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More transparency in customized search results

As we continue to refine our search algorithms to deliver more relevant results, we strive to be as open as possible about <a title="how we use data" href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/03/why-data-matters.html" id="or8w">how we use data</a> to improve your search experience. Today, we're rolling out a new feature in Google Web Search that will help you better understand how your search results are already customized. Over the next few days, you may start to see messages like this in the upper right corner of your search results page (click on the image to view larger): <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdMjNZ9K4NSNzqO9ZjGbSwxFE-8eIuXuAeCgKYe32Sp__RZVYiaHHu2OCjdlD4brQoIlB1Wqu1RspSdkYE7CsXS0PCWXXU-STRuU0jAoWtr6-rp3ZXkJwm1htvb6uhvO_1EsVvuxEXSk5p/s1600-h/customized_search.gif"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5228622444598153922" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjdMjNZ9K4NSNzqO9ZjGbSwxFE-8eIuXuAeCgKYe32Sp__RZVYiaHHu2OCjdlD4brQoIlB1Wqu1RspSdkYE7CsXS0PCWXXU-STRuU0jAoWtr6-rp3ZXkJwm1htvb6uhvO_1EsVvuxEXSk5p/s320/customized_search.gif" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" /></a>You can click the "More details" link to get to a page like this: <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsI0dksqIOcf9HKwoIbsJ4YN-sL0CHzTUBqjsmVN5VtlChJ41vsweq1-SLNg9eBSho3MnDkmqAPC6OkHTuQ48oyVMD1dLxmAFH4T0iThG8nWLrG_TYX8WqjBaz8zXggbJwtCQTsX_c-V7R/s1600-h/customized_search2.gif"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5228622966539146498" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsI0dksqIOcf9HKwoIbsJ4YN-sL0CHzTUBqjsmVN5VtlChJ41vsweq1-SLNg9eBSho3MnDkmqAPC6OkHTuQ48oyVMD1dLxmAFH4T0iThG8nWLrG_TYX8WqjBaz8zXggbJwtCQTsX_c-V7R/s320/customized_search2.gif" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" /></a>You'll see these new messages whenever your search results have been customized based on one or more of the following types of information: <ul><li>Location. By default, we identify your approximate city location based on your computer's <a href="https://www.google.com/adsense/support/bin/answer.py?hl=en&answer=32741" id="mkih" title="IP address">IP address</a> and use it to customize your search results. If you'd like Google to use a different location, you can sign into or create a Google Account and provide a city or street address. Your specific location will be used not only for customizing search results, but also to improve your experience in Google Maps and other Google products.</li></ul><ul><li>Recent searches. We take into account whether a particular query followed on the heels of another query. Because recent search activity provides such valuable context for understanding the meaning behind your searches, we use it to customize your results whenever possible, regardless of whether you're signed in or signed out. In order to customize your results and show you the customization details, we keep the most recent query on your browser for a limited time. After that, the information is removed from your browser and disappears immediately if you close your browser.</li></ul><ul><li>Web History. If you're signed in and have <a href="http://www.google.com/psearch" id="ap::" title="Web History">Web History</a> enabled, we customize your search results based on what you've searched for in the past on Google, and what web sites you've visited. One important note about Web History: it belongs to you and you have complete control over it. You can remove specific items or pause the service at any time. And if there's a particular search that you'd rather not have personalized based on your Web History, you can also just temporarily sign out of your Google Account.</li></ul>This new feature doesn't change anything at all about how you search on Google and the results you get; it just gives you more of a behind-the-scenes look at how we customize your search experience. We consider this to be an important step in our <a href="http://www.google.com/privacy" id="jyq_" title="commitment to transparency">commitment to transparency</a>, and we hope you find it informative and useful. Posted by Rachel Garb, Product Manager

More transparency in customized search results

As we continue to refine our search algorithms to deliver more relevant results, we strive to be as open as possible about how we use data ...

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Goodbye to Randy Pausch, a great teacher

Goodbye to Randy Pausch, a great teacher

Randy Pausch , a professor of computer science at Carnegie Mellon University and a good friend of Google, passed away last night. In additio...

