Google India Blog

Matt Cutts HangsOut with India Webmasters

2012-01-25T12:32:00.001+05:30

Hello Webmasters!

Matt Cutts is in town this week spending time with a group of Googlers involved in webmaster outreach. Matt would like to interact more with the local webmaster community, so we’re going to try a Google+ Hangout later today. Matt is a Distinguished Software Engineer heading the Google Webspam Team, and is known for talking to webmasters about how to make Google-friendly sites. To learn more about Matt, visit his blog.

If you’d like to watch the Hangout, head to Matt’s Google+ profile at 2 p.m. IST today. You can ask Matt questions in the Google+ post for the hangout, or tweet @mattcutts with the hashtag #askmatt.

See you there!

Google Search Quality Team

Sixty YouTube Space Lab Finalists Announced: Vote Now For Your Favorites

2012-01-20T15:33:00.000+05:30

[Cross Posted from the Youtube Bog]

A few months ago we set 14-18 year olds the bold challenge to design a science experiment that could be performed by NASA aboard the International Space Station, something that has traditionally been the preserve of qualified astronauts and scientists. Coming up with a suitable idea required huge imagination, passion and scientific curiosity, which is why we were thrilled with your response—we received a total of 2,000 video submissions from students in more than 80 countries!

Expert scientists helped us check and rank all of the entries, and today we are very proud to announce the sixty finalists. All of their submissions can now be viewed on the YouTube.com/SpaceLab Channel, and from January 17–24, you can vote for the ones you want to win. We need your help selecting the six regional winners, and ultimately the two global winners that will have their experiments performed 250 miles above Earth and live streamed on YouTube. Start voting today.

Remember, the channel is also a launchpad to some of the best space and science videos on YouTube. We’ve already received more than 39 million combined video views worldwide and we’re adding new videos and playlists regularly, like this new playlist about the mysteries of the Red Planet. Subscribe to the channel to keep up to date with all the latest content.

Didn’t make it to the final round? Check out the newly launched Google Science Fair 2012 for another chance to enter an amazing global science competition.

Posted by Zahaan Bharmal, YouTube Space Lab lead , who recently watched “Living in Space: 225,000 Miles Above Earth.”

Search, plus Your World

2012-01-11T14:30:00.001+05:30

[Cross-posted from The Official Google Blog]

Google Search has always been about finding the best results for you. Sometimes that means results from the public web, but sometimes it means your personal content or things shared with you by people you care about. These wonderful people and this rich personal content is currently missing from your search experience. Search is still limited to a universe of webpages created publicly, mostly by people you’ve never met. Today, we’re changing that by bringing your world, rich with people and information, into search.

Search is pretty amazing at finding that one needle in a haystack of billions of webpages, images, videos, news and much more. But clearly, that isn’t enough. You should also be able to find your own stuff on the web, the people you know and things they’ve shared with you, as well as the people you don’t know but might want to... all from one search box.

We’re transforming Google into a search engine that understands not only content, but also people and relationships. We began this transformation with Social Search, and today we’re taking another big step in this direction by introducing three new features:

Personal Results, which enable you to find information just for you, such as Google+ photos and posts—both your own and those shared specifically with you, that only you will be able to see on your results page;
Profiles in Search, both in autocomplete and results, which enable you to immediately find people you’re close to or might be interested in following; and,
People and Pages, which help you find people profiles and Google+ pages related to a specific topic or area of interest, and enable you to follow them with just a few clicks. Because behind most every query is a community.

Together, these features combine to create Search plus Your World. Search is simply better with your world in it, and we’re just getting started.

Personal Results
Say you’re looking for a vacation destination. You can of course search the web, but what if you want to learn from the experiences your friends have had on their vacations? Just as in real life, your friends’ experiences are often so much more meaningful to you than impersonal content on the web. With your world in search, you can find:

Google+ posts. You can find relevant Google+ posts from friends talking about an amazing trip they just took, whether they’ve shared privately with you or publicly. You’ll find links shared by your friends, such as activities, restaurants and other things they enjoyed on their trip.
Photos. You can find beautiful vacation photos from your friends right in your search results page. You can also find your own private photos from Google+ and Picasa, based on captions, comments and album title.

Personal Results: a family story
As a child, my favorite fruit was Chikoo, which is exceptionally sweet and tasty. A few years back when getting a family dog, we decided to name our sweet little puppy after my favorite fruit. Over the years we have privately shared many pictures of Chikoo (our dog) with our family. To me, the query [chikoo] means two very sweet and different things, and today’s improvements give me the magical experience of finding both the Chikoos I love, right in the results page.

This is search that truly knows me, and gives me a result page that only I can see. And while I get a nice mix of personal results with results from the web, I can also click the link at the top of the results page (red arrow) for the option to search only within my world.

Profiles in Search
Every day, there are hundreds of millions of searches for people. Sometimes, it’s hard to find the person you’re looking for. Once you do find him or her, there’s no quick way for you to actually interact. Starting today, you’ll have meaningful ways to connect with people instantly, right from the search results.

Now, typing just the first few letters of your friend’s name brings up a personalized profile prediction in autocomplete. Selecting a predicted profile takes you to a results page for your friend, which includes information from their Google+ profile and relevant web results that may be related to them. And you can have this personal experience instantaneously, thanks to Google Instant. So when I search for [ben smith], I now find my dear friend Ben every time, instead of the hundreds of other Ben Smiths out there (no offense to all of them!).

In addition, you’ll find profile autocomplete predictions for various prominent people from Google+, such as high-quality authors from our authorship pilot program.

Once you select that profile, if you’re a signed-in Google+ user, you’ll also see a button to add them to your circles right on your search results page.

People and Pages
As I mentioned earlier, behind most queries are communities. Starting today, if you search for a topic like [music] or [baseball], you might see prominent people who frequently discuss this topic on Google+ appearing on the right-hand side of the results page. You can connect with them on Google+, strike up meaningful conversations and discover entire communities in a way that simply wasn’t possible before.

Unprecedented security, transparency and control
When it comes to security and privacy, we set a high bar for Search plus Your World. Since some of the information you’ll now find in search results, including Google+ posts and private photos, is already secured by SSL encryption on Google+, we have decided that the results page should also have the same level of security and privacy protection. That's part of why we were the first major search engine to turn on search via SSL by default for signed-in users last year. This means when you’re signed in to Google, your search results—including your private content—are protected by the same high standards of encryption as your messages in Gmail.

