apps in 90 days

Posted by Joe Kraus, U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum

Editors note: Today’s guest blogger is Joe Kraus, the Chief Information Officer of the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum, which opened in 1993 as a result of legislation unanimously passed by the U.S. Congress. The Museum’s employees went live with Google Apps for Government this Tuesday.

A living memorial to the Holocaust, the United States Holocaust Memorial Museum inspires citizens and leaders worldwide to confront hatred, prevent genocide and promote human dignity. Federal support guarantees the Museum’s permanent place on the National Mall, and its far-reaching educational programs and global impact are made possible by the generosity of donors nationwide.

To fulfill this mission, the Museum employs technologies that promote online collaboration for its teaching programs and uses crowdsourcing to expand and make more accessible its collections relating to Holocaust survivors and victims. Our migration to Google Apps will enable closer collaboration with teachers, universities and institutions that are engaged in teaching the lessons of the Holocaust, preventing genocide and conducting research on Holocaust history.

This week, the Museum launched Google Apps for Government for our 500 staff and support personnel. We chose Google Apps because of its ease of use and extensive collaboration and sharing capabilities. Our educators in Holocaust programs will use Google Docs to support online development of lesson plans. Our researchers and scholars will use Google Apps to develop their material on Holocaust history and the lessons learned. The general public, youth groups and teachers will be able to easily register for our many programs using Google Forms. Our staff will use Google Sites to collaborate on the multitude of cross- departmental programs and projects that we run each year to advance Holocaust understanding.

Our transition to Google went very well. We conducted a three-month pilot with staff from across the Museum followed by a three-month transition period. Our final switchover was done overnight on October 31. The transition required a rigorous communications and training program, with about 70% of our staff participating in classroom and webinar training led by our project integrator, Onix Networking. One of the key aspects that enabled our smooth transition was the identification of “Google Guides,” people from across the Museum who volunteered to help their colleagues with the new Google Apps environment. Now that we are in the cloud we will be able to take full advantage of a dynamic ecosystem of new functionality that continues to provide our employees new and innovative ways of doing the important work of the Museum with very little additional support required from my IT team.


The Museum's Google Guides mark Tuesday’s switchover.

URL: http://googleenterprise.blogspot.com/2011/11/us-holocaust-memorial-museum-completes.html