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Ragogmakan (Google) goes to the Amazon

Last month, a group of Googlers traveled to Brazil, to conduct our first-ever project in the Amazon. Organized by our <a href="http://earth.google.com/outreach" id="nciy" title="Google Earth Outreach">Google Earth Outreach</a> team, we went at the special invitation of Amazon Chief Almir Naramayoga Surui, who'd invited us down to train his people on using Google Earth, YouTube, blogs and other Internet tools in order to preserve their history and culture, protect their rainforest, and create a sustainable future for their tribe. This was an unusual request, especially because until recently, the Surui Indians used stone tools and hunted and fished with bows and arrows. But as we considered this request, we realized that it was very much within the mission of Google Earth Outreach, which helps people around the world learn how to use Google Earth and Maps for public benefit. We had previously collaborated with the U.S. Holocaust Memorial Museum to <a href="http://www.ushmm.org/maps/" id="b5on" title="map destroyed villages in Darfur">map destroyed villages in Darfur</a>, with UNHCR to show <a href="http://www.unhcr.org/googleearth" id="sb8y" title=""A Refugee's Life"">"A Refugee's Life"</a>, with Appalachian Voices to illustrate <a href="http://earth.google.com/outreach/cs_app_voices.html" id="lrb5" title="mountaintop removal coal-mining">mountaintop removal coal-mining</a>, and with the Jane Goodall Institute to <a href="http://www.janegoodall.org/gombe-chimp-blog/" id="z2fl" title="follow chimpanzees in Tanzania">follow chimpanzees in Tanzania</a>. Maybe, we thought, it was time to go to the Amazon. <div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZ6pUxzSmG_izVQqkwKE8jyPb6TKYgp3Pf5K81oeO3GMRUZLuvswWXvfBLmvqbqb2w6VGoru7tI8StcoiRWf6_M1P57N6kW5GZ0_FN9NQHM-HI2_XgLskMqH45PVjoetirq1Z6g2Gsmthj/s1600-h/Amazon_logo.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5227103334091900498" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEjZ6pUxzSmG_izVQqkwKE8jyPb6TKYgp3Pf5K81oeO3GMRUZLuvswWXvfBLmvqbqb2w6VGoru7tI8StcoiRWf6_M1P57N6kW5GZ0_FN9NQHM-HI2_XgLskMqH45PVjoetirq1Z6g2Gsmthj/s320/Amazon_logo.JPG" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer; width: 199px; height: 165px;" /></a>"New Technologies and Indigenous Peoples" - the logo created by the Surui for our partnership </div> We learned from Chief Almir that just as the Amazon rainforest is disappearing at an alarming rate, so too are the indigenous peoples who live there. This loss of biological and cultural diversity, of natural resources, habitats and human beings, has profound consequences both locally and globally. Al Gore has called the Amazon rainforest "the lungs of the planet" for the vital role it plays in consuming carbon dioxide and producing oxygen for all of us to breathe. Chief Almir explained that his tribe had already begun replanting thousands of hectares of their forest which had been illegally logged by outsiders. He hopes that through this project, they will be able to participate in the emerging carbon offset marketplace. And he wants to use Google Earth, YouTube and blogs to give the world a virtual tour of these projects, to raise awareness, and educate other tribes in how to do the same thing. So we spent several months preparing special training materials. We partnered closely with the Amazon Conservation Team, who'd previously taught the Surui how to GPS-locate their significant sites that the Surui now wanted to map in full 3D, in Google Earth. Along the way, we found that many people asked us these questions: "So why is Google going to the Amazon?" "Why are you trying to train Indians?" "Won't technology harm their culture?" "Are Amazon Indians even capable of learning to use the Internet?" Without giving away too much of the story, the answer to the last question is YES. During the trainings, we were moved to see how committed the young Surui students were to learning everything they possibly could. Their first two web searches were "Povos Indigenas do Brasil" (Indigenous peoples of Brazil) and "Desmatamento Amazonia" (Deforestation of the Amazon). They succeeded in importing their cultural map into Google Earth (see image), as the starting point for their virtual tour. They showed their warrior spirit in their very first <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=798rRF48oFY&feature=related" id="i9:3" title="YouTube video">YouTube video</a>. They began building a Google Site. All of these are now works in progress, and when they are ready to release to the world, we expect that they will be unlike anything anyone has seen before. The Surui call Google "ragogmakan", or "messenger", because they are using our tools to get their message out. Although we traveled to the Amazon rain forest expecting to be the teachers, there are lessons for all of us in the story of the Surui. As they engage with the modern world, they are making choices about what to adopt, adapt or reject. If we pay attention, we may have as much to learn from them as they from us. Read more on the <a href="http://google-latlong.blogspot.com/2008/07/memories-of-amazon.html">Lat Long blog</a>, and experience the story of our trip on the <a href="http://earth.google.com/outreach/amazon1.html">Google Earth Outreach site</a>. <div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsDglt7o_IusAkEEOjov6MSUt76PKTqyJpfUDfz7nLpUqwmxlg6YqSYuq84oJ3W7sSZ-NvV455HvzYOWC7TUe2LVjjuQ7rucsFZIxAIocY82AvwCXS44reZ5SqtbAeXX23hp8oWPB0wOqH/s1600-h/surui_sites_oblique_for_ogb.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5227103070684732338" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEhsDglt7o_IusAkEEOjov6MSUt76PKTqyJpfUDfz7nLpUqwmxlg6YqSYuq84oJ3W7sSZ-NvV455HvzYOWC7TUe2LVjjuQ7rucsFZIxAIocY82AvwCXS44reZ5SqtbAeXX23hp8oWPB0wOqH/s320/surui_sites_oblique_for_ogb.JPG" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" /></a>Surui cultural map </div> Posted by Rebecca Moore, Manager, Google Earth Outreach