We also want to be transparent about how our features work and give you control over how to use them. With today’s changes, we provide interface elements and control settings like those you’ll find in Google+. For example, personal results are clearly marked as Public, Limited or Only you. Additionally, people in your results are clearly marked with the Google+ circle they are in, or as suggested connections.

We’re also introducing a prominent new toggle on the upper right of the results page where you can see what your search results look like without personal content. With a single click, you can see an unpersonalized view of search results.

That means no results from your friends, no private information and no personalization of results based on your Web History. This toggle button works for an individual search session, but you can also make this the default in your Search Settings. We provide separate control in Search Settings over other contextual signals we use, including location and language.

That's unprecedented transparency and control over personal search results.

A beautiful journey begins
Search plus Your World will become available over the next few days to people who are signed in and searching on https://www.google.com in English.

While there may be 7 billion people and 197 million square miles on Earth, a septillion stars and a trillion webpages, we spend our short, precious lives living in a particular town, with particular friends and family, orbiting a single star and relying on a tiny slice of the world’s information. Our dream is to have technology enable everyone to experience the richness of all their information and people around them.

We named our company after the mathematical number googol as an aspiration toward indexing the countless answers on webpages, but that’s only part of the picture. The other part is people, and that’s what Search plus Your World is all about.

Posted by Amit Singhal, Google Fellow

What were we watching this year? Let’s rewind 2011.

2011-12-21T14:37:00.001+05:30

In India:

Bollywood ruled the charts with Shah Rukh Khan Don 2 Trailer being the most watched video
Jennifer Lopez - On The floor Ft Pitbull piped Salman Khan Dhinka Chika Song as the most watched music video of 2011
Kolaveri Di became the fastest rising music video of the year with over 25 million views within a month of its release

One hundred years into the future, when our great-grandkids look back to what was capturing the world’s imagination on YouTube in 2011, what will they make of us? Will they still be delighted by babbling babies? Will they still be “so excited” about the weekend? And will they be any closer to understanding the mystery of the space-traveling toaster pastry cat?

Check out YouTube.com/Rewind for a timeline of this year's most popular videos and events and to see what the world watched in 2011.

Today, we rewind through the videos and channels that absorbed our collective global attention this year. To compile these lists, we looked at global view counts of popular videos uploaded throughout this year, and, in some instances, we aggregated views across multiple versions of the same video. 2011 was a year of amazing new channels and new stars being discovered, awesome creativity, and of course, Rebecca Black. It was also a year of powerful news stories playing out on YouTube, as people witnessed and documented uprisings and natural disasters, touching personal moments and moments of protest.

In total, there were more than 1,000,000,000,000 (one trillion) playbacks on YouTube this year (yep, count ‘em, 12 zeroes). That’s about 140 views for every person on the earth. More than twice as many stars as in the Milky Way.

In India, YouTube users couldn’t get enough of the stars on the big screen, as bollywood ruled the charts on YouTube in India for the year 2011. From movie trailers, popular movie songs to nursery rhymes India enjoyed them all on YouTube.

In India, the top 10 most-watched YouTube videos of 2011 were:

And the top 10 most watched music videos from major music labels were:

The most-watched YouTube videos of 2011 reflect the people, places and events that captured our attention and imagination throughout the year.

Globally, the most-watched YouTube community videos were:

And globally, the most-watched music videos on YouTube were:

In India, some highlights from other categories include:

Kolaveri Di became the fastest rising music video of the year in India, garnering over 25 million views within a month of its release on YouTube
Haal E Dil - from ‘shraddharockin’ - topped the most watched user generated video of the year
Teri Meri - "Bodyguard (2011) - was the most watched bollywood music video of the year
Jennifer Lopez - On The Floor ft. Pitbull - was the most watched international music video of the year
KBC: 2011- Episode 40 -20th Oct 2011 - Full Episode - was the most watched popular TV show - video of the year

So to all of you who picked up a guitar and sang a love song, held your camera phone high above a rioting crowd, danced along to Friday, or just forgot the webcam was on, thank you. You make YouTube what it is, and we can’t wait to hear your stories next year.

Posted by Kevin Allocca, YouTube Trends Manager, recently watched “Miracle on 42nd Street.”

Bharat ki Khoj: Top Google Searches of 2011

2011-12-16T12:31:00.000+05:30

Why is it that we Indians search the web? Whether it is to find a job, follow the world of politics, Bollywood or cricket, stock updates or to send flowers to a friend, listen to music or just to hang out .... we come to Google with something on our mind.

As the year comes to an end, we look back at the searches in 2011 to compose the year’s Zeitgeist—the spirit of the time. With Zeitgeist, we look at the most popular and the fastest rising terms—the terms with the highest growth in 2011—in many categories across India to give you a glimpse into the hottest trends and topics. From searching for information on local politics, the Lokpal Bill and Aadhar cards, to following news on the Japan earthquake and Osama Bin Laden’s death, people turned to Google to learn more about what was happening in India and around the world.

In 2011, Bharat started coming online. It has been a coming-of-age year for the Indian internet, with young Indians following anti-corruption crusader Anna Hazare and making him the fastest rising people query of 2011. IBPS (Institute of Banking Personnel Selection) made a surprise appearance as one of the fastest rising searches, showing Indians’ interest in government jobs. Indian Railways continued to be a popular search term, with Indians getting online to book tickets and searching for train timings and other railway-related information.

On a lighter note, Poonam Pandey created a frenzy on the web with a promise she could not fulfill. Katrina Kaif continued her reign in Bollywood as the most searched celebrity in India for the fourth year in a row. 2011 also saw the Khans ruling the web with their movies Bodyguard and Ra One in the top two positions, while movies from contemporaries Aamir Khan (Delhi Belly) and Ajay Devgan (Singham) also made a mark in the top searched movies list.

In a country where cricket is a religion, it comes as no surprise to see the Indian net buzzing with excitement with the historic World Cup win, IPL and Sachin Tendulkar’s campaign for that elusive century of centuries.

While social networking sites featured on the ‘Top Searches’ list, we also saw a sudden spurt in the use of the free SMS website way2SMS, a new entry in this year’s list.