Ragogmakan (Google) goes to the Amazon

Last month, a group of Googlers traveled to Brazil, to conduct our first-ever project in the Amazon. Organized by our Google Earth Outreach ...

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We knew the web was big...

We've known it for a long time: the web is big. The first Google index in 1998 already had 26 million pages, and by 2000 the Google index reached the one billion mark. Over the last eight years, we've seen a lot of big numbers about how much content is really out there. Recently, even our search engineers stopped in awe about just how big the web is these days -- when our systems that process links on the web to find new content hit a milestone: 1 trillion (as in 1,000,000,000,000) unique URLs on the web at once! How do we find all those pages? We start at a set of well-connected initial pages and follow each of their links to new pages. Then we follow the links on those new pages to even more pages and so on, until we have a huge list of links. In fact, we found even more than 1 trillion individual links, but not all of them lead to unique web pages. Many pages have multiple URLs with exactly the same content or URLs that are auto-generated copies of each other. Even after removing those exact duplicates, we saw a trillion unique URLs, and the number of individual web pages out there is growing by several billion pages per day. So how many unique pages does the web really contain? We don't know; we don't have time to look at them all! :-) Strictly speaking, the number of pages out there is infinite -- for example, web calendars may have a "next day" link, and we could follow that link forever, each time finding a "new" page. We're not doing that, obviously, since there would be little benefit to you. But this example shows that the size of the web really depends on your definition of what's a useful page, and there is no exact answer. We don't index every one of those trillion pages -- many of them are similar to each other, or represent auto-generated content similar to the calendar example that isn't very useful to searchers. But we're proud to have the most comprehensive index of any search engine, and our goal always has been to index all the world's data. To keep up with this volume of information, our systems have come a long way since the first set of web data Google processed to answer queries. Back then, we did everything in batches: one workstation could compute the PageRank graph on 26 million pages in a couple of hours, and that set of pages would be used as Google's index for a fixed period of time. Today, Google downloads the web continuously, collecting updated page information and re-processing the entire web-link graph several times per day. This graph of one trillion URLs is similar to a map made up of one trillion intersections. So multiple times every day, we do the computational equivalent of fully exploring every intersection of every road in the United States. Except it'd be a map about 50,000 times as big as the U.S., with 50,000 times as many roads and intersections. As you can see, our distributed infrastructure allows applications to efficiently traverse a link graph with many trillions of connections, or quickly sort petabytes of data, just to prepare to answer the most important question: your next Google search. Posted by Jesse Alpert & Nissan Hajaj, Software Engineers, Web Search Infrastructure Team

We knew the web was big...

We've known it for a long time: the web is big. The first Google index in 1998 already had 26 million pages, and by 2000 the Google inde...

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Knol is open to everyone

A few months ago we <a id="hqad" title="announced" href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2007/12/encouraging-people-to-contribute.html">announced</a> that we were testing a new product called <a id="toc:" title="Knol" href="http://knol.google.com/">Knol</a>. Knols are authoritative articles about specific topics, written by people who know about those subjects. Today, we're making Knol available to everyone. The web contains vast amounts of information, but not everything worth knowing is on the web. An enormous amount of information resides in people's heads: millions of people know useful things and billions more could benefit from that knowledge. Knol will encourage these people to contribute their knowledge online and make it accessible to everyone. <div id="n_0y0"> The key principle behind Knol is authorship. Every knol will have an author (or group of authors) who put their name behind their content. It's their knol, their voice, their opinion. We expect that there will be multiple knols on the same subject, and we think that is good. With Knol, we are introducing a new method for authors to work together that we call "moderated collaboration." With this feature, any reader can make suggested edits to a knol which the author may then choose to accept, reject, or modify before these contributions become visible to the public. This allows authors to accept suggestions from everyone in the world while remaining in control of their content. After all, their name is associated with it! Knols include strong community tools which allow for many modes of interaction between readers and authors. People can submit comments, rate, or write a review of a knol. At the discretion of the author, a knol may include ads from our AdSense program. If an author chooses to include ads, Google will provide the author with a revenue share from the proceeds of those ad placements. We are happy to announce an agreement with the New Yorker magazine which allows any author to add one cartoon per knol from the New Yorker's extensive cartoon repository. Cartoons are an effective (and fun) way to make your point, even on the most serious topics. Everyone knows something. See what people are writing about, then tell the world what you know: <a id="hqad14" href="http://knol.google.com/">knol.google.com</a> Posted by Cedric Dupont, Product Manager and Michael McNally, Software Engineer</div>

Knol is open to everyone

A few months ago we announced that we were testing a new product called Knol . Knols are authoritative articles about specific topics, writ...

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Hitting 40 languages

One of our goals is to give everyone using Google the information they want, wherever they are, in whatever language they speak, and through whatever device they're using. A huge part of that goal is making our services available in as many languages as possible. And as I’m sure you can imagine, that isn't as easy as simply as translating a few lines of text. Take Hebrew or Arabic, which are written from right to left. An Arabic speaker may search for [world cup football 2008] [<a id="qr.220" href="http://www.google.com/search?source=ig&hl=en&rlz=1G1GGLQ_ENUK241&q=%D9%83%D8%A3%D8%B3+%D8%A7%D9%84%D8%B9%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%85+2008+%D9%84%D9%83%D8%B1%D8%A9+%D8%A7%D9%84%D9%82%D8%AF%D9%85&btnG=Google+Search" target="_blank" title="كأس العالم 2008 لكرة القدم">كأس العالم 2008 لكرة القدم</a>]. Part of the query will be <a id="qr.221" href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/02/searching-rght-to-left.html" target="_blank" title="written in one direction">written from right to left in Arabic</a>, while the numbers will be written left to right. Sometimes the right-to-left difference can mean having to change the entire layout of a page, as with Gmail. Or take Russian, where words change depending on their placement and role in a sentence. In Russian, for example [pizza in Moscow] is [<a href="http://www.google.ru/search?hl=ru&q=%D0%BF%D0%B8%D1%86%D1%86%D0%B0+%D0%B2+%D0%9C%D0%BE%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B2%D0%B5&btnG=%D0%9F%D0%BE%D0%B8%D1%81%D0%BA+%D0%B2+Google&lr=&aq=f">пицца в Москве</a>] but [pizza near Moscow] is [<a href="http://www.google.ru/search?hl=ru&q=%D0%BF%D0%B8%D1%86%D1%86%D0%B0+%D1%80%D1%8F%D0%B4%D0%BE%D0%BC+%D1%81+%D0%9C%D0%BE%D1%81%D0%BA%D0%B2%D0%BE%D0%B9&btnG=%D0%9F%D0%BE%D0%B8%D1%81%D0%BA+%D0%B2+Google&lr=&aq=f">пицца рядом с Москвой</a>]. Then there's the whole challenge of ensuring that results are locally relevant. While many Australians searching for [freedom] are looking for the Australian furniture chain, UK and US users are often looking for the definition of the word itself. Our search results, then, have to take into account these local differences. Our efforts to make Google products available in as many languages as possible dates to 2001, when we started <a title="Google in Your Language" href="https://www.google.com/accounts/ServiceLogin?service=transconsole&passive=true&nui=1&continue=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2Ftransconsole&followup=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.google.com%2Ftransconsole" id="b9s9">Google in Your Language</a>, which lets volunteers translate and edit translations of Google products in their native languages. As more and more users, advertisers, and partners interact with Google across the world, the need for local products has become even more obvious. In 2007, we undertook a company-wide initiative to increase the availability of our products in multiple languages. We picked the 40 languages read by over 98% of Internet users and got going, relying heavily on open source libraries such as <a href="http://icu-project.org/">ICU</a> and other internationalization technologies to design products. Do you need <a href="http://www.google.cn/">web search in Chinese</a> or <a href="https://adwords.google.es/support/">AdWords online support in Spanish</a>? Perhaps <a href="http://news.google.com/news?ned=hi_in">Google News in Hindi</a> or <a href="http://scholar.google.co.kr">Google Scholar in Korean</a>? Not a problem. Here's a taste of how far we've come. <div style="text-align: center;"><a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5nY5fZebF9lHdT6FGpG1Z2_vvoMAtKGf5od_8AcvlfbND03LoPuAOb2VEyMhWRVVv-AntRwYRHno4HszVvYQvnv3-0E6ttX8eiTccQSXO37q76d7n_QbWJ7HQxTmjsvuCbF2IaZjWKvyb/s1600-h/40+lang+graph-3.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5224353121513643106" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEg5nY5fZebF9lHdT6FGpG1Z2_vvoMAtKGf5od_8AcvlfbND03LoPuAOb2VEyMhWRVVv-AntRwYRHno4HszVvYQvnv3-0E6ttX8eiTccQSXO37q76d7n_QbWJ7HQxTmjsvuCbF2IaZjWKvyb/s320/40+lang+graph-3.JPG" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" /></a> Growth in local language versions. </div><ul><li>30 in 30: Today we have more than 30 products in more than 30 languages, up from 5 products in 30 languages just a year ago.</li><li>In 2004, we had 150 local-language versions of various products (e.g. a product local to the UK, not just the English-speaking world); today we're at more than 1500.</li><li>From January to March of 2008, we launched 256 local-language versions of various products, compared to 55 in the same period of 2007. </li><li>We've upgraded to <a id="y.4217" href="http://googleblog.blogspot.com/2008/05/moving-to-unicode-51.html" target="_blank" title="Unicode">Unicode 5.1</a> to make sure that we can handle any characters people read or write in.</li></ul>The web is only useful - or utile, 便利, pożyteczny, or nyttig, depending on what language you speak - to the degree it can be accessible in your language. That's why we're so excited about how far we've come - and why we know there's still a lot of work to be done. Posted by Mario Queiroz, Vice President, Product Management, Europe, Middle East, Africa, Latin America