And my personal favorite is the only tech personality to make it to the top 10.. Steve Jobs, who was one of the pillars of computing and internet age and will be missed by India’s netizens.

Fastest rising searches	Fastest rising people	Top Searches
Facebook IBPS Google+ World Cup 2011 Bodyguard Ra.one Anna Hazare IPL 2011 Poonam Pandey Ready	Anna Hazare Poonam Pandey Steve Jobs Anushka Sharma Salman Khan Justin Bieber Kajal Agarwal Katrina Kaif Vijay Mallya Aishwarya Rai	Facebook YouTube Gmail Yahoomail Google Yahoo IRCTC Rediffmail Indian Railways way2sms

Top Searched People	Top Searched Movies	Top Searched events/news
Katrina Kaif Anna Hazare Salman Khan Poonam Pandey Justin Bieber Aishwarya Rai Sachin Tendulkar Kareena Kapoor Steve Jobs Priyanka Chopra	Bodyguard Ra One Harry Potter Delhi Belly Singham Ready Mankatha Transformers 3 Dookudu Zindagi Na Milegi Dobara	IPL World Cup 2011 CBSE result 2011 Diwali Lokpal bill Japan earthquake Aadhar card Osama Bin Laden Pakistan F1

Beginning today, you can head over to our Year-End Google Zeitgeist website (http://www.googlezeitgeist.com/#en/) to see the top global searches of 2011, and additional top searches in more than forty countries.

We created these lists and graphs using a combination of several tools that give insight into global, regional, past and present search trends on an aggregated level. Google Insights for Search, a publicly available tool that displays relative search volume across geographies, time periods and queries, informed many lists and graphs found on this year's Year-End Zeitgeist page.

With billions of searches conducted globally on Google each year, there are a plethora of search trends based on location, season and vertical, and our Year-End Zeitgeist cannot possibly capture them all. If you want to come up with your own lists or graphs, we encourage you to play around with our public Google Insights for Search tool to generate your own "Zeitgeist" lists for 2011.

Thanks to everyone out there for searching on Google -- and here's to more searching in 2012!

Posted by Lalitesh Katragadda, Country Head - India Products

Mapping made easier with the new Google Map Maker

2011-12-15T16:06:00.000+05:30

[Cross-posted from The Google LatLong Blog]

With 2012 approaching, we're getting a head start on our New Year's resolution to shed some excess weight and improve our overall appearance. You may have seen our ongoing efforts to improve the look, feel, and user experience across many other Google products to date. And with Google Map Maker available in the United States, Canada, and more than 180 other regions, it's time for another makeover. Today, we’re revealing a new version of Google Map Maker to help users map the places they know best and make their hometowns sparkle on Google Maps.

With Map Maker, you can easily help ensure that the changing world around you is accurately reflected on the map. Add your favorite gift shop, the nearest tree farm, or even the golf course where you once got that hole in one. It’s also easier to mark the best route to Grandma’s house and draw better buildings with courtyards and crisper corners. The options are endless when it comes to mapping the places you know and love. Once approved, your contributions will appear on Google Maps, Google Earth and Google Maps for mobile for all the world to see.

You don’t have to be an expert to start using Google Map Maker. High school student and Eagle Scout Tommy Bruce is a mapping superstar who finds mapping fun, fulfilling, and a simple way to help those in his community have the best, most comprehensive information possible. He started by mapping bike trails in his hometown of Mooresville, North Carolina and is now on an exchange program in Puebla, Mexico, mapping unmarked rivers that run through town! After witnessing Tommy’s accomplishments firsthand at the U.S. Geo User Summit, even his mother Margaret began thinking of places that she’s eager to put on the map. Why not make your New Year’s resolution to improve the map for millions of people? Start here.

Posted by Kaushik Sridharan, Software Engineer

Giving back in 2011

2011-12-14T14:23:00.000+05:30

Supporting great non-profit organisations doing work in India

As the holiday season approaches we thought it was a good moment to update you on
some grants we're making to support education, technology and the fight against modern
day slavery.
In India, eight of the selected grantee organisations will receive funding to aid them in the
valuable work they are doing across the country.

Fighting slavery and human trafficking

Modern day slavery is a multi-billion dollar industry that impacts the lives of around 27
million people. So we're funding a number of groups that are working to tackle the
problem. For instance, in India, International Justice Mission (IJM), along with The BBC
World Service Trust, Action Aid and Aide et Action, are forming a new coalition. These
organizations will work on the ground with governments to stop slave labor by identifying
the ring masters, documenting abuse, freeing individuals and providing them with therapy
as well as job training. Our support will also help expand the reach of tools like the
powerful Slavery Footprint calculator and Polaris Project’s National Trafficking Hotline.

STEM and girls’ education

Science, technology, engineering and math (STEM) open up great opportunities for young
people so we've decided to fund 16 great programs in this area. These include
Boston-based Citizen Schools and Generating Genius in the U.K, both of which work to
help to expand the horizons of underprivileged youngsters. In total, our grants will provide
enhanced STEM education for more than 3 million students.

In addition, we're supporting girls’ education in the developing world. By giving girls an
education, you not only improve her opportunities, but that of her whole family. The
African Leadership Academy provides merit scholarships to promising young women
across the continent, and the Afghan Institute of Learning offers literacy classes to
women and girls in rural Afghanistan. Groups like these will use our funds to educate
more than 10,000 girls in developing countries.

Empowerment through technology

We've all been wowed by the entrepreneurial spirit behind the 15 awards in this category,
all of whom are using the web and open source programming to connect communities and
improve access to information. Vittana, for instance, helps lenders offer loans to students
in the developing world who have have a 99 percent repayment rate--potentially doubling
or tripling a recipient's earning power. Code for America enables the web industry to share
its skills with the public sector by developing projects that improve transparency and
encourage civic engagement on a mass scale. And Switchboard is working with local
mobile providers to help African health care workers create networks and communicate
for free.

To learn more about these organizations and how you can get involved, visit our Google
Gives Back 2011 site and take a look at this video:

These grants, which total $40 million, are only part of our annual philanthropic efforts.
Over the course of the year, Google provided more than $115 million in funding to various
nonprofit organizations and academic institutions around the world; our in-kind support
(programs like Google Grants and Google Apps for Education that offer free products and
services to eligible organizations) came to more than $1 billion, and our annual
company-wide GoogleServe event and related programs enabled individual Googlers to
donate more than 40,000 hours of their own volunteer time.

As 2011 draws to a close, I’m inspired by this year’s grantees and look forward to seeing
their world-changing work in 2012.

Posted by Shona Brown, SVP Google.org

Jagriti Yatra 2011 - Awakening the Entrepreneurial spirit

2011-12-12T15:29:00.000+05:30

Yatra means “journey” in Sanskrit. It is a journey one takes to achieve a higher cause or spread a message. Jagriti Yatra is a journey of awakening, a journey where young entrepreneurs awaken to issues and challenges of Middle India (smaller cities and villages) and seek solutions to the same. Conducted by Jagriti Sewa Sansthan a non profit, Jagriti Yatra consists of 8,500 kilometer long annual train journey of 15 days traversing cities and villages across India. The Yatra starts in Mumbai on December 25th 2011 and ends on January 8th 2012. During the Yatra, selected young budding entrepreneurs from Middle India will get mentored and trained by role models who themselves have been successful entrepreneurs. At Google entrepreneurial behavior is highly desired and encouraged and has been the foundation of many products and successes. And Google is very happy to associate with this unique initiative.

India is going through an exciting phase and the enormous economic growth in the cities now needs to trickle down to the interiors of India. Jagriti’s mission of awakening the spirit of enterprise in India’s youth can go a long way in addressing Middle India’s challenges and problems. Jagriti’s focus on solving problems in the areas of Healthcare, Agro-bussiness, Water, Energy are very relevant and urgent.

Jagriti will use Google’s platforms like YouTube to bring the experience of the 15 day train journey, to millions of others by creating a dedicated channel On YouTube www.youtube.com/jagriti. Jagriti Yatra will also use Google SMS Channel and Google+ to continuously disseminate information about the Yatra. Google will also extend its support by facilitating internet connectivity to the train through wi-fi.

We are excited to participate in an event that can have significant impact on the country for many years to come. Previous Yatras have led to the creation of 130 enterprises. We are eagerly waiting to see what exciting ideas and enterprises come out of this year’s Yatra. I hope you are as excited about the Yatra as we are. Please spread the message, share the link and add it to your status message. We are waiting to get on the train and experience the Yatra first hand.

For Yatra updates, including registration for the journey log on to http://www.jagritiyatra.com/

Posted by Adhi Kesarla, Principal, New Business Development, India
Kushagra Shrivastava, Associate Product Marketing Manager

Virender Sehwag Live and Exclusive on Google+, Today @2:30PM

2011-12-12T13:42:00.000+05:30

Virender Sehwag will be hanging out today 2.30 PM IST on Google+ to thank his fans for their overwhelming support and wishes on his glorious double century. Sehwag shared his double ton celebration and posted an exclusive video on his Google+ profile earlier.

Sehwag along with Dhoni, Gambhir and other top cricketers of India have found a whole new way to interact with their fans through Google+. In fact Dhoni shared his circle of cricketers making it easier for them to connect with all their favourite stars at one go! Go ahead and add that circle to yours and stay connected with the entire cricket team at one go!

Check out the posts between the cricket stars, candid conversations with their fans, and their plan before the big Australian Tour on the 26th of December. Fans can add all the top cricketers to their circles; Harbhajan, Ishant Sharma, Sreesanth, Murali Kartik, Amit Mishra, Manoj Tiwary, Umesh Yadav, Iqbal Abdullah, Sudeep Tyagi, Ashoke Dinda, Varun Aaron, Sarbjeet Ladda and RP Singh.

Don’t forget to add Sehwag to your circle and be ready for a face to face chat with Nawab of Najafgarh.

Posted by Guneet Singh, Lead Consumer Marketing.

Google Internet Bus Enters West Bengal

2011-12-05T11:06:00.000+05:30

While Kolkata has 30 lakh Internet users, the rest of West Bengal is predominantly offline. Out of all the Internet users across India more than 60% hail from non-metro cities and small towns.

After a very successful run in Bihar where close to 10 lakh people visited the Internet Bus, we are now entering the Bengali heartland. The bus will visit Kolkata, Durgapur, Asansol, Kharagpur, Uluberia, Chandannagar, Behrampore, Haldia, Bankura & Puruliya during its two month long stay in West Bengal.

The project has enjoyed success and interest among the people of 11 states, covering more than 2500 locations and touching the lives of more than 65,00,000 Indians across 130 towns. Surveys have indicated that more than 20,00,000 people have gone online for the first time after visiting the Google Internet Bus.

The bus will showcase informative content in English, Hindi and Bengali in addition to the basic familiarization on using services like search, email, social networking and online maps. The bus will also showcase how Internet services can be used on a mobile device. We will also continue to engage cyber café owners and school teachers with an aim to build local advocacy for this powerful medium.

Users across India can follow the bus through its journey, see pictures & videos,
and join online communities by simply visiting http://www.google.co.in/internetbus

Posted by Nishant Nair, Program Manager, Google India

Get more into what you love on YouTube with our new look

2011-12-02T13:23:00.001+05:30

(Cross-posted from the YouTube Blog )

From your favorite sports highlights and dance competitions to make-up tutorials, science experiments and great movies, there’s a ton of great stuff on YouTube — over three billion views worth per day by last count. More and more, behind every great video is a great Channel, and with our announcement last month that more of them are coming to YouTube, we want to make it easier for you to find and keep tabs of what you want to watch.

So, today we're introducing a new homepage, Channel design and a fresh coat of digital paint. Here are three ways these updates will improve your life on YouTube:

1. A new homepage
The YouTube homepage is your gateway to a vast entertainment universe. To help you get more into YouTube, we’re making it easier to find and follow great Channels when you arrive. On the left side of the homepage you can create your own, personal, customizable YouTube Channel line-up. Sign-in, or create a YouTube account. Then you can browse recommended Channels; customize your homepage’s feed; even link your YouTube account to Google+ and Facebook to see what your friends are sharing. The new homepage feed we launched earlier this year is now front and center on the homepage. You can switch between feeds by clicking on different Channels on the left.

For step by step instructions on using the new YouTube homepage, you can go to our help center.

2. Simpler, customizable Channels
Given the homepage’s new focus on helping you find and organize your favorite Channels, we would be remiss if we didn’t update the look and feel of the Channels themselves. Today we're launching an improved Channel design focused on what matters most: helping users find great videos. As different uploaders have different goals, we've created new Channel templates to meet your needs whether you produce one video a week or have thousands of videos for a fan to browse. Some partners have even uploaded videos talking about the features, or giving tips on how they’re taking advantage of the new design. To learn how to opt-in to and test this new Channel design, check out our help center.

3. A new overall design
To bring the new homepage and Channels designs together we’ve also applied a fresh coat of digital paint across the whole site. In July, we unveiled an experimental design called Cosmic Panda. We’ve used your feedback to improve our overall design, and today, we’re presenting a cleaner and simpler YouTube, with a consistent gray background, bigger video thumbnails and a more streamlined watch page.

Ready to get started? Your new YouTube is already shipped and waiting for you at YouTube.com, and like every new toy, we included an instruction manual (and video) to help.

Our recent Channels expansion, our grants and educational programs, and this new design are all focused on helping you discover a broader range of entertainment on YouTube. We’re always innovating and testing new stuff out to make the experience the best it can be for you. We rely on your feedback to figure out when we've gotten it right and when it needs further tweaks. So let us know what you think.

The YouTube team

Navi Mumbai, Thane and Kalyan bus services board Google Transit

2011-11-22T09:53:00.005+05:30

Rapidly growing Indian cities have transformed into large urban spreads that include city outgrowths and nearby towns. At the heart of all this urban expansion is the transport infrastructure that allows people and goods to move across. City commute has increasingly become complex as people travel longer and use services of multiple agencies to reach their destination. For example, someone living in Kalyan and planning to go to Thane would use services of KDMT (home to kalyan station), CR (kalyan station to thane station) and TMT (thane station to destination). Few tools and information sources are today available to address this complexity of city commute.

We are happy to announce that with the launch of NMMT (Navi Mumbai Municipal Transport), KDMT (Kalyan Dombivali Municipal Transport) and TMT (Thane Municipal Transport), Google Transit will offer one click solution for planning city commute in Mumbai. These launches along with already launched data for BEST, CR and WR will help commuters and tourists find their way seamlessly around the Mumbai metropolitan region using both trains and buses. Below is one example that demonstrates the ability of Google Transit (available both on desktop and mobile) to combine the schedule data from multiple agencies to create a travel plan for a commuter.

Above are the possible itineraries for a commuter planning to go from Rambaugh, Kalyan to Manpada, Thane. The first suggested trip plan involves taking Bus No 16 (run by KDMT), Local Train (run by Central Railway) and Bus No 62 (Run by TMT).

So next time when you want to plan your trip whether from Lokhandwala Complex, Andheri to Godbunder Rd Thane or from Pali Hill, Bandra to Sector 8, Vashi, adopt an environment friendly way to commute by using bus or trains.

Posted by Kapil Goswami, Business Development, Google India

YouTube Space Lab team is coming to your school

2011-11-15T12:02:00.003+05:30

How many of you think that your experiment has what it takes to be conducted 250 miles above the earth for the world to see! Well, space is more exciting and accessible for us here more than ever before. YouTube Space Lab with Lenovo, in cooperation with Space Adventures, National Aeronautics and Space Administration (NASA), the European Space Agency (ESA), and the Japan Aerospace Exploration Agency (JAXA) is a new galactic channel on YouTube that will lift off from your laptop, taking you to interesting and awesome videos from around the world... and beyond.

And to make it easier for you to be a part of this exciting project, YouTube Space Lab team will be visiting more than 10,000 Schools across India inviting entries from those who dare to dream big. Check out for more details on your School notice board or watch out for YouTube team as it visits your School.

YouTube Space Lab is an open competition inviting 14 - 18 year olds to come up with an idea for a science experiment that will be carried out by NASA astronauts aboard the International Space Station (ISS), 250 miles into space and live streamed to classrooms and people around the world on YouTube. You don't have to actually do the experiment; you just have to record your self explaining it.

The last date for submitting entries is 7th December 2011. The YouTube community and a panel of distinguished scientists, astronauts and expert judges, including Professor Stephen Hawking, will pick the best ones. If you're crowned global winner, fantastic, the whole world will get to see your idea on YouTube.

We'll also throw in some out-of-this-world prizes for the winners: like ZERO-G flights, Lenovo IdeaPad laptops and your choice of either a trip to Tanegashima Island, Japan, to watch your experiment blast off in a rocket bound for the ISS, or—once you’re 18—a one-of-a-kind astronaut training experience in Star City, Russia, the training center for Russian cosmonauts. For more information on how to enter, including eligibility requirements and experiment guidelines, check out the competition page on the channel or the official rules.

Blast off now and be part of a global experiment where your teacher is an astronaut and your classroom, space!

Posted by Varun Kabra, Marketing Manager, YouTube

Google+ Pages get going in India too!

2011-11-10T10:25:00.004+05:30

Google+ Pages, have received a tremendous response worldwide within 48 hours of launch.

Whether its Pepsi, Toyota, Burberry, Save the Children or The Muppets. Brands are leveraging the power of the Google+ platform to engage with their fans in fun ways - it could be the animated images on the Burberry page, the hangout by The Muppets or the season’s latest Versace fashion collection from H&M!

Google+ Pages launched simultaneously In India too, and there is a rapidly growing set of brands who have already made a Google+ Page to connect with their fans.

Whether its top consumer brands from Unilever India - Axe Angels Club, Pepsodent, Close up, Friends of Sure; India’s leading car manufacturer Maruti Suzuki, e-retailers like FashionAndYou - all are quickly connecting with their fans on Google+ in unique ways.

And entertainment organizations are equally active TV Channels like IBNLive, Zoom TV or TechGuru, music labels like Sony Music India and India’s coolest music festival Sunburn. Infact you can even find the ‘dhoodana namunkin hai’ Don2 - Bollywood’s first movie on Google+.

Any organization can make a Google+ page at plus.google.com/pages/create. Stay tuned for much more fun stuff on Google+.

Posted by Guneet Singh, Lead Consumer Marketing

Translate more Indic languages with the updated Google Translate for iPhone app

2011-11-10T10:24:00.000+05:30

[Cross Posted from the Google Translate Blog]

Back in June, we launched five new experimental Indic languages for Google Translate on the desktop and mobile web app. Today, we’ve updated the Google Translate for iPhone app to add these new alpha languages: Bengali, Gujarati, Kannada, Tamil and Telugu. This brings the total number of languages supported by the app to 63 languages.

The updated app supports the ability to view dictionary results for single words and to display romanizations for these new Indic languages. So even if you can't read the script the words are written in, you can still take a shot at reading the translation.

Since these are still experimental alpha languages, you can expect translations be less fluent and include many more untranslated words than some of our more mature languages—like Spanish or Chinese—which have much more parallel data to power our statistical machine translation approach. Despite these challenges, we believe users will find these new languages helpful and we're excited to be making them available through the Translate app.

Google Translate for iPhone now supports text translation among 63 languages, voice input in 17 of those languages, and text-to-speech in 24 of them. Get the latest version of the Google Translate for iPhone app from the App Store now and start breaking down language barriers wherever you are!

Posted by Jeff Chin, Product Manager, Google Translate

“Indian Musical Instruments” doodle will mark Google India homepage on Children’s Day

2011-11-09T13:43:00.003+05:30

With more than 1.5 lakh entries and over a lakh online votes, the anticipation has been building in this year’s Doodle4Google competition. Today, the wait is finally over as India gets its third Doodle4Google winner—7-year-old Varsha Gupta of Greater Noida is the national winner with her imaginative doodle, entitled “Indian Musical Instruments”

Varsha Gupta, who attends Ryan International School, Greater Noida, submitted her design around this year’s theme, ‘India’s gift to the world’. Varsha Gupta’s doodle of the Google logo artfully depicts how India is a land of different cultures and music plays an important role in it. The doodle artfully represents many musical instruments that India has introduced to the to the world- Tabla, Sarod, Veena and Shehnai. The Doodle team and Jennifer Hom – the creative force behind the legendary Gandhi birth anniversary doodle, chose the winning doodle for India.

Varsha Gupta’s artistic merit, creativity, and expression of the theme has won her a technology starter package that includes a laptop, a year’s Internet connection and a Rs.2,00,000 technology grant for her school. Her doodle will also be featured on the Google India homepage on 14th November 2011 to mark the occasion of Children’s day in the country.

We are overwhelmed to see great participation from young children and schools year-on-year since 2009. The designs for this year’s theme “India’s Gift to the world” were incredibly creative across all grade groups. In addition to selecting Varsha Gupta as the national winner, more than 1 million public votes helped us determine the three group winners, each of which will receive a Technology Starter package.

Grades 1-3: Shibajyoti Choudhury (Group I) from Jamshedpur won the group prize for his doodle titled ‘Developing excellent India and World’
Grades 4-6: Abhinav R. (Group II) from Coimbatore won the prize for his doodle titled ‘India’s contribution to the world - Tradition’.
Grades 7-10: Nishi Bordia (Group III) from Indore won the prize for her doodle titled ‘India’s gift to the world - India itself’.

As part of today’s announcement at an event organized in the capital, all 45 regional finalists enjoyed on-ground activities and interacted with Rajan Anandan, MD & VP, Google India, Jennifer Hom, part of the Mountain View Doodle Squad.

Big thanks to all of you who voted and helped us select this year's winners. More importantly, we thank all the students who submitted entries this year and our partner schools & guest judges who helped us in the difficult task of selecting the winning doodles from among the amazing entries this year. Keep on doodling and we’ll see you next year!

Posted by Robin Joseph, Consumer Marketing

Over 1,500 Movies from Across India now at YouTube.com/movies

2011-11-03T16:49:00.008+05:30

India is not just the world’s largest producer of motion pictures, but most likely has the world’s largest population of cinephiles. That means it’s tough to satisfy the insatiable Indian demand for films — but we have accepted the challenge.

Over the last year, we’ve worked to bring together over 1,500 Indian films on YouTube, available free of charge. And with so many titles, we thought it was time to give the youtube.com/movies page a brand new look. (For those outside of India who want to access our Indian films, go to http://www.youtube.com/movies/indian-cinema or alternatively, http://www.youtube.com/movies/bollywood.)

This renovated Movies page not only brings together the site’s Bollywood and Indic films into one convenient place but breaks down films by genre, spotlights new and interesting films, and gives you a Top 10 list of recent favorites. If you’re looking for a comedy this weekend, just scroll down to the Comedy section and check out Golmaal or Andaz Apna Apna.

Beyond Bollywood, the page also offers top Telugu hits like Pokiri and Kick, as well as Tamil films Kanchivaram and Baashha. You can watch movies in the language of your choice by selecting their preferred language in the top-right hand of the page.

Going forward we want YouTube to be the most convenient place for your film needs — whether that be watching old classics like Gumrah, Anand and Abhimaan, checking out trailers for upcoming releases like Don 2, Rockstar, and Desi Boyz, or viewing behind-the-scene footage for the films you love such as Swades, Band Baaja Baaraat, or the Making of a blockbuster song.

Posted by Manan Singhi, Strategic Partner Manager, YouTube

Google offers free websites to Indian SMBs - Introduces ‘India Get Your Business Online’ program

2011-11-02T11:31:00.000+05:30

Today Google India is announcing ‘India Get Your Business Online’, a first-of-its kind program to offer free websites, domain & hosting services to small medium businesses in India. Designed with local partners, the program provides Indian businesses the tools and resources to establish a website, find new customers, and grow their businesses.

The initiative aims to break down the barriers that stop small businesses from getting online - by offering a quick, easy and free tool to set up and host a website. Our goal is to help 500,000 small medium businesses in India to get online in next three years through this program, with our partner HostGator. Small business owners in India can logon to www.indiagetonline.in and use the tool to get a free, easy-to-build website and web hosting for one year powered by HostGator. Businesses will also get a customized domain .in name and free tools, training and resources to succeed online.

While India is home to an estimated 8 million small medium businesses, only about 5% have a website. This program is designed to bridge the information gap that exists online due to the lack of presence of local Indian businesses on the Internet. Businesses often believe that getting online is too complex, costly and time-consuming; this perception prevents many SMBs from taking the first step towards building an online presence. Google India and HostGator plan to change that through this initiative. In addition, HostGator will also offer free support in creating, hosting and managing the website for a period of one year without any cost through its toll free call centers 1800-266-3000.

So what do Indian businesses get:

Free: It’s free to set up your website. The domain is free for 1 year, and it’s free to maintain your website for 12 months.
Quick: The website tool takes 15 minutes from sitting down to being found online
Easy: You don’t need to be a tech whiz to get started. All you need to start is your address, phone number, TAN/CIN or PAN to verify you as a business
The website is simple because customers are looking for simple information online
Gives you your own .in domain
Other features include photos/logos, integration with social media platforms
You get a Google Apps account - free personalised email ids
If you want to make your website work harder, you’ll have access to steady stream of free tips and tools from the Getting Indian Business Online team and a free coupon of worth Rs. 2500 INR advertising trial from Google AdWords to help promote your site.
After the first year, SMBs can choose to pay a monthly pay-as-you-go to maintain their website using hostgator.
At the end of the first year, they’ll have to pay a nominal charge if they wish to renew their domain name. They can cancel their website at any time.

India get your business online program is also supported by Federation of Micro, Small and Medium Enterprises (MSMEs), popularly known as FISME. FISME, the non-profit organisation will work with Google India to help SMBs get online through direct customer outreach and events.

So what are you waiting for, just log on to www.indiagetonline.in and create your website in 15 minutes.

Posted By Rajan Anandan, MD & Vice President, Sales & Operations, Google India

Vote for your favorite Google Doodle

2011-11-01T08:56:00.000+05:30

You have seen a number of doodles grace the Google India homepage, here’s your chance to choose the next one. Take your pick from each of the three grade categories for the third Doodle4Google competition, as they open for online public voting on www.google.co.in/doodle4google. After a panel of eminent judges from the art and media fraternity selected these 45 finalists, we leave it open for you to decide your favorite doodles. The experience this year has been phenomenal as we received over 1.5 lakh entries from across the country with over 350 schools participating in the competition.

Various artists and culture institutes which include- Nirmala Niketan Polytechnic, National Institute Of Fine Arts, Karnataka Chitrakala Parishad, Aakriti Art Gallery, Srusti Art Institute, Gayathri Art Galore, CANMAS (Contemporary And New Media Art School), Nasik's Kala Niketans-Chitrakala Mahavidyalya, Government Fine Art Institute – Indore, Sky Blue Institute Of Design, Bhavya Art & Craft College, Lalit Kalakshetra- helped in selecting the quarter finalists from which the JJ school of Arts, Mumbai helped in the final shortlisting which further went through the renowned panel of judges.

Nandita Das, Prasoon Joshi and Ganga Kadakia helped select the 45 finalists; Dennis Hwang (the original Google Doodler) and team who will be selecting the final winner whose doodle will go live on Google India’s Homepage on 14th November 2011.

Final winner for the Doodle4Google competition will be announced on 9th November 2011 in New Delhi and the winning doodle will go live on the Google India homepage to mark Children’s Day on 14th November.

Vote here: www.google.co.in/doodle4google
Voting open only till 4th November 2011.

Posted by Robin Joseph, Associate Product Marketing Manager

Narain Karthikeyan joins the fast growing Google+ on the day F1 comes to India!

2011-10-28T21:48:00.003+05:30

On the eve of the first Indian Grand Prix, F1 passion has reached its zenith in India. Motorsport fans are trying to get their hands on coveted tickets, searching online for the latest news, and the whole nation is waiting with baited breath for the flag off.

In the midst of all this euphoria, Narain Karthikeyan the first Indian ever to compete in the coveted Formula 1 championships, the only Indian driver racing on the circuit, has now also become the first Indian motor sportsperson to join Google+.

Narain has personified F1 in India and will be providing his fans an insider’s view to the Indian Grand Prix on his Google+ profile. He charted into the unknown territory of F1 at a time when this sport was not popular in India and has been promoting it ever since. On Google+, F1 fans can expect Narain to give sneak peeks on the first ever F1 track in India, the garages, pits and also regular updates with behind the scene news, practice sessions, pictures and videos.

With his recent display of speed and breaks at the Hispanian circuit, all eyes are set to watch him perform in front of the home crowd. Just add Narain to your Google+ circle for the thrills, the adrenaline rush, the madness and the fear of racing in F1, and don’t forget to send across your best wishes, as he makes us all proud.

Posted by Guneet Singh - Lead, Consumer Marketing

Are you the next big chef or trainer on YouTube?

2011-10-24T13:34:00.003+05:30

(Cross-posted from the YouTube Blog )

Since launching the first YouTube NextUp, we’ve been working to supercharge the careers of partners from around the world, and now we’re expanding the program even further. Today we’re kicking off two new YouTube Next Creator Programs to highlight the stars of tomorrow on YouTube today: YouTube Next Chef and YouTube Next Trainer.

Each program will have sixteen participants who take part in a three month virtual class held on Google+ Hangouts. Our chefs and trainers will each receive an equipment kit worth more than $5,000, mentoring from industry leaders, filming and editing lessons and more than $10,000 worth of promotion on YouTube. Here’s more info on each and an introduction from our hosts.

YouTube Next Chef
Crafty in the kitchen? Love sharing your family’s recipes with the world? With YouTube Next Chef, you could be selected to learn filmmaking tailored to cooking videos. Shea Hess of Hungry in Brooklyn will be your host.

YouTube Next Trainer
Personal health comes in many forms, and we’re interested in your unique approach. From yoga to 100-yard sprints, this program will help you develop filmmaking talents specifically for fitness videos. Sarah Dussalt ofSarahsFabChannel will be your host.

How to apply
Starting today through October 25, partners from Australia, Canada, India, Ireland, New Zealand, South Africa, the United Kingdom and the United States can apply at youtube.com/NextChef and youtube.com/NextTrainer, which also includes all rules and details.

We’ll be back on November 9 to introduce you to the selected chefs and trainers, as we keep working on ways to help YouTube Partners turn their passion into their career.

Austin Lau, YouTube Creator Programs, recently watched, “How To Peel a Head of Garlic in Less Than 10 Seconds.”

Shah Rukh Khan to meet fans on a Google+ Hangout on October 20, 2011

2011-10-20T09:56:00.003+05:30

The best way to interact with people is face to face as text & voice can never convey the rich emotions of the human face.

Google+ stems from the concept of real-life interactions, brought to the web. And to make your interactions as spontaneous and direct as possible, Google+ has Hangouts where you can get on to a multi-person video chat with a number of your friends. So even if you can’t walk up to them, get on a hangout for a face-to-face-to-face chat in real time from anywhere.

And now hangouts are enabling different form of connections. How often is it possible for a fan to come face to face with their favourite star and enjoy a live conversation? Well later today it will be possible with none other than the Bollywood Baadshah himself - Shah Rukh Khan. The man of many firsts, Shah Rukh Khan is the first ever movie superstar globally to connect with his fans on a Google+ hangout.

To join the hangout, go to Google+, search for Shah Rukh Khan on Google+ and add him to your circles. You’ll get a notification in your stream, as soon as Shah Rukh is Live! Nine fans can join Shah Rukh Khan in every hangout, and everyone else will be able to see the video chat live on his Google+ profile! Shah Rukh Khan will host multiple hangouts to meet as many of his fans as he can.

Check your hair and make sure your mic works. And login to Google+ at 1500 (IST, UTC +5:30), its time to Hangout with Shah Rukh Khan!

Posted by Guneet Singh Lead, Consumer Marketing

YouTube Box Office to host Shah Rukh Khan Film Festival

2011-10-12T12:38:00.000+05:30

Enjoy mega blockbuster movies of Shah Rukh Khan all month long for free

With all the action surrounding Shah Rukh Khan and Ra.One on YouTube, we decided to line up a treat for all his fans with a month long film festival dedicated to the super star. YouTube Box Office (www.youtube.com/boxoffice), the special destination for all movie buffs in India, will host five mega blockbuster movies of Shah Rukh Khan absolutely free. Starting with the mega hit Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge, YouTube Box office will host a new movie every friday. The festival will showcase super hit movies like Chak De India, Kal Ho Na Ho, Om Shanti Om and Kuch Kuch Hota hai.

Four months into its launch, the Intel sponsored YouTube Box Office channel continues to be popular with our users and has already garnered over 15 million views in India making it the #19 most subscribed (all time) channel in India. The channel is available to all Indian users absolutely free and users based in India can enjoy the movies by directly streaming it online. We are grateful to all our partners who continue to embrace the YouTube platform and offer our users, the most entertaining and premium content available on the web.

Apart from featuring full-length movies, the channel also engages users with movie trivia and contests. Users can also choose to watch movies from YouTube movie catalogues which offers over 1500 movie titles including over 400 titles from regional movies in languages such as Gujarati, Marathi, Telugu, Tamil and Bengali.

Now playing:

Dilwale Dulhania Le Jayenge A romantic comedy, the film marked the directorial debut of Aditya Chopra, and stars Shahrukh Khan and Kajol. All Time Blockbuster and remains the longest-running film in the history of Indian cinema. Kajol plays a young girl from India, brought up in London who falls in love with Raj, played by Shah Rukh Khan, much against her father’s wishes.

Catch the excitement on http://www.youtube.com/boxoffice

Posted by Amit Agrawal Head Content Partnerships YouTube - India.

King Khan becomes the first verified celeb on Google +

2011-10-04T09:17:00.001+05:30

We all know how easy it is to impersonate a celebrity across various social platforms today. It’s not uncommon to view fake profiles of our favorite celebrities online or even bump into these numerous simulated profiles before we reach the authentic one. Very frequently, we end up following or liking celeb profiles only to realize later that it was an incorrect one.

Google+ stems from the concept of real-life sharing, brought to the web. And to ensure that you connect with a real celebrity, a simple identification process with the Google Team allows celebs to have a web presence that is real. This simple verification process, places a small "verified profile" flag in front of the name.

Globally a number of key celebrities on Google+ have verified profiles, including Britney Spears, Ashton Kutcher and Paris Hilton. Needless to mention their fan base is only increasing by the day while helping them manage friends, fans and family using the concept of circles on one social platform. Not to forget, keeping privacy intact.

The growing popularity of Google+ in India has encouraged us to keep fake profiles away from Google+. And now, in order to give our users the best experience of this platform, Shah Rukh Khan is the first verified Indian celeb on Google+. Infact over the last 2 weeks, the team has reactively removed many fake Shah Rukh profiles.

An interesting fact is that, out of the 4Mn monthly SRK search queries on Google worldwide, more than 1Mn searches happen from countries like Germany, Finland, Malaysia and other Middle East nations. Therefore, being the 1st verified celebrity on Google+, allows the superstar to connect with his fans in India and worldwide. Stay tuned in as more stars from India, get onboard the fast growing Google + social network.

Posted by Guneet Singh, Lead Consumer Marketing

YouTube doubles the movie treat on YouTube Box Office

2011-09-20T13:00:00.000+05:30

Now enjoy two new Bollywood movies every month on YouTube Box Office for free

Movies of the month - ‘Shaitan’ & ‘Pyaar Ka Punchnama’

You asked for it and we have got it. Starting this month, YouTube will feature two new blockbuster movies every month for free on its YouTube Box Office channel (www.youtube.com/boxoffice) for users in India. After the overwhelming response to Band Baaja Baaraat, 3 idiots and Bheja fry 2, YouTube has lined up a special treat for the month of September - featuring the latest edgy entertainer from Anurag Kashyap & Binoy Nambiar - ‘Shaitan’ and the hilarious anti rom-com ‘Pyaar Ka Punchnama’. Shaitan is making its online debut first on YouTube even before its television premiere.

Launched three months back, the Intel sponsored YouTube Box Office channel has already got over 11.5 million views in India and is the #20 most subscribed (all time) channel in India. Apart from featuring full length movies, the channel also engages users with movie trivia and contests. Users can also choose to watch movies from YouTube movie catalogues which offers over 1500 movie titles including over 400 titles from regional movies in languages such as Gujarati, Marathi, Telugu, Tamil and Bengali.

Now playing:
Shaitan - the gritty crime drama sees Kalki Koechlin play a disturbed teenager who joins a group of rich young friends who get into a mess after a road accident, leading to a seething cauldron of crime and violence.

Catch the excitement on www.youtube.com/boxoffice

Posted by Amit Agrawal, Head of YouTube Content Partnerships, India