Hitting 40 languages

One of our goals is to give everyone using Google the information they want, wherever they are, in whatever language they speak, and through...

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Celebrating young computer scientists

Last week, the ten grand prize winners for the first <a href="http://code.google.com/opensource/ghop/" target="_blank">Google Highly Open Participation Contest</a>, our initiative to get pre-university students involved in open source development. We were very excited to welcome these burgeoning computer scientists and their families to Silicon Valley in a celebration of their many accomplishments. <a onblur="try {parent.deselectBloggerImageGracefully();} catch(e) {}" href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgneKRnVMQBvLbX3OqE2vhd3yyIJJjbz1DNsimYim2nqokU8Dbtr__m17NDGM1L4WMdvyxs_-uWL5eY_urBGLvKcczouh3pix2C4pTSoi5KvfRMw3rwKlVZcqKK9LfevrSk76rZyozHwQ1I/s1600-h/GHOP_group.JPG"><img alt="" border="0" id="BLOGGER_PHOTO_ID_5223745625448254562" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgneKRnVMQBvLbX3OqE2vhd3yyIJJjbz1DNsimYim2nqokU8Dbtr__m17NDGM1L4WMdvyxs_-uWL5eY_urBGLvKcczouh3pix2C4pTSoi5KvfRMw3rwKlVZcqKK9LfevrSk76rZyozHwQ1I/s320/GHOP_group.JPG" style="margin: 0px auto 10px; display: block; text-align: center; cursor: pointer;" /></a> <div style="text-align: center;">Our grand prize winners and the Open Source team</div> Chosen from more than 350 students worldwide, our winners created software, documentation and marketing materials for ten different open source projects, getting all this work accomplished in just over two months. For more details, including interviews with the winners and their mentors, check out the <a href="http://google-opensource.blogspot.com/2008/07/grand-prize-winners-visit-googleplex.html">Google Open Source Blog</a>. Posted by Leslie Hawthorn, Program Manager - Open Source

Celebrating young computer scientists

Last week, the ten grand prize winners for the first Google Highly Open Participation Contest , our initiative to get pre-university student...